☀️ Weekly Team Meetings Summer Series ☀️

Each week this summer, I'm answering reader questions about weekly team meetings. New here? Click here to read the first issue in this series​

In this week's newsletter

• Q: How can I tell if we need more time or need to stick to our agenda?
• Warm-up: prioritize the agenda together
• Check-out: a pulse check on meeting length
• Your weekly bird break

Q: We always run over. How can I tell if we need more time or need to stick to our agenda?

A: You’ll need to analyze your patterns and experiment. Start by looking back at your last few meetings (or start tracking now).

• How many agenda items did you intend to cover, and how many did you actually get through?
• Which ones took longer than anticipated?
• How often did you discuss topics that weren’t on the agenda? Were they relevant?
• How many topics could have been handled asynchronously or through another channel?

Once you can see the patterns, try experimenting with the following approaches:

Shift your collaboration and communication channels

Your weekly meeting likely isn’t the only way you communicate. When you plan to bring a topic, consider whether it’s best for that forum vs. one-on-one or asynchronously even if it could be handled in the meeting.

Set extremely specific objectives

If a topic must be addressed in the meeting, that doesn’t mean comprehensive coverage. For every agenda item, set objectives that are specific, outcomes-focused, and realistic. Then ask: what pre-work will you do to frame the discussion, and what pre-work or context will others need to achieve the objective?

For example, an HR policy change might not need a slide-by-slide overview and 10-minute Q&A. An email or short video to cover the change + a Slack thread to prioritize questions you'll address live can reduce the meeting time required while achieving your ultimate goal.

Rate urgency and importance

Even with focused objectives, you might still have a bloated agenda. At the top of the meeting, have your team rate each item now (must discuss today), next (will be "now" by next meeting), or nice-to-have (can wait a couple of weeks). Work through them in that order. This way, if you don’t get to everything, you aren't running over or scrambling to find more time this week. Those items simply move to next week's agenda.

Try the “rule of halves”

Researchers Leidy Klotz and Bob Sutton, and Huggy Rao have found humans have “addition sickness:” we’re biased toward adding more and typically overlook opportunities to subtract. To counter that bias, they encourage the "rule of halves." Cut your agenda in half. Cut the meeting time in half. Cut the frequency in half. Cut the attendee list in half. Half isn’t a magic number, but it's drastic enough to push you out of the status quo so you can find your sweet spot. Read more here and here.

Think in seasons

In certain periods you may need longer or more frequent meetings: onboarding someone new, kicking off a project, a brand new start-up environment. If you do your analysis and decide you need to meet longer or more often, that’s OK. Set a reminder for three months from now to revisit, and use these reflection questions when you do.

Whether the issue is your allotted time, your agenda, or both, you now have some ideas for figuring out your next moves.

Before your next weekly meeting, ask yourself

Have a question about your weekly meeting?

Reply with your question and I'll answer!

Meeting Minute

Use these to start and end your meetings this week

​Warm-up question​

This question is one way to have the group jointly identify priorities for the meeting. It's a lighter-touch alternative to rating each agenda item red, yellow, or green. It's also a great opportunity to reset expectations at the top if you know you won't achieve what someone shared.

​Check-out question​

Holding a longer meeting isn’t inherently bad if you’re achieving your objectives and the group agrees it’s a productive use of time. This is one of a handful of questions you can ask to get a pulse check from the group on length. If you’re running short on time, you could ask people to fill out a quick poll at the end or afterward, instead of answering live.