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Brenna Donoghue

How much do meetings get in the way of your maker/productive time?

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This year I am committing to better-protecting blocks of focused work time, which in the past have been chipped away by meetings. How do you balance maker time with important meetings and conversations?

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Marcel Schouwenaar
A lot. When doing deep work, like creative work or development, I need blocks of 3-4hrs of uninterrupted focus time. Hence I plan all meetings as first thing in the morning, right before lunch, or late afternoon. Or find 1 day in the week to take meetings back-to-back and just don't expect any work to be done.
Brenna Donoghue
@marcel_schouwenaar I love this approach. Do you find other people tend to respect those boundaries or do you get nudged to make exceptions?
Marcel Schouwenaar
@brenna_donoghue most people I work with (nowadays) have similar preferences. So it works most days!
@marcel_schouwenaar Exactly! It just breaks my creative flow many times.
Kevin Ramirez
I have one day where I schedule all my meetings. Otherwise, it's before 830 or after 4. The rest of the time is to do work.
Brenna Donoghue
@kevin_ramirez2 Love the discipline of stacking meetings like that. Also it's a good way of making sure the other participants think a meeting is truly important if they'll have to make it happen early in the day! Do you find people are generally responsive to your boundaries on this?
Kevin Ramirez
@brenna_donoghue I personally think it weeds out the people who can't plan. then I gravitate working with those who can.
Brenna Donoghue
@gloria_ayanbimpe So true. Do you find people tend to book you at times when you were planning on doing focused work? Have you found strategies that help prevent it?
@brenna_donoghue I certainly do. How I deal with that is by doing most of my creative stuff at my peak period.I’m most creative in the mornings so I’ve scheduled my day in such a way that most meetings start from somewhere around 11am
Brenna Donoghue
@graham_patel I hear that. Have you found any ways to cut down on meetings?
Gaurav Parvadiya
@brenna_donoghue 1. I have decided No meeting Thursday 2. Started delegating my work to peers so everyone doesn’t poke me for every little thing. 3. Started writing documentations of the processes and products so everyone can use it as a knowledge base 4. Fix meeting agenda beforehand so we don’t do any extra discussions in the meeting.
Brenna Donoghue
@graham_patel so many good nuggets in here. Also, I think we all need a meeting-free work day each week. Thanks!
Pablo Ignacio
Not so much actually, we normally use them to present the product and to get feedback on it, so they are productive. I think something it helps us a lot was to reduce the amount of time of the meetings in general and delete the ones that weren't necessary.
Pablo Ignacio
@gloria_ayanbimpe is all about being open and honest with the team and start measuring time and results… sometimes a meeting can just be an email :)
Brenna Donoghue
@pablo_ignacio the meeting that could have been an email... we've all experienced those (and probably been guilty of some too!)
Jason Chan
I think meetings get a bad rep. There are definitely good vs bad meetings. Good meetings tend to give me more energy and give me creativity for when I go back to building and making things. So for me, I like having good meetings every day (e.g. user interviews or feedback sessions) in addition to maker time. One thing that has worked for me is to have back to back calls. If I have a 10 min gap inbetween calls, that time has a high likelihood of being wasted
Brenna Donoghue
@jasonchan007 You're so right... a good meeting can be incredibly energizing and accomplish a ton... plus I do just like thinking through things with my awesome colleagues sometimes. When you have a bad meeting, do you try to diagnose why it fell short? Also, love the stacking of meetings. Sometimes I need that 5-10 min of 'wasted time' in between to reset and be ready for the next one.
Jason Chan
@brenna_donoghue I don't but I probably should on a meeting by meeting basis. I feel like every 3-4 months I just reflect on if there are any recurring meetings that are "bad" and can be cut.
Rayan Abid
Sadly a lot and usually when I get into focused mode, what I’ve started doing is that I’ve asked my teammates to just message the issue that they are facing beforehand.
Brenna Donoghue
@rayanabid Smart. Do you find people are sticking to it?
Rayan Abid
@brenna_donoghue Thankfully yes it’s just that you have to communicate with them because they can’t read your minds so just let them know and 90% of the time they will understand
Brent Pedersen
Bravo! I’m doing the same, having discovered a similar trend in burnout, through making up lost time which is currently filled with fairly valuable and sometimes not valuable at all, online meetings. I’ll be deliberately blocking out focus/work action time in my calendar to avoid additional adhoc meetings from being created, and to slow down interruptions. 2023 will be the testing ground for me 🙏
Moon
Meetings can certainly be a major source of interruption and distraction for many people, especially those who work in a fast-paced or deadline-driven environment. They can take up a lot of time and energy, and can also disrupt a person's ability to focus and be productive. Here are a few strategies that may help you to minimize the impact of meetings on your maker/productive time: Prioritize your time Be prepared Communicate effectively Schedule breaks: Take back control Ultimately, it's important to find a balance between attending meetings and having dedicated time for focused work. By being proactive and communicative, you can help to minimize the impact of meetings on your productivity and maker time.
Ramon Williamson
I have meeting time blocked out in my calendar just like “maker” time. (maker time in AM, meetings in PM) I’ve also set my online scheduler to correspond and only allow me and others to book meetings in Google calendar based on those times. The other thing I’ve started doing is starting 80% of meetings in async (using a video tool) before face to face in real time. This has eliminated 75% of conventional meetings. See how it works: https://jo.my/volley
Brenna Donoghue
@ramonwilliamson I love this! Do you set your maker time based on when you tend to be most productive?
Ayush Jangra
Meetings are a necessary evil. 😈 If you're looking to be more productive, I'd recommend having fewer meetings and fewer people in each meeting.
Brenna Donoghue
@deleted-2958004 The approach Shopify is taking at an org level. Super interested to see how it works there over time
Alexander Johann Eser
@brenna_donoghue , we are actually developing a solution to have more productive 1:1s and team meetings. Please check zipdo.co - We are launching our MVP soon and if you want to be one of the first users to try it out, please contact me at ajeser[at]zipdo.co or join our waitlist.