stormbrew

There was a brief discussion on Twitter yesterday about whether meetings are a good thing or a bad thing. The question was raised, by a young and up-and-comer self-taught programmer and university student in what I understand to be one of his first office jobs (in the form of an internship), as to why others dislike meetings so much.

My off the cuff and simple response to this was to point out that he might understand better after he has a bit more experience and has been through more of these meetings. I don’t really like this answer, though, because it reeks of argument from authority. So I’m going to explain a little better, because I’ve found that meetings are often a source of frustration for people doing direct work (as opposed to managerial work), and I’d like to explain why I think that is and how it can be fixed from both sides.

The first, and most important, thing about meetings is that for them to be effective they must (in the words of another responder) have “purpose and progress.”

To expand on that, the “purpose” of all meetings is to inform. Sometimes in a single direction (for example, monthly status meetings from the CEO), sometimes in two directions (similar to status meetings, but with the added expectations of issues being raised from below), and sometimes in every direction (brainstorming).

Progress, essentially, means productivity. People should come out of the meeting feeling as if they have achieved something. This is difficult, since it’s hard for most people to think of being informed as something actually productive.

This much may be obvious. Beyond that, though, it’s important to realize that there is always someone who will find a meeting productive or it would never happen. That one person is usually the one who called the meeting. It is usually also the person in the most supervisory role who is attending the meeting. This person will always come out of the meeting feeling informed about something, whether it was the goal of the meeting or not. This is because their job is to supervise or manage, and management is all about information. Not just the overt statements, but the subtle cues of mood and interactions between their charges.

The problem is that meetings are not always called with the right people or clear enough goals.

I’ll cover the issue of ‘the right people’ first. From the perspective of the supervisor, it is always tempting to be as inclusive as possible because of the perception that that will help bring as much information to them as possible. From the lower positions, it’s always tempting to try to get involved in every meeting possible because of a perception that you might be missing out on something.

In the end, both of these desires can be somewhat self-destructive. They will create the illusion of productivity, since more is being said, but the value of the information being presented is greatly reduced. Consider it this way, though it is a bit of an oversimplification: Every person at a meeting is likely to have 10-15 minutes of potential contribution to that meeting if left unchecked. So, if the meeting is uncoordinated, a meeting of 5 people will take a little under an hour, or of 10 people will take about an hour and a half. If compressed, each person will have to cram information into shorter increments or leave potentially crucial information out.

Leaving information out and focusing on the essentials works really well if the people in the meeting are qualified to make those decisions. 15 minute developer scrums of 3-7 people work well because of this, since developers have a good sense of what’s important to convey to other developers. But this is not the case for the broader spectrum of meeting.

Also keep in mind that meetings cost money in terms of both opportunity cost and real hard cash. If the average hourly wage of all meeting attendees is $15/hr, there are 10 people in the meeting, and it takes an hour and a half, the meeting cost $225. Money that may have been better spent on work more productive on an individual basis.

In terms of ‘the right goals,’ on the other hand, status meetings are by far the worst offenders. Except when they can be organized efficiently and effectively like dev scrums, general status meetings lose effectiveness very quickly. This is because the goal is so nebulous and unclear that they tend to go off in many different directions. It takes a strong hand to direct this sort of meeting when it goes off the rails, and a lot of people are unwilling to provide that. Or, because they’re the supervisor and find value in ALL information conveyed to them at a meeting, they don’t entirely recognize when the meeting goes off the rails.

For all these reasons, I think it’s very important to take a skeptical attitude towards meetings. They are important, in fact vital, to the smooth operations of an organization. But at the same time, they are often a major source of frustration. Especially for people doing ‘real’ work in a company as opposed to having supervisory responsibilities. I think it’s important to say that this is not derogatory. I’m defining real work as the kind of work that has a clear and simple correlation between time spent and outcome produced. Coding is more or less like this, while managing a development team is not.

When people who do this ‘real’ work are pulled out of it to do a meeting, it is frustrating. It takes them away from the achievement that makes their job feel worthwhile. Some people can handle this, and they often go on to become good managers, while others don’t handle it so well. Recognizing this is key to making meetings successful for everyone.

What all this means is that in order for meetings to be successful, you need to always strive to have fewer of them, with fewer people. This is a case for efficiency, mind you, and not elimination. A good meeting leaves everyone feeling satisfied, and the more people or the longer the meeting is, the more likely someone comes out of it frustrated and bored. And this is a waste of time, money, and opportunity.