I can’t stand meetings. Meetings are supposed to be extremely short. They should act as quick status updates from all the various members of a team. Each individual states the status of their projects in a few short minutes and poses any questions they may have to the group. The group responds quickly, then you  move to the next team member. Most meetings generally start out like the first part of that sentence, but tend to go haywire when questions are asked. This is an issue with a lack of concise problem solving and decision making. During longer meetings, people think that discussing open items in long winded fashion is kosher because, hey, we have an hour!

The real fact is that you are employed to accomplish tasks and meet goals and deadlines, status meetings don’t necessarily move everyone forward if all you’re doing is asking question after question. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat in a meeting for an hour or more and at the end of it had nothing to show for it — simply too many questions were asked and it derailed the meeting’s purpose time and time again. One question lead to another and so on and so forth until the hour was up and everyone had to leave.

Keep it short to force teammates to be concise.

Keeping meetings short helps keep things concise. Working under a time limit forces attendees to be very direct and to the point, not to mention it allows you to get back to work as soon as possible.

However, I’m not advocating that all meetings should be this short. Brainstorms require guided creative thought that can’t be confined to only a few minutes. But think about this for a minute: how often has an out of this world idea ever popped up in a brain storm? Sure, there will be lots of canon fodder, but more than likely, there aren’t any that truly hits it out of the park. Creative strikes of lightening happen throughout the day, and if you’re like me, it’s probably when you’re brain is relaxing and not concentrating on anything. So odds are that brainstorm won’t yield that holy grail you were hoping for. That being said, brainstorms should be kept short as well. Not only because of the aforementioned, but also because there will probably be more than one, and the key is to not keep going back to the whiteboard at the start of a new meeting and begin to draw another damn spider chart.

Hey, it has to happen sometime... so only beat it a few times, then move on.

Stop beating dead horses. If the idea sucks, can it. If it’s so-so and nobody can riff on it, move on for now — someone will come back to it in a few minutes. If it seems good, but off strategy, write it on a side portion of whatever surface you’re marking up and work it out later. Keep the pace moving fast and furious, get as much out on the floor as possible, work backwards later. Just remember: nobody likes a horse beater.

How do you keep meetings short and productive?