Meetings Are Redundant

It's true! They did a study. Which is kind of like a glorified meeting but still, they have proven what we all have felt to be true for a long time!

According to the article (found in the Metro News, May 27th), 28% of these gatherings are a waste of time (I feel like the percentage should be higher, but then again, I'm not running these meetings). However, 45% of the people asked felt that employees would be more productive if companies banned meetings once a week.I agree. I cannot tell you how many times my managers are unavailable or out of the office because they are in meetings!

On a day like today (glorious weather) I'm sure their out of office "meetings" are actually an 11am tee time and a nice cold beer. The life of a manager is filled with perks isnt it?

We have weekly meetings in our department. On Friday mornings. They were initially set up to get feedback on how we felt John could improve morale, productivity and processes in our department in the wake of the previous manager's departure. They became a weekly occurance.

But instead of productive, constructive essays on making positive changes, they have basically become all out bitching sessions. We bitch about the reps that we have to deal with, broken processes, broken promises, that there aren't enough people, too much work, printers, paper, coffee flavour- you name it, we complain about it.

Obviously this is a symptom of a greater issue- general malaise felt about working here. But the point is that these meetings (which the article notes could outlive their purpose) have degenerated and no longer warrant an hour of our time. Especially when everything is so behind. The only thing that it accomplishes is the feeling of a shorter friday.

Don't get me wrong, I'm loving the shorter friday (in fact, today we didn't have the meeting and I'm finding that the day feels longer), but when everyone is so stressed out about not having enough time, one more precious hour could do a lot to assuage the feeling of panic currently coursing through the department.