If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has
not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word
would be ‘meetings’.
– Dave Barry, “Things That It Took Me 50 Years to Learnâ€
I love the quote above! Maybe because in our innovation workshops, I’ll often ask participants, "who has been in a meeting recently that you’d consider a total waste of time?" And the response? A majority of participants shake their heads yes or begin laughing.
Which set me off in search of a few statistics in terms of meetings and what attendees think of them? So here are two interesting statistics I found. See if you can guess the answers.
1) Approximately, how many meetings are held each day in the US?*
2) What % of those meetings are characterized as a waste of time by attendees?*
See answers below
*source: (MIT Sloan Management: The Science and Fiction of Meetings: Winter 2007)
And now the ANSWERS…
1) 11,000,000 (Yes millions)
2) Between 25 – 50% are considered a waste
So my question is from your perspective, what separates great meetings from a waste of time?
Please comment.
