Random rant- Meetings, bloody meetings!

[nachtjaeger]

Hey, gang.

Ever sit in a business meeting and suddenly realize how a Coyote can chew off its own foot to get out of a trap?

I don't mind well-run, productive meetings. But lately I run into educated, experienced professionals who can't run a meeting, and will totally destroy somebody else's meeting. How hard is it to stay on topic when there is an agenda? I almost bit through my tongue yesterday as a manager talked on and on endlessly off-topic. No amount of gentle nudging or suggesting "That might be a topic for another meeting" or "Okay, can we get back to the agenda?" would work- assuming one could get a word in edgewise. Meanwhile, another educated, experienced professional had literally 5 pages of scrawled notes on the table, and (as usual) kept dragging us back to previous items. In the end, we never got through half the agenda, and 3 of us ended up with tasks only marginally related to the agenda and beyond the original scope of the meeting.

This isn't rocket science; my hometown fire department ran the tightest meetings. Even when we were hosting the county firemen's convention and had huge agendas, we got right through every item in good order. My employer even offers excellent training; I was lucky enough to get to watch a video called "Meetings, bloody meetings!" starring John Cleese as a manager who runs the worst meetings imaginable, and in his dreams is put on trial for the same. Hilarious, and very educational. I'm sure these managers have seen it. No excuse for such unprofessional, unproductive conduct.

And then there's "The boss is always right." NEVER interrupt the boss when they're speaking- even if said boss (who is not the subject matter expert) is giving out bad information at a meeting. One is just supposed to sit there, nod and smile, and let the whole thing bite said Boss in the butt later. My boss recently was told "You have to be at X meeting, but you can't say anything." Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot?

More than once, I've been abused, belittled and harassed by bosses who (right or wrong) figured since I was smarter then they were, I was after their job. Never mind that the Civil Service system doesn't work that way. But if they ever asked me to my face, I would say "Of course I'm after your job- I get you promoted, you move up, I get your job. Is that a problem?" I'm a good employee- exploit me! Use me to make yourself and your fiefdom look good. Don't get bogged down in the details and try to micromanage, and then complain you're overworked. Let your skilled and capable staff (about half of us) handle the details, and only come to you when we have a problem or need a decision made. And in the name of all that's holy, MAKE a decision! That's why you get paid the big bucks.

Okay, rant over. Thanks, guys.

[PM2K]

Amen, brother! Been there. Done that. Have the mental scars. Totally sympathize.

In my capacity as a journalist, I've had the fun of not only being bored and frustrated at our staff meetings, but being bored and frustrated at other people's meetings - especially municipal council sessions - where I also have to pay attention to hammer out a coherent story about it afterwards. Now that is a challenge anyone to who thinks writing as a job is easy.....

I've seen versions of what nachtjaeger has described... There's also seems to be a school of management out there which is particularly agonizing... where the manager, who already has made the decision, will hold a meeting and keep the discussion going until everyone supposedly buys into that decision, as if they really had any real input at all. I remember when my daily paper was bought out years ago, and I knew we were going to be a) absorbed into the rival paper which bought us (they couldn't compete with us at any level, so they bought us instead), and b) reduced to a "shopper" freebie of sorts. Still, I was trapped in a meeting with our new publisher who gathered our staff and, after praising our great work, proceeded to dismantle it over the course of three hours... by keeping my colleagues talking and talking... any suggestions we made to keep what was left of our old paper weren't rejected outright, but smothered in endless circular doubletalk until by the end, our overall consensus was to do what the publisher had already decided to do when he first entered the room... but now it seemed like our idea. I sat silent and glared through the whole farce...

I have more respect for a new boss to come in, give us a 15 minute speech of "this is the way it is... if you don't like it, don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out." than this weaselly method of trying to get our buy in on a decision made before he even entered the room. At least I wouldn't have wasted three hours...

[Fred588]

Much of the same things happen in the academic world. Part of the problem, in that case, is the very vertical structure of management. The department chair person, who must lead faculty meetings, is really at the lowest level of management, under a Dean, Provost, President, and System President (not to mention the legislature and moronic governor), so whatever is decided has to fit within what all those levels want. Combine that with 25 percent growth in enrollment over seven years and a 50 percent cut in budget over the same period and what you have is a recipe for getting nothing done. Nevertheless, every manager (mostly) thinks he or she still needs to have meetings. Actually, my department head is a bit more intelligent than most so we only have about three meetings a year.

I might be a bit smarter still (self-serving comment, I know) - Last time we had an opening for a department head, when I was asked if I was going to apply I said flat out I would not touch the job with a ten foot pole and would retire early if forced to take it. They ave left me alone since, which is the way I like it.

[Mynock]

You're preaching to the choir man......every frigging week I end up wasting Monday afternoon because what starts out as a quick schedule update meeting turns into the sales guys jerking each other off over their commission checks.......

[bbjohn]

As a fellow journalist, I know right where you're coming from, PM2K. I will say most of the political meetings I've been too have been orderly. I've concluded this is so because the politicians don't like these meetings anymore than anyone else, so they want to get them over with.

On the other hand, staff meetings with our publisher have not been orderly. I recently was on the speaker phone for 90+ minutes for a staff meeting, and it could easily have been over with in 20. I never saw anyone waste so much time on trivial matters. Of course, I was not the only one involved in that meeting. The time spent on the meeting could've been spent getting actual work done. It's not easy putting out a daily paper, and it's also not easy putting out a weekly because the staff is so much smaller.

I've had my hours cut over the last few years as an economizing measure. Given how much time I've wasted on our publisher, I found it more than just a little ironic that, when I say I don't have the time to do a lot of things I used to do, he tells me I need to learn to manage my time better.

-Big Bad John

[Lomax]

Hey, gang.

Ever sit in a business meeting and suddenly realize how a Coyote can chew off its own foot to get out of a trap?

I don't mind well-run, productive meetings. But lately I run into educated, experienced professionals who can't run a meeting, and will totally destroy somebody else's meeting. How hard is it to stay on topic when there is an agenda? I almost bit through my tongue yesterday as a manager talked on and on endlessly off-topic. No amount of gentle nudging or suggesting "That might be a topic for another meeting" or "Okay, can we get back to the agenda?" would work- assuming one could get a word in edgewise. Meanwhile, another educated, experienced professional had literally 5 pages of scrawled notes on the table, and (as usual) kept dragging us back to previous items. In the end, we never got through half the agenda, and 3 of us ended up with tasks only marginally related to the agenda and beyond the original scope of the meeting. :evil:

This isn't rocket science; my hometown fire department ran the tightest meetings. Even when we were hosting the county firemen's convention and had huge agendas, we got right through every item in good order. My employer even offers excellent training; I was lucky enough to get to watch a video called "Meetings, bloody meetings!" starring John Cleese as a manager who runs the worst meetings imaginable, and in his dreams is put on trial for the same. Hilarious, and very educational. I'm sure these managers have seen it. No excuse for such unprofessional, unproductive conduct.

And then there's "The boss is always right." :roll: NEVER interrupt the boss when they're speaking- even if said boss (who is not the subject matter expert) is giving out bad information at a meeting. One is just supposed to sit there, nod and smile, and let the whole thing bite said Boss in the butt later. My boss recently was told "You have to be at X meeting, but you can't say anything." Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot? :?

More than once, I've been abused, belittled and harassed by bosses who (right or wrong) figured since I was smarter then they were, I was after their job. Never mind that the Civil Service system doesn't work that way. But if they ever asked me to my face, I would say "Of course I'm after your job- I get you promoted, you move up, I get your job. Is that a problem?" I'm a good employee- exploit me! Use me to make yourself and your fiefdom look good. Don't get bogged down in the details and try to micromanage, and then complain you're overworked. Let your skilled and capable staff (about half of us) handle the details, and only come to you when we have a problem or need a decision made. And in the name of all that's holy, MAKE a decision! That's why you get paid the big bucks.

Okay, rant over. Thanks, guys.

There's worse. There's being employed by a family-run firm. Imagine a company founded by a man who was an expert in his field, and combined this with enough nous to build on this, and established a successful firm. Now imagine that this man is dead, and that his firm is now in the hands of his two daughters. Who don't know shit. And who have been feuding with each other for the last three decades (no, I don't know why. Possibly one stole the other's boyfriend, or teddy bear, or something).

Want to guess what effect this has on business efficiency, profitability and staff morale? You only get one guess, not three - it would be a waste of the other two.

[Fred588]

When an inefficiency is observed in a business, or any endeavor, if that inefficiency is systemic, it likely represents an opportunity for a new business to come in competitively. I was once in retailing (more than 35 years ago) and saw this sort of thing all the time. Over three years I worked for three different chains, NONE OF WHICH exist today.

[Mynock]

You inevitably become a victim of your own success. You get to the top, you get lazy......and then somebody else knocks you down.

[Fred588]

Success tends to lead to what a French general once described as "victory disease." Having had some success you convince yourself that you succeeded because you were clever. That leads to the assumption that you will continue to be successful because you will continue to be clever. The truth was you succeeded because you were lucky. Luck is probabilistic and tends to not continue contrary to probability.

You inevitably become a victim of your own success. You get to the top, you get lazy......and then somebody else knocks you down.