Are We Still In Meeting Hell?

Image by Jo_Johnston from Pixabay 

I’ve written before of my distaste for meetings (here, here and here) and specifically, meaningless meetings that should actually have been emails or a phone chat - or none of the above! 

I’ve seen companies where meetings are the norm and the work of actually getting things done (time for deep thinking or focused work) becomes the exception, something that gets done after-hours (or worse, not at all). In fact, I’ve often wondered if there’s a correlation between the percentage of time that executives spend in meetings and the performance of the company. (If you’ve worked in a global organization or professional services firm of any size, you’re sure to have experienced it yourself.) 

I wonder what’s happened to that culture now that we’re all physically separated and working from home?

Have we simply ported that culture over into our ‘current normal’? Have we simply replaced meetings with video calls - back to back to back? Are we still using meetings as the way to manage by committee or monitor our employees or ensure that “things are getting done”?

Or, have we taken a clean sheet view of it (intentionally or by accident)? 

Have we found that maybe we don’t actually need to spend time in endless meetings? Have we found that a simple email exchange does the job? That we can get much more done in the hours where we can simply sit and think and do?

Have we learned our lesson? 

Or are we simply going to go back to the “old normal” when we’re back in the “new normal”?