Is there ANY business activity that receives more scrutiny than the venerable meeting? Its importance is enough to gain the attention of a Harvard Business professor, and business leaders are always ready to share their pearls of wisdom about the benefits and wastefulness of meetings. They are like coffee, the most studied “drug” (OK, caffeine) in the world.
I wanted to provide some background to the subject, and then I turned to people throughout the country who have probably given it even more thought than I have. Here’s what I know. Most of us want to limit meetings, but when we have one, we want it to be productive, usually measured in the simplest of fashion when a session answers two questions: Did I learn something, and did it turn into some productive action?