Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy' • Hacker News Board

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#161

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 9:30 PM UTC

ronvenna wrote: post #160

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #9

One of my employers actively discouraged meetings and phone calls. They wanted everything done through Slack and email. It felt great at first. Having a wide-open calendar and knowing that random managers can’t pull you into a waste of time meeting seems like a dream come true. However, we quickly learned that removing meetings doesn’t removed the need for communication. Instead of scheduled meetings, our Slack chann…

The side effect of having all meetings on slack is that you get note taking for free and will always have the discussion and data points logged down and searchable forever. I find this to be extremely useful when looking back on decisions made and finding context on why they were made.

[deleted]

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#162

Post by prepend » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 9:45 PM UTC

duxup wrote: post #96

mipmap04 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've found that, with the exception of daily stand-ups, all meetings must have a bullet point agenda and notes should be sent out for each meeting with risks, action items, issues and ownership of those items. If both of those things are lacking, I doubt how useful the meeting will be or was.

I was at a company that employed thousands of people. They did a company wide training on effective meetings. Set agendas, notes, and etc were all part of their training. It was great. I never saw a single person do those things... not the VPs, not the CEO, nobody. I did it for my meetings as a sort of invisible act of defiance, but nobody ever read them before the meeting and most didn't know meeting invites came wi…

I started refusing any meetings that didn’t say their purpose and desired outcome. I’m a schmeg so it just made people stop scheduling meetings with me and that was pretty good.

People seem really busy and tell me they are too busy to plan their meeting or prepare for mine. It’s a viscous cycle.

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#163

Post by stingraycharles » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 9:48 PM UTC

potta_coffee wrote: post #113

crazypyro wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps you are being overly dismissive of the "extroverts" needs in the situations you are describing... Some might just "complain", but others feel safer being vocal in a group of people. You mention understanding that some of the quietest people have the most to say behind a screen, well, I imagine there is a non-insignificant group of people who feel much safer talking it out within a group where there isn't a wr…

Most work places are heavily dominated by the extroverts. The sales and executive teams are all extroverts. So is the marketing team. IMO it's fair to consider the other side of the coin, there's virtually no way that extroverts aren't going to continue to rule the workplace.

Playing the devil’s advocate, if what you say is true, that most of an organization is extroverted, why would you want to optimize your feedback process for the introverts? Is the reason that you believe the extroverts’ voice is already heard?

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#164

Post by greenhatman » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 9:53 PM UTC

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #9

One of my employers actively discouraged meetings and phone calls. They wanted everything done through Slack and email. It felt great at first. Having a wide-open calendar and knowing that random managers can’t pull you into a waste of time meeting seems like a dream come true. However, we quickly learned that removing meetings doesn’t removed the need for communication. Instead of scheduled meetings, our Slack chann…

@here is not asynchronous.

It sounds to me like they were using Slack for discussions that should have happened on a Google Doc or ticketing system.

If people are constantly pinging you on Slack they're doing it wrong, and you need to let them know.

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#165

Post by stjohnswarts » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 10:12 PM UTC

They aren't therapy for me. It takes me a while to get into the zone if I'm doing anything that I would consider "creative" as far as coding. Incessant meetings break up my day into chunks that aren't useful. I don't mind status meetings but a recent job turned into 3 or 4 meetings a day for half and hour at a time and that destroys my day and creates a lot of stress. I think sending a status to the team once a day is fine. If you want my attention email me and we'll set something up. This public flogging that managers like to pull at meetings really is stress inducing.

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#166

Post by cpeterso » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 10:41 PM UTC

lilbobbytables wrote: post #154

mipmap04 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've found that, with the exception of daily stand-ups, all meetings must have a bullet point agenda and notes should be sent out for each meeting with risks, action items, issues and ownership of those items. If both of those things are lacking, I doubt how useful the meeting will be or was.

Can you provide some examples? Need to push for changes like this myself.

As a project manager who runs and attends a lot of meetings :) I recommend these two books about planning and running effective meetings:

* "Effective Meeting Skills" by Marion Haynes is a short workbook from 1988. It looks dated, but the material is still relevant and a quick read. https://www.amazon.com/dp/0931961335/

* "The Surprising Science of Meetings: How You Can Lead Your Team to Peak Performance" by Steven Rogelberg. This 2019 book is great and includes useful findings from real studies of meetings. https://www.amazon.com/dp/0190689218/

This podcast interview with the author is a good introduction: https://www.gayleallen.net/cm-127-steven-rogelberg-on-making...

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#167

Post by eitland » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 10:51 PM UTC

triceratops wrote: post #126

caro_douglos wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

might charging a ‘call to meeting’ fee based on the attendees salary/hourly rate be an alternative?

Not sure how many people would want to pay to do their own jobs.

I'm not certain it is a good idea to to that but let me try to come up with a more constructive way to do it:

Of course people shouldn't pay to do their work, so this must be taken from their allocated budget. If they don't have a budget they cannot invite anyone without the permission of someone who has a budget and think the meeting is a good idea.

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#168

Post by abawany » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 10:53 PM UTC

WhompingWindows wrote: post #52

asaph wrote: post #5

People should decline pointless meetings.

An interesting idea...supposedly at Tesla and SpaceX, Elon recommended that anyone who found a meeting to be pointless should get up and leave immediately. I don't know if that's still the practice, maybe someone from those companies can chime in.

David Marcus (FB, previously PayPal) had (has?) a similar stated policy regarding meetings.

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#169

Post by abawany » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 10:55 PM UTC

eeZah7Ux wrote: post #2

WTF? Venting might be arguably beneficial in some cases, but in many companies employees don't get to vent in a meeting. Rather, they have to endure demands, complaints and display of status from management - which is the opposite of therapy. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness One of the reasons of pointless meeting is to keep busy and appear busy - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_Jobs

In fact one of the easiest way to get disinvited from such meetings and get a less-good performance review next time around is to make a bit of noise about the utility of such meetings (edit: from my personal/anecdotal experience). Serendipity is good.

Re: Pointless work meetings 'really a form of therapy'

#170

Post by bryanmgreen » Fri, Nov 15, 2019, 10:57 PM UTC

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #9

One of my employers actively discouraged meetings and phone calls. They wanted everything done through Slack and email. It felt great at first. Having a wide-open calendar and knowing that random managers can’t pull you into a waste of time meeting seems like a dream come true. However, we quickly learned that removing meetings doesn’t removed the need for communication. Instead of scheduled meetings, our Slack chann…

Slack is a useful product that is so frequently and heavily abused that an argument could potentially be made it shouldn't exist at all.

A friend of mine showed me her work slack for a company of ~100 people and no joke, they have over 20 channels for non-work purposes that are entirely random (#cupcakeparty) and are frequently contributed to with nothing valuable. Based on personal experience, I suspect that's not too unique.