Meetings Are “Actual Work”
By: Matt Saunders
Tags: Personal Development, Time Blocking, Productivity Hacks, Meetings, Productivity

Meetings Are “Actual Work”

I don’t know about you but there seems to be a tendency in my circles for people to write off meetings as “non-work”, taking up precious time that could be used for “actual work”.

As somebody who runs a web development business with a number of clients, many of whom I speak with regularly, I’ve been guilty of complaining about this myself.

If only I didn’t have meetings today: I could get on with some coding and do some actual work…

Talking to people *is* work

In this brave new world of endless Zoom calls, it can feel like we’re always having to show up, to perform. And certainly, in many cases a meeting could be substituted for an email, that has always been the case.

But every project needs good communication. And now, more than ever, face to face meetings have value. We don’t complain so much about being available 24 hours a day on IM or email, so why do we file meetings under “unproductive time”?

Photo by Magnet.me on Unsplash

Do meetings waste your time?

If you said “yes” it might be that your meetings could run more effectively. I used to consider meetings to be a real time-sap with little return until I realised it was the way I conducted myself in meetings that were the problem.

Here are some tips to make meetings, in-person or over the video, work better for you:

Have an agenda

First of all you should have an agenda. I’m not talking about some formal document that gets circulated with all attendees before you meet. I simply mean a brief idea of what you want to talk about. What do you want to get out of the meeting? This helps prevent “quick calls” from spiraling into 40 minute conversations that take more tangents than a soap opera.

Allocate time for it

It’s easy to feel you’re wasting time if a meeting has been imposed on you unexpectedly. To get around this, plan for it. I’m a fan of time-blocking and for each meeting I have planned, I allocate a block of time that day for it. It’s largely psychological because the only thing that’s changed is my perception of how I spend my time, but the material benefit is you can actually track how long you spend in meetings as well.

Keep notes and actions

A good meeting will always produce some actions, either for yourself or others. For me, the sign of a productive meeting is not how much gets discussed but what decisions get made. If you find that you spend a large amount of time in meetings with little outcomes to show for it, it could mean that your time is being spent inefficiently.

Take charge of yourself

I’m not suggesting that you try to control the meeting, rather I’m saying that if you need to leave early or only have a short amount of time, say so. If you let yourself be led by others, you’ll be forced to stick around indefinitely. That’s very anxiety-provoking, so learn to assert yourself when needed and only join meetings that you know you can get value from. Then leave (nicely).

Re-inventing the meeting

Now more than ever it’s worth thinking deeply about how we spend our time. Video calls can require a lot of energy and if you do too many of them you’ll burn out. When done well, intermittent comms with team members and clients can deliver huge value to your life, making work more pleasurable and productive. But if you let these “quick calls” run away with you, it can leave you lethargic and too tired to focus on other areas of business.

When this happens, it’s no wonder we often don’t think of meetings as actual work.