You are not a middle schooler changing classes

No one wins when you go passively from meeting to meeting

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio Good Morning.
This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
tip is that you are not a middle school student
changing classes, so don't go passively from thing to thing

(00:23):
in your schedule without focusing on what each meeting accomplishes.
One of the most frequent concerns I hear from listeners
is that their workdays are consumed by back to back meetings,
so there's no time to get their actual work done.
They become like middle schoolers changing classes, going from your

(00:46):
one o'clock to your two o'clock, to your three o'clock
to your four o'clock things that have just appeared on
your schedule and that you have no say over. I
underst stand that frustration. It boggles my mind how much
staff time businesses are willing to spend on meetings without
considering the actual return on investment. If you are an

(01:09):
organizational leader, do a time audit and figure out how
much time your team is spending in meetings. You may
be able to cut this time significantly by being a
bit more judicious on how long meetings are, who attends,
and whether any given meeting is actually necessary. But If

(01:30):
your organization's meeting schedule is not up to you, you
still can be intentional about your own participation. It can
be easy to acquiesce to a calendar full of meetings
that you didn't schedule, so you wind up tramping through
a day like a middle school or changing classes. But
that may not help you accomplish your core work. So
here's a few ways of avoiding it. First, to the extent,

(01:53):
you can be selective about what appointments you make. Just
because you received a calendar indentation doesn't mean you need
to go to the meeting. Could someone else from your
team go, Could you just read the minutes? Does this
topic need a meeting at all? Or could you handle
it through email or within the context of another existing meeting.

(02:16):
If you are new to your company or junior, you
may have less ability to decline a meeting or delegate it,
but you may still be able to avoid some meetings
by accomplishing their goals before the meeting is supposed to happen.
For instance, if the meeting purpose is to start planning
an orientation for new program participants, and you send a

(02:37):
draft agenda for the orientation before the scheduled meeting, the
project leader may decide you don't actually need to meet
after all, or you might be able to address the
topic of a planned meeting during your regular one on
one meeting with your boss and then avoid the other meeting.
In addition to being choosy about which meetings you attend,

(02:58):
I also recommend being intentional about what the times you
schedule meetings for. Maybe you aim to schedule meetings in
the afternoon or at the end of the week so
you can leave mornings or the beginning of the week
for deep work. There are also ways to make the
most of the meetings you do go to. If you
are leading a meeting, create an agenda circulated in advanced

(03:21):
so everyone arrives prepared. If someone else is leading the meeting,
request the agenda in advance offered a draft one if
nothing seems forthcoming. If nothing else, your agenda will make
the meeting more useful. For every meeting you do go to,

(03:42):
think through what you need to get out of it.
After all, the purpose of gathering people is to change
something in the world, So what should be the outcome?
What questions do you need answered, What action steps need
to be planned? Think about who else be at the meeting.
Is there anything you need to touch base about during

(04:05):
and immediately after the meeting? Make notes for yourself and
communicate with anyone else you need to about next steps.
You may be able to complete some action steps within
the scheduled time for the meeting itself. That can leave
at least some time open in the rest of your schedule.
The big idea here is that going passively from meeting
to meeting does nothing for you or your employer. You

(04:30):
need to make sure you're using meetings to advance your
own and your team's goals. Otherwise you are just changing
classes passing the time rather than doing something with it,
and time is just too valuable for that. In the meantime,

(04:51):
this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making
the most of our time. Thanks for listening to Before Breakfast.
If you've got questions, ideas, or feedback, you can reach
me at Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast

(05:20):
is a production of iHeartMedia. For more podcasts from iHeartMedia,
please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.