Why Most Meetings Are a Waste And How to Have an Effective One

All of us have complained about meetings at some point in our careers. Some meetings can be useful in solving problems or building team relationships, while others are wasteful and drain our productivity. We can all collectively agree that meetings can be, and should be, improved for a better experience at work. Each day in the U.S. there are at least 36 million meetings that waste about $37 billion in lost productivity. Every time you have a meeting, that's time you aren't spent doing the work you were hired to do. A meeting can be an opportunity cost to a worker or leader. If you choose to go to a meeting, that could mean one less customer visit or presentation you don't have time to create. Executives spend up to 23 hours of their workweek in meetings, which makes sense if, and only if, real decisions are made during them. Otherwise, they are getting paid the most, while not really accomplishing much of anything.

While there are many distractions in the workplace, meetings are almost always the biggest one. In a 2018 Salary.com survey, half of workers cited "too many meetings" as the top time-waster at the office. The reason is because during meetings, workers daydream (91%), do other work that has nothing to do with the meeting (73%), feel overwhelmed by the number of meetings they have to attend (45%), sleep (39%) and respond to emails or texts (31%). In addition, academics from the University of Malmo in Sweden recently discovered that longer meetings provide a form of therapy to participants, an outlet for them to showcase their status, and express frustration and "arouse feelings of meaninglessness". Their big conclusion was that few decisions are actually made during a meeting even though the point of the meeting is to come together to make decisions.

Employees complain that meetings have no result, individuals dominate them, they aren't organized, people don't prepare for them and decisions aren't made. The technology that's meant to streamline meetings is the biggest distraction from effective ones. People who use technology devices and apps during meetings are physically present but not mentally or emotionally. You can't be respectful, attention and contribute to meetings when you're looking at a device trying to please people who aren't even attending. Meetings are so dysfunctional because of the lack of engagement and abundance of distractions. A study by Staples Advantage found that having a lot of meetings decreases employee productivity by 50 percent.

We need to start having purposeful, thoughtful and more efficient meetings to create a better work experience. Here are some tips if you want meetings that people look forward to and that achieve your business objectives:

• Create a pre-planned agenda. As the meeting organizer, have a vision for how you want the meeting to go even before you have it. Almost two-thirds of meetings are conducted without an agenda. On the agenda, break down the length of the meeting into multiple parts with time intervals so that you can accomplish everything in that time, allotting the right amount of time based on priority. This will force you to be thoughtful as to how long your meetings are, set expectations for participants for what will be covered and make them feel like it's worthwhile to attend.
• Have fewer meetings. In the Staples Advantage survey, 32 percent of workers said fewer meetings would result in improve the results of those meetings. Don't just have a meeting as an excuse not to do work, or have a break or because you think you need to have one. Before you set a meeting, be thoughtful about the outcome you're looking for and who needs to be involved so you don't waste anyones precious time.
• Turn off your technology devices. In a study Future Workplace conducted with Poly called "Perils of the Open Office", we found 42 percent of employees said the best way to reduce distractions at work was to put phones away during meetings. You can't give your teammates eye contact if you're looking down at your phone. There's no such thing as multi-tasking, it's scientifically impossible so don't try it! By turning off your phone, you force yourself to be present and listen, so you can actively contribute to the discussion.
• Use a notebook to take handwritten notes. Research shows that if you take notes by hand you'll remember conceptual information longer than if you were to type on a laptop. Plus, by taking handwritten notes during a meeting, it's an excuse not to use any electronics, which will make you focus better, pay attention and remember what your teammates are sharing. Have at least one attendee be responsible for taking notes so they can then type them up and send a follow up email to everyone within 24 hours after the meeting.
• Start and end on time. Everyone is "busy" these days so make sure that attendees know to get there on time with the promise that you will end on time. When you keep to a set schedule, it builds dependability and trust, which will set a precedent for future meetings. If attendees are just coming in at any given time, it disturbs the flow of the meeting and can get it off course.

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