Mention meetings to almost anyone and you’ll get an immediate reaction, usually a groan. Too many meetings, not enough time to actually do the work. But here’s the less obvious problem: too few meetings can be just as costly. The real challenge isn’t eliminating meetings — it’s knowing when they’re the right tool and when they’re not. Let’s look at too many meetings first.
Data tells us that there is a growing feeling of meeting overload. Atlassian/ Fellow research found 78% of workers say they attend so many meetings that it’s hard to get their actual work done. Microsoft/ Vyopta research cited by Harvard Business Review found that up to one-third of meetings are unnecessary. Other studies found meetings clustered in peak cognitive hours (9-11 am and 1-3 pm) interfere with high-value thinking work. The result is predictable: people report that meetings leave them too little time to complete their actual job responsibilities.
While meetings do serve a positive function when leveraged for collegiality and specific work tasks requiring group input, meetings can become a crutch for avoiding more appropriate communication models or making decisions.
Five things to consider before deciding if a meeting is necessary
- Making decisions that require real-time negotiation – Meetings are most valuable when multiple stakeholders must weigh tradeoffs, ambiguity is high, priorities conflict or rapid iteration is needed.
Examples:
- resolving competing project priorities
- negotiating budget or timelines
- handling crises
- making strategic decisions
- aligning cross-functional teams
Why meetings work better in this scenario:
- people can ask clarifying questions immediately
- misunderstandings get corrected in real time
- emotional nuance and reactions are visible
- consensus forms faster
If the conversation requires live negotiation, a meeting is often justified.
- Building trust, relationships and alignment – Human connection is one of the strongest predictors of effective collaboration. Meetings are especially useful for:
- onboarding
- difficult conversations
- team cohesion
- brainstorming
- coaching
- performance feedback
- conflict resolution
- creating shared commitment
Experience shows trust develops faster through richer communication channels and alignment improves when people can see tone, intent, and engagement. This is why many organizations now reserve synchronous meetings for relationship-intensive work rather than simple information transfer.
A useful rule – If emotional nuance or trust matters,
meetings are often the best medium.
- Solving complex problems collaboratively – Meetings are valuable when teams need collective thinking, not just information sharing.
Examples:
- diagnosing operational problems
- designing systems
- brainstorming creatively
- planning scenarios
- analyzing root cause
- whiteboarding process changes
Advantages come from:
- rapid idea iteration
- combining perspectives
- spontaneous connections
- shared situational awareness
Complex collaborative thinking is often slower asynchronously due to ideas fragmenting across threads, context getting lost and momentum disappearing between responses. That said, research also shows brainstorming works best when participants prepare asynchronously first and meetings focus on synthesis and decision-making rather than raw idea generation alone.
If the group needs to think together in real time, a well structured meeting adds value.
- When meetings are NOT a good idea – The data is also pretty clear about where meetings are often unnecessary, such as:
- status updates
- one-way information sharing
- reading slides aloud
- routine approvals
- FYI discussions
- updates that could be documented
- large groups with passive attendees
These are usually handled better through:
- shared documents
- dashboards
- project tools
- recorded updates
- chat features
The strongest modern workplace trend is not “fewer meetings at all costs,” but rather use meetings for high-value human interaction and move everything else async.
- Good facilitation skills make meetings efficient and effective – Over many years in my career, I have seen the impact of a trained facilitator on meeting outcomes. A facilitated meeting has momentum. Someone is actively steering, the group doesn’t drift, revisit closed topics, or run out of time before reaching the meeting objective.
A good facilitator with a solid briefing can get the meeting planned and timed with a clear agenda and clear objectives. The facilitator has to remain neutral to the outcome of the meeting. Their job is to achieve the meeting objectives through a planned process that elicits team inputs and shapes those objectives into the outcomes desired.
This skillset and the tools that go with it can be learned relatively quickly. With enough practice, I have seen people become great facilitators and achieve much more visibility in the organization because of the skillset. A facilitator does for a meeting what a good Production Leader does for a shift — keeps things moving toward the right outcome.
Using these five points in deciding when to have and when not to have a meeting is the first step. If the decision is to hold the meeting, have a colleague with solid facilitation skills and tools plan the meeting, set the agenda and execute it efficiently within a timed period.
Author: Phil Chadderdon has been a VMEC Business Advisor since December 2019. Starting his career as an engineer visiting customers to solve problems and introduce new products, Phil has also held roles in sales and business development as well as plant manager, technical director and general manager.