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The Cost of Meetings:
What They Never Taught You
about Meetings
in Business School
Written By
Gerard P. Kaufhold, SPHR
First published in
The
New Corporate University Review, May-June 2000
Have
you ever thought about the cost of meetings you attend or are responsible for leading?
If
you're like most of our clients, you haven't. You recognize
meetings as just part of doing business, often a major drain on your
time with sometimes questionable value. When I was in the
corporate world, I felt like I was meeting'd to death with little
time left to do the things I was being paid to do. It was
through these corporate experiences, however, that I realized the
cost of my time and the time of other meeting participants.
Being
a curious person, I developed the following tool to determine what
that cost actually was. I invite you and the other attendees
at your next meeting to see what meetings are really costing your
organization. It won't take long and I'm sure you'll be surprised by
the results. Minimally, it is worth the time invested because
the results will probably be significant enough for some people to
recognize their contribution to the cost -- and to vow a change in
their behaviors.
Meetings
Cost Reduction and Opportunity Analysis
For each of the
following statements, estimate as accurately as possible the amount
of
time that is spent (wasted) in an average week:
|
|
Meeting Time
Wasters Inventory |
Time
(minutes) |
|
1 |
Time lost when meetings did not
start on time. (e.g. delayed because all members were not
present, information repeated when latecomers did show up) |
|
|
2 |
Time lost because participants
came to meetings with their own agenda. |
|
|
3 |
Time lost because participants
came to meetings unprepared. (no agenda was prepared and
distributed prior to the meeting) |
|
|
4 |
Time lost because persons
having key information did not show up or canceled at the last
minute. |
|
|
5 |
Time lost because discussions
were dominated by one or a few individuals. |
|
|
6 |
Time lost because the purpose
of the meeting was not clear to all meeting participants. |
|
|
7 |
Time lost when the meeting
strayed off purpose with discussion of unplanned topics. |
|
|
8 |
Time lost because intolerance
for others' views and ideas caused conflict which disrupted
the meeting. |
|
|
9 |
Time lost because an individual
raised roadblocks to progress until they got heard or got
their way. |
|
|
10 |
Team meetings did not end when
scheduled. |
|
|
11 |
Other Time Wasters (insert any
others) |
|
|
TOTAL TIME
WASTED WEEKLY (minutes) |
|
Compute the Cost:
| |
|
Total time wasted weekly in minutes
(from Meeting Time
Waster Inventory) |
|
X |
|
Times number of
meeting participants |
|
= |
|
Equals time lost
by organization or team per week (minutes) |
|
X |
52 |
Times weeks in
year |
|
= |
|
Equals Total
lost time annually (minutes) |
|
/ |
60 |
Divide by
60 for conversion from minutes to hours |
|
X |
|
Times average
hourly salary (use "loaded" salary if known) |
|
= |
$ |
Equals Annual Cost
to the Organization |
CONCLUSION
Planning and conducting
effective meetings is one of the most common barriers to high
performing groups or teams. That being said, it is also one of
the easier behavioral changes to make to begin reducing organization
costs.
Be advised however, that
the behavior statements in the tool may be symptomatic of more
complex and serious issues effecting organizational or team
effectiveness. An organization / team effectiveness audit
should be the next step in your journey to become a "High
Performing" organization or team.
Click here to
open and download an updated PDF version of our Meeting Cost Reduction
Tool.
Our policy for use and reproduction is accessible by
clicking here.
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