Question: What is the biggest time management challenge in businesses today?
You probably already know the answer: Back-to-back meetings. Per the observations of organization experts, this is the number one complaint of nearly everyone including associates, managers, and executives.
Let’s face it. The problem of back-to-back meetings has been building for a long time, but the global pandemic made it significantly worse when almost overnight, millions of us found ourselves suddenly working remotely---and essentially invisibly as far as our co-workers were concerned. It was as if an unspoken, twofold rule emerged that said unless we were meeting, we didn’t know if anyone was working, and meetings are the only way for people to feel connected. However, productivity experts have seen that this is not the case.
How about you and those around you? In the past few years, have you more often found yourself in meetings starting earlier in the morning than ever, and meetings regularly lasting until evening or even into the wee hours of the night? If so, time management experts tell us that you are not alone.
Here is the real problem via time management experts: If a back-to-back meeting culture is allowed to become the standard practice, it leads to meeting overload, which prevents real work from getting done. Think about it: For a meeting to be effective, it requires at least some advanced preparation time. Constant back-to-back meetings mean preparation is only being done properly for a small number of meetings while not preparing at all for the rest of them. In addition, work is being generated in back-to-back meetings, but never executed on because there is little to no time outside of all the meetings. Work just continues to pile up, and this is exhausting for everyone. Both the members of the organization and the business will suffer. Organization experts have been seeing this for some time and it has only gotten worse. What do we do to combat this?
Time Management Expert Advice
As a time management expert, I’m here to tell you that every leader at every level needs to start by seriously asking themselves this question: Regardless of how my calendar looks right now, what percentage of my day should I devote to the following three areas?
Thinking time for strategizing, conceptualizing, or idea generating
Responding time with my direct reports, our customers, and others I support
Meeting time to make decisions, communicate information, and generate work
A productivity expert will point out that it is not productive that upwards of 70, 80, or 90% of our days are filled with meetings. And while we are in those meetings, we are attempting to multitask by doing our interactions, on our laptops or smartphones. This leaves thinking time for only late at night or weekends which are times that are essential for rest, renewal, and recharging.
Organizational Expert Advice on Eliminating Meeting Overload
Yet when all our meetings seem essential, how do we eliminate some? And how many should we eliminate? Here are a few parameters to get you started.
If holding or attending meetings is an important part of your job, then narrowing your meeting load down to 70% of your day consisting of meetings is a good goal.
An even better goal would be 60%, or even less if you are not in a job where being in meetings is a requirement.
Considering the three areas listed above, this leaves 40% of your day to divide between thinking time and responding time. Between time to get your own work done, and having present, thoughtful interactions with your team members.
Enlist the Help of a Productivity Expert
It may be time for you to partner with a productivity expert to help develop a strategy in this area. We must take control of the back-to-back meeting culture and the meeting overload it has created. We need to make a concerted effort to eliminate some meetings from our schedules to create essential time for purposeful thinking and for meaningful interactions. Only in the spaces we make for ourselves to think can we innovate and solve problems that will create a better future.