WORK LIFE: Do or do not keep meetings short?

I just read this blog: https://timdenning.com/overly-productive-people/

I actually put on my resume and accomplishments that I have shortened meetings from 2 hours to 30 minutes, so I thought this read was interesting and I do agree on a lot of the points it made.

I do a lot of small banter, small talk, and weather. I agree that it is important to connect to people.

The post also mentions to avoid saying that I am busy because it makes it seem my time is more valuable than others. I also agree with this. In my meeting, I say that I want to keep it short to save everyone else's time.

I think this post does a good job of too much trimming to short meetings. I do believe a lot of meetings ARE too long but for reasons not listed on the post (which makes sense as it is not the point of the article).

For me, it is important to keep topics that seem to only address less than 10% of the attendance to a separate call. I do give them a minute or two because it usually takes me a couple minutes to know if the conversation is going off tangent. I do my best to interrupt and side-bar the conversation. (I do not understand why people still do not understand this concept after working with them for 4 years now but that is outside my control so I do my best to change course.)

Sometimes the small talk goes a little too long. I found the most affective way is to just continue the meeting topic. If I add something to the banter, this may trigger someone to rebut or one-up or just wanting to put in the final word. After 10 years, no one has complained about this method and I haven't noticed anyone take offense to it. Most people have complimented me on my meeting management and I also get the highest attendance rate in all companies I have worked for. That is including upper management who I rarely see in other calls.

I also make sure that the majority of my attendance are impacted by the majority of the meeting agenda. I do not like having full teams on my calls for status updates. I recommend team leads to join the calls then they can distribute the information as needed. This also encourages team leads to know what is going on (which I think is helpful for the team leads that are not leaders; I hate having team leads that just delegate to another individual for status because to me the basic team lead should at least know the status).

If I see managers forward to another individual that I do not believe will be helpful to them, I do remind the individual of the meeting agenda and their presence may not be needed.

Of course I am biased to my own meeting style, but I find the frequent attendees of my meetings are much more relaxed and focused which I believe is through the small communications that is mentioned in Tim Denning's post.

Take the title with a nuanced take on the topic. The content has some good things to say and is a recommended read.