Meetings. Meetings. Meetings. Does going to too many meetings take away from the amount of time you have to get things done? Do you ever wonder if you really need to have so many meetings?
The answer to that is Yes, Maybe, and sometimes No. It is estimated that there are over 11 million meetings held in the United States every day. Some meetings are out of results and some are out of habit.
There are some advantages to having meetings. Having a meeting will allow for discussion, sharing of conflictive opinions and suggestions on how to solve problems. Having meetings is much more personal than email or text messaging, and can enhance team building and cohesiveness. They can also allow for two-way communication with the benefit of immediate feedback and the richness of nonverbal communication.
Having meetings allows the person who called the meeting to find out immediately whether the message is understood and how it’s being interpreted and received. And, all listeners receive the same information at the same time without delay or any organizational factors having distracting impact.
So, have meetings for results. Don’t just have meetings out of habit. Meetings are expensive (the direct cost of payroll of people attending, the indirect cost of decisions and actions not being taken while people are sitting in the meetings). It’s okay to have a meeting, just make sure they’re worth it.
To learn more on effective meetings, watch Kit Welchlin’s presentation here. Check back in next week for another video blog.