Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Speaker 1: Today's tip is to schedule meetings for fifty minutes, not sixty.
Speaker 1: That way, people can get where they're going and more
Speaker 1: meetings can start on time. As I have studied corporate
Speaker 1: schedules over the years, I have been fascinated to see
Speaker 1: how most organizations, or at least most individual people, have
Speaker 1: some sort of default length for their meetings. Some places
Speaker 1: set the default at thirty minutes, but sixty minutes tends
Speaker 1: to be the most common. Because people wind up in
Speaker 1: a lot of meetings, many of these meetings get scheduled
Speaker 1: back to back. This is a problem because if you
Speaker 1: are in a meeting that runs from nine to ten
Speaker 1: and another one that runs from ten to eleven, you
Speaker 1: are expected to be in two different meetings at precisely
Speaker 1: ten am, and if the meetings are in different places,
Speaker 1: this is a physical impossibility. But even if both meetings
Speaker 1: are by video conference, and even if the first ends
Speaker 1: precisely on time, you will still be a minute late
Speaker 1: to the second because it takes a non zero amount
Speaker 1: of time to log in. You also won't have time
Speaker 1: to use the restroom or make any notes about follow
Speaker 1: ups from the first meeting, which means those to dos
Speaker 1: may fade to the back of your mind until they
Speaker 1: urgently boil back up. And of course, mini meetings do
Speaker 1: not end on time. That makes people even later for
Speaker 1: all subsequent meetings, so all meetings after the first start
Speaker 1: in a discombobulated way, as you do decide whether to
Speaker 1: wait for the late comers or shift the agenda accordingly. Fortunately,
Speaker 1: this is a comparatively easy problem to solve. Indeed, it
Speaker 1: is a problem that most high schools have solved. You
Speaker 1: need to create a passing period between scheduled events so
Speaker 1: people can get from one commitment to another. If you
Speaker 1: are in a leadership role at your organization, one obvious
Speaker 1: way to do this is to set the norm of
Speaker 1: having meetings start on the hour and end at ten minutes.
Speaker 2: Until the hour. That is, they are.
Speaker 1: All fifty minutes long instead of sixty minutes long. That way,
Speaker 1: even participants with back to back meetings aren't inevitably late
Speaker 1: for all of their meetings of the day.
Speaker 2: Except the first.
Speaker 1: You can even encourage staff to adjust their outlook settings
Speaker 1: to shorten the duration of all events. So that meetings
Speaker 1: default to a specific amount of time before the hour.
Speaker 1: A few organizations choose a corollary to this idea, that is,
Speaker 1: all meetings start ten minutes after the hour and end
Speaker 1: on the hour. That can also work, but it is
Speaker 1: slightly less intuitive to explain to people outside the organization.
Speaker 1: So I like on the hour and ending ten minutes
Speaker 1: till now. It is true that fifty minutes is less
Speaker 1: than sixty minutes, and if you were accustomed to filling
Speaker 1: every single one of those sixty minutes efficiently in all
Speaker 1: of your meetings, then you may have to rethink things.
Speaker 1: But in my experience, there are very few corporate meetings
Speaker 1: that were scheduled for sixty minutes but that could not
Speaker 1: take fifty Indeed, since many meetings start late because of
Speaker 1: latecomers from previs meetings, the material may often be taking
Speaker 1: closer to fifty minutes. Anyway, as people get antsy once
Speaker 1: the clock strikes the hour and they know they need
Speaker 1: to go to the next thing. Best to acknowledge this now.
Speaker 1: If you are not in a leadership role, this might
Speaker 1: be a bit harder to establish, but you can certainly
Speaker 1: make it happen for any meetings that are under your control.
Speaker 1: If you know people are going to be late, plan
Speaker 1: on starting at five minutes after the hour and then
Speaker 1: end ten minutes before. Yep, that means turning your sixty
Speaker 1: minute meetings into forty five minute ones. But hey, you
Speaker 1: listen to this podcast. You thrive on doing things effectively.
Speaker 1: I am betting that you could figure it out. Of course,
Speaker 1: in the grand scheme of things, it.
Speaker 2: Would be better to just have fewer meetings.
Speaker 1: Ideally, when a meeting happens, it is because something needs
Speaker 1: to change in the world that can only result from
Speaker 1: bringing those people together. The length of the meeting is
Speaker 1: determined by what needs to happen, and not by some
Speaker 1: arbitrary clock time. If you need twenty minutes, you set
Speaker 1: the meeting for twenty minutes. If you need thirty seven
Speaker 1: point five minutes, you ask for that, and everyone is
Speaker 1: going to assume your agenda is incredibly well thought through.
Speaker 1: But if that is not going to happen, the next
Speaker 1: best solution is to shorten all meetings just a little.
Speaker 1: People won't be late, they can catch their breath, they
Speaker 1: can think about what just happened, and then they can
Speaker 1: start the next thing. This is a fairly simple fix
Speaker 1: that can have a big impact in terms of increasing
Speaker 1: focus and avoiding a sense of being overwhelmed. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: This is Laura. Thanks for listening and here's.
Speaker 2: To making the most of our time.
Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, I'd love to hear from you. You can
Speaker 1: send me your tips, your questions, or anything else. Just
Speaker 1: connect with me on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at Before
Speaker 1: Breakfast Pod. That's b E the number four then Breakfast pod.
Speaker 1: You can also shoot me an email at Before Breakfast
Speaker 1: podcast at iHeartMedia dot com that Before Breakfast is spelled
Speaker 1: out with all the letters.
Speaker 2: Thanks so much, should I look forward to staying in touch.
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