The Right Way to Run Meetings

I asked a few readers to tell me why they hated meetings.

Here’s one:

I have a quarterly meeting with a funder. I travel 250 miles to get there. When I get there, it’s clear that no one has read the report I spent hours putting together. I essentially recite the report and then travel 250 miles home.

Here’s another one—a cross-departmental planning meeting for the upcoming fall gala:

My boss insists on a weekly team meeting. The agenda hits my inbox minutes before it starts and it’s missing important things, but that isn’t even the point. She begins by reading a list of RSVPs (which is already in a Google doc we all have access to). Next she reports on things she had previously included in emails she had already sent to us.