If I am in meetings all-day, when does the work get done?
You have probably uttered the dreaded words once or twice in your career. “That meeting could have been an email.”
And I’ll take the liberty of assuming you have also spent hours responding to email threads that never die, only to realize that at the end of your day, you have worked hard to respond to emails that check off someone else’s to do list.
In 2014, Harvard Business Review published an article highlighting the communication schedule for a large tech company’s VP who spent 44 hours per week in meetings, and 22 hours per week on emails. At the managerial level, one IT manager interviewed spent 35 hours a week in meetings and sent emails during 85% of the time they were in meetings. Now if you’re asking, “But when do they get their work done?” or maybe you’re saying, “That sounds familiar!”, you are not alone. And 8 years later, I’m willing to bet that time has only increased for most of us working in or running our own businesses.
In 2022, we now have new avenues of communicating with our teams. If I asked you to tell me all the ways you communicate within your organization, what would be the first few to come to mind? Do you use Slack, Teams, Zoom? How about in person, or via project management boards like Monday, Hive, Trello, or Asana? Do you ever communicate via WhatsApp, text message, phone call, or social media? Woo, I’m already tired and I haven’t even checked my email!
It’s no wonder that we have made coffee mugs, TV shows, and TikToks all bemoaning the challenges of sitting in meetings and sending emails. The good news is, we don’t have to continue to work this way. We can improve communication and operational efficiencies within our own organization, starting with how and when we communicate within our teams. This post will give you tangible inputs to help you make decisions on how and when you communicate with your team.
To begin, we’ll first bucket the communication forms into three sections.
Instant forms – text, IMs, hallway conversations
Written forms – email, memos, project management tools
Meetings – in person, on the phone, online
To decide which type of communication to use, begin by asking yourself the following questions. Consider that the answers to these questions should provide insight into how best to communicate your intended message.
First, what is the goal of the communication?
Do I need the recipient to respond immediately?
Is this a status update or does it require decision making?
How many people are currently included in this communication?
How many people need to be involved in the communication?
Is the communication easy to understand and/or respond to?
Am I trying to get my team to collaborate or does my request require an input or output from the recipient?
Do we have an agenda or an intended outcome to drive the conversation?
Second, what is the culture of my organization?
Is written or verbal communication important to my organization and how we make decisions?
Who has authority in my organization to make decisions?
Do we all need to hear the same message from one person?
Third, what is the cost of how I’m communicating?
For any communication method, you can calculate the cost by taking the [total time associated with your communication] * [your attendees/recipients] * [your average rate of attendees] to determine the total cost associated.
If using an instant form of communication, will it potentially distract the individual receiving the message?
On average if your team is spending 30 minutes a day receiving, shifting gears, and responding to instant messages, and you have 15 people in your organization that earn an average of $25/hour then the total cost of instant messages is $187.50 per day.
If using a written form of communication, how long will it take each person to review and respond?
On average, people spend 3 hours per day on email. If you have 15 people in your organization then your organization is spending 45 hours a day on work email. If the average pay rate is $25/hour, then the total cost of email in your organization is $1,125 per day.
If meeting, how long is the meeting and how many people have I invited?
If you are having a one-hour team meeting with 15 employees who earn an average of $25/hour, then that meeting will cost $375. This doesn’t factor in time it takes to prepare for the meeting, or conduct follow-ups, which would increase the total cost of that meeting.
Now that you have considered your goal, your company culture, and the cost of your communication, you may have a communication method in mind. Use the below charts to determine if your method matches the guidance below. Consider the best practices, and actionable next steps.
Take Action:
🡪 People Leaders/Business Owners: Develop a healthy work culture with your team by encouraging everyone to use the status feature on your instant message tools
🡪 Individuals: Try utilizing the status section (ex: online, unavailable) of instant messaging tools when you’re needing dedicated heads down time to focus on an activity. Discuss how you plan to use this feature with your leadership, so they understand the guidelines you’re using around chat features.
Take Action:
🡪 People Leaders/Business owners: Help your teams understand what you are looking for out of email responses. If there are specific ways you, or your leaders, want to see the information, coach your team on how to draft emails in that format.
🡪 Individuals: Be specific in your messages and get to the point. Use your subject line to be specific and get exactly to the point.
Take action
🡪 Individuals: Capture how much time you’re spending in meetings each week. Consider if all meetings you are in are adding value. If not, consider requesting email updates from the meeting, or reducing your frequency in attendance. Communicate with your leadership so they have line of sight to meetings you are no longer attending, and an understanding of why.
🡪 People Leaders/Business Owners: Consider the cost of each meeting you held in the last 2 weeks. If the cost outweighs the benefits, consider reducing the frequency or time of that meeting or eliminating meetings all together.
Also consider how you are driving teams to interact and communicate. Set the tone for your organization based on the culture you are trying to create. Consider implementing “No Meeting” days so individuals can have heads down time to do their work.
