LONDON (Parliament Politics Magazine): Meetings: for some the moment to make decisions, for others the ultimate form of wasting time. But are meetings really necessary? And what if we met less? Would we be more productive then?
Company culture
Meetings are part of the corporate culture, although not everyone is equally enthusiastic about them because they are too long (windy), too superficial, too exhausting, and too often a repeat episode of the previous meeting.
Nevertheless, a meeting does have an important function: a fruitful meeting is the one that exercises brainstorming, updating, evaluation and information exchange to reach a decision.
More but less long
The corona crisis has turned the labor market upside down and the meeting culture was also forced to adapt to the new reality: online meetings turned out to have many advantages and now seems to have really become well established.
Those hoping for a sharp reduction in the number of meetings are in the win: Research from Harvard Business School found that during the pandemic, employees had just 13% more meetings even though the average online meeting lasted 20% less.
However, this higher number of online meetings and frequent virtual contacts with colleagues leads to Zoom fatigue for many employees. Conclusion: less productivity. So the most logical solution is to meet less or not?
Less is more?
By allowing your workday to be interrupted less by online meetings, you can fully focus on your workload. This can increase productivity, provided you don’t waste time answering the extra emails with urgent questions that now arrive in your mailbox.
An efficient meeting on time might not be so bad after all.
Quality over quantity
In an ideal working environment, the number of meetings is examined and only those meetings that are really necessary remain. Many user-friendly online tools and platforms can also be used to share information or to keep abreast of current projects.
Recording a meeting-free day can also ensure that you can work on a project or task completely undisturbed on at least that one day. In addition, important meetings can easily be bundled into a meeting block with short, targeted meetings that you as an employee can optimally prepare for.
Result: fewer work interruptions and more productivity.
