Meetings

Schedule meetings to optimize your team’s productivity.

Ideally, schedule “standalone” meetings mid-week. It’s okay to have a standing weekly meeting on Monday—many companies do their “all-hands” weekly meeting on Monday mornings. Don’t expect that everyone’s coffee will have kicked in for an 8:30am Monday morning meeting, though.

If you want people to be there in-person, schedule them for days and times that they will be in the office and available. Don’t schedule remote and hybrid people to be in the office solely for an internal meeting—that’s a morale-crusher.

If you are having the meeting on Teams or Zoom, ask people to keep their cameras on. Ideally let them know in advance that this is your expectation, so they can dress appropriately, brush their hair, clean up the mess in their background or set the background to blur out, etc.

Keep your meetings brief and on-point. Have an agenda and stick to it—if a new issue arises, have a few key people stick around after the meeting to discuss it further, or schedule a follow-up later in the day, so that people can prep materials or seek out the relevant information.

Don’t ambush your people in meetings. If you want someone to explain or discuss something specific, make sure they know in advance and have time to gather their thoughts. Set them up for success.

(image source: https://makesaasbetter.com/teamwork-memes/)