Long pointless meetings are useful in that they keep incompetent people from interfering with those who are working. Bad meetings are a cultural malady that senior executives pass on to new employees. An employee who needs permission to buy a box of paperclips can spend tens of thousands of dollars worth of employee time on bad meetings. Many people attempt to save time by Not planning. This false short cut guarantees that everyone will spend more time later. Unstructured spontaneity leads to serendipity, which (in business) leads to bankruptcy. Meetings are a magnetic opiate that keep people from the tasks they were hired to perform. The main activity in many meetings consists of simple chit chat. If it's an important meeting, then this becomes sincere chit chat. A meeting without an agenda is like a journey without a map. A teleconference without an agenda is like a journey without a map, in the dark. Most meetings are social street lamps that attract the unproductive moths in an organization. People fail to prepare an agenda for two reasons. They think they�re saving time and they don�t know what to put in it. Expecting a meeting to produce results without an agenda is like expecting the Easter Bunny to leave eggs on your doorstep. Bad meetings waste a fortune. My surveys show that companies waste almost 20% of their payroll on bad meetings.
