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Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

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Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#141

Post by ctkhn »

khedoros1 wrote: post #126
ctkhn wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been in 90 minute standups, the 10 minute standup pedants would be my heroes.

With my current team lead, 90-minute standups aren't common, but they've happened. 30 minutes is "short", and most take 45 minutes. The previous lead kept things to about 10-15 minutes. The new guy has apparently never in his life said "OK, let's discuss this after standup".

I get why people hate scrum/agile and random standards from above but this is the kind of guy that needs enforcement from his manager. Unfortunately I have never seen that happen and have had to just move on from teams where it gets poisoned like this.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#142

Post by bityard »

gwbas1c wrote: post #14

If I was in the room, I'd be relieved. I always found that meetings at large companies dragged on unless there was a forcing factor (like a doorknock) that got someone to bring it to an end.

I noticed years ago that I start to tune out of any meeting that lasts longer than 45 minutes. So whenever I was the one running a meeting, I would always timebox it to 45 minutes. Never could tell if anyone appreciated or resented that. But it worked for me.

Now that I work 100% remote, I have more flexibility to mentally ignore the bits of all meetings that don't apply to me and can instead fill the time writing comments on HN.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#143

Post by RHSeeger »

stkni wrote: post #119

Think I'm with Larry on this one. Someone should chair the meeting and there should be some expected outcome (decision) from it within the alotted time. If we're 45 mins in and no closer to an answer it's time to assign some investigative actions and regroup? Malicious compliance in this context is good, because it creates an environment where meetings end and everyone gets to pee?

Not all meetings have decisions to be made. Some are just discussions of a topic; generally to make sure everyone is on the same page.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#144

Post by raphman »

Tomte wrote: post #93
gwd wrote: post #85

> When 2:50 rolled around and your meeting was supposed to end, do you think people actually ended the meeting? Noooooo. Absolutely not! At U of M, they solved this problem by having classes officially start 10 minutes after the time they were advertised as. That is, a class listed as being 10-11am was actually 10:10-11am; nobody showed up until 10:10. Sure, technically it's the same thing, but there's a pretty massi…

Fifteen minutes late used to be the academic standard in Germany (and other countries): it was noted by “c.t.” in the timetable, meaning “cum tempore”. When I studied it had already been mostly abolished. Sometimes starting times were explicitly marked “sine tempore”.

> it had already been mostly abolished

c.t. is still standard at many German universities (and at all Bavarian universities I know). However, I know at least one university of applied sciences where lectures start at full hours.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#145

Post by bityard »

hinkley wrote: post #84
gwbas1c wrote: post #14

If I was in the room, I'd be relieved. I always found that meetings at large companies dragged on unless there was a forcing factor (like a doorknock) that got someone to bring it to an end.

I’ve worked at a couple places where someone had the balls to just get up and leave the meeting room at around 70-80 minutes to force a break. If we are going to be stuck in here I’m going to the bathroom and to get more coffee. Usually by this point the stuffy room and long meeting have people going in circles. Getting up, opening the door, getting the blood moving while one or two groups have a little sidebar, usua…

I do this at 60 minutes, even though my meetings are all over zoom these days. "Sorry, I need to step away to get some water. I'll be back in a few minutes."

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#146

Post by barbazoo »

morkalork wrote: post #97
barbazoo wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They’re talking in the context of C level meetings. Not many juniors there.

I must have been reading sideways, it came off like a blanket policy from top down to everyone

I think it could both be true, a decision made from top to bottom _and_ made in the context of someone who's in executive meetings all day.

At that point you might not be able to relate anymore to what a day of people looks like that are half a dozen levels down and have decades less work experience.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#147

Post by 0cf8612b2e1e »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #123
apercu wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> neither side understands the other. Being late is viewed as rude or lacking respect for others by a lot of people. Do people who are habitually late view prompt people as rude for being on time?

In my experience, being on time isn't viewed as rude, but it is viewed as a nuisance, reflecting poorly on other people. I had a Chinese tutor who got pretty upset that I would show up to lessons before she got there. Her first approach was to assure me that it was ok if I showed up later. Eventually she responded by showing up very, very early. In a different case, I had an appointment to meet a friend, and she text…

Presumably the tutor was being paid. If you arrive late, you are cheating yourself of your full time slot. Unless the tutor operated on a model of, “45 minutes starting whenever we are both here”.

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#148

Post by davio »

dr_kretyn wrote: post #104
remram wrote: post #18

This is not "malicious compliance", this is more like "pedantic enforcement". "Malicious compliance" would be if the same team booked a 50min meeting then a 10min meeting in the same room.

Ditto. I thought the punchline, i.e. the malicious compliance, will be booking 50 min and then booking 10 min more. Someone using an unreserved spot is that, booking a meeting.

Malicious compliance would involve reviewing the action items from the 50 minute meeting at the beginning of the 10 minute meeting

Re: Malicious compliance by booking an available meeting room

#149

Post by dsr_ »

stkni wrote: post #119

Think I'm with Larry on this one. Someone should chair the meeting and there should be some expected outcome (decision) from it within the alotted time. If we're 45 mins in and no closer to an answer it's time to assign some investigative actions and regroup? Malicious compliance in this context is good, because it creates an environment where meetings end and everyone gets to pee?

You're going to have to pick a word which means "a specific group of people get together for a specific period in order to do something which does not result in a specific decision", and be able to allocate time and space for those things, too.

Some examples:

- a class

- a briefing

- a classic "all-hands meeting"

- standup (if you haven't had a standup which ended in 45 seconds because everyone reported "no obstacles, no requests", your standups have too many people in them or your organization is under too much stress)

- lunch-and-learn

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