Monday's top tips - Meetings that could have been an email from the start

In the business world, there is one reality that unites almost every team: meetings that start with “it's just a quick catch-up” and end an hour later with nobody quite sure why they were there.

The invitation appears in the calendar, usually with a vague and mysterious title such as “Status update”, “General catch-up” or the classic “Quick meeting”. When the time comes, half the people are still joining the call, someone has no microphone, someone else can't share their screen, and there's always someone asking:
“Can you hear me now?”

After several minutes of introductions, pauses, interruptions and small side conversations, the purpose of the meeting finally arrives. And the conclusion is often surprisingly simple:

“So it was just to let you know this.”
Or worse:
“We'll look at that properly in another meeting.”

The truth is that many companies are surrounded by meetings that end up consuming time, focus and productivity unnecessarily. And the problem isn't always the meetings themselves, as many are important and necessary, but rather the lack of organisation of information and internal communication.

When processes aren't clear, when information is scattered or when teams don't have simple tools to keep track of tasks and decisions, everything ends up turning into a meeting.

The impact of this day to day is greater than it seems. A one-hour meeting doesn't just take up one hour. It takes up several people's time at once, interrupts work in progress, breaks the team's rhythm and creates that constant feeling of “we were busy all day… but didn't really get anywhere”.

That is precisely why more and more companies are looking for simpler and more efficient ways to communicate internally. Having centralised, accessible and up-to-date information reduces unnecessary interruptions and avoids meetings held just to confirm tasks, statuses or small decisions.

And let's be honest:
some meetings are so short and simple that an email would have done.
Or even a two-line message.