[MTC Global] FHow to make meetings more productive

Yes. Meetings It's not your fault.

Meetings are useful, and a waste of time. Useful for people who don't work much, because meetings enable them to 'show their busyness'. For many, participating in meetings is the equivalent of walking around carrying a bunch of papers. They appear busy while in reality, they're doing nothing. But people who enjoy being productive and doing focused work dread meetings more than taking a day off.

Meetings are the biggest wastes of time, money and attention, according to Jason Fried. Also they are

"an addictive, highly self indulgent activity that corporations and other organizations habitually engage in only because they cannot actually masturbate." 

Not my words. These are words of Pulitzer Prize-winning American humorist Dave Barry.

Alright, let's get down to the calculations and specifics.

How Meetings Waste Resources

There's no such thing as a one-hour meeting - Jason Fried 

A one-hour meeting for you is never the same for an organization. The total time spent in a meeting equals the total number of people attending, multiplied by the time spent by each person in the meeting. So a 1-hour meeting attended by 6 people is a 6-hour meeting. Even a 30-minute meeting attended by 10 people is a 5-hour meeting.

Thus, five productive hours of a team are wasted. Multiply this by the number of meetings held in an organization each day. You'll find that they lose over 100 man hours each week. Imagine what businesses could achieve if they got these 5200 additional man hours each year!

Calculate the hourly rates of people attending, and the picture worsens. Add in attention diverted (considering it takes up to 23 minutes to refocus on our tasks after being distracted), and expenses escalate further.

"How would you feel if you had to regularly spend $1200 so you could 'tell a few teammates something'," Fried asks. Add to that the amount of productive time lost for employees, and you'll see why many people believe that they cannot get work done at work.

Few organizations can function without meetings. As much as we hate them, we need them. Utilized effectively, meetings can improve communication, help us adhere to deadlines and make organizations more productive. So how can you use meetings to make yourself and your organization 10x more productive?

Steal From Apple and Amazon

Steal anything from Amazon or Apple and you'll be slapped with infringements and lawsuits faster than people get distracted. But you can steal their best practices for meetings. And the best part? They can't do a damn thing about it.

Here are 4 amazing, yet easy-to-use, practices which Jobs and Bezos implemented, and which you can follow too:

1. Keep 'Em Lean

Once, Steve Jobs was about to start a weekly meeting with Apple's ad agency, when he spotted someone new in the room.

"Who are you?" he asked, pointing at her. Calmly, Lorrie explained that she was asked to join the meeting because she was part of related marketing projects.

Jobs heard her out and then politely said, "I don't think we need you in this meeting, Lorrie. Thanks."

Keep your meetings as lean as possible. Involve few people, so that you can keep them short and reach resolutions quickly. Too many cooks spoil the broth.

The next logical question is, how does one know whom to involve in meetings.

2. Invite Responsible People

'Responsible' here doesn't imply capable and trustworthy. Of course, all your team members should be capable and trustworthy. But here, 'responsible' means more.

Fortune Magazine columnist Adam Lashinskyshed light on one of Apple's corporate innovations - The Directly Responsible Individual (DRI).

There was never a confusion [at Apple] about who was responsible for what, Lashinsky explained. Often, the DRI's name would appear on the agenda for a meeting, so that everyone knew who was responsible. "Any effective meeting at Apple will have an action list," a former employee said. "Next to each action item will be the DRI." A common phrase heard around Apple when someone was trying to connect with the right contact on a project was "Who's the DRI on that?"

Gloria Lin moved from Apple to Flipboard, and carried the DRI concept with her. The process is hugely effective, she explained. "When you feel like something is your baby, then you really, really care about how it's doing.".

Include only DRI's in a meeting - people who are directly involved in the project's development. This will keep meetings lean and avoid time wastage. People not needed in the meetings can invest their time to make the organization benefit constructively.

But don't get started with a meeting just yet.

3. Define An Agenda

Most meetings fall flat on their face due to the lack of a well-defined agenda. "Meetings should only be held to make decisions about a predefined situation, not to define the problem," Tim Ferriss wrote in The 4 Hour Work Week.

If you truly want to keep meetings short and productive, send an email to invitees clearly defining the purpose. The purpose should be to achieve a resolution, not define a problem. The latter can be done over email with each member sharing her thoughts after pondering individually.

The agenda-defining e-mail forces people to explain the desired outcome with specificity. 9 times out of 10, the meeting is unnecessary and people can answer the questions over e-mail. Let's go back to the calculation of time and money. Imagine how much of these valuable resources will an activity like this save.

However, if you must organize a meeting, ensure that stakeholders don't hide behind a PowerPoint.

4. No PowerPoint

Steve Jobs hated PowerPoint slides. So does Jeff Bezos. PowerPoint is easy for the presenter, but lets the audience get distracted once they lose interest.

Instead, Amazon staff meetings start with 30 minutes of silently reading a 6-page memo drafted by the presenter. On a traditional presentation, attendees interrupt. But when they read the whole memo, the question they might have on page 2 will mostly get answered in the coming pages.

This serves 3 purposes:

1. It makes the presenter puts forth her ideas clearly. Writing 6 pages forces a presenter to consider various aspects and offer a clear, in-depth analysis.
2. It gives the presenter the satisfaction of seeing her hard work being read.
3. Glossophobia - the fear of public speaking - is not in the picture. Plus, the floor is open for quick and focused discussion, with little space for ambiguity.

Don't try implementing all the above points at once. Too much change makes people uncomfortable. Instead, start small and build from there. Test each technique for 2 weeks and make modifications as you go. Then move to the next technique. Rinse. Repeat.

Soon enough, you will experience smoother flow of communication in your team. This will have a cascading effect on every aspect of your team's functioning. People will use their time better, resolutions will be reached faster, and you will save your company a lot of money. These reasons are good enough to get you started on implementing the above suggestions, right?

What do you do to make meetings more productive? Do leave a comment. I intend on making this list more comprehensive with time, using your suggestions.

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Written by

Vishal KatariaFounder at Aryatra | Helping People Become Productive and Happy