Taking Care of Business - Part 3

I hate sitting in meetings. What I hate most are meetings that have no purpose. Meetings that exist just so those attending and running the meetings can feel important.

I've got an interesting situation at my office where a co-worker feels compelled to create work around an issue that really is none of her concern. Our supervisor has told us that this issue is being taken care of by another department and that we should focus on our jobs and expect some results on this issue soon. Nevertheless, my co-worker wants results NOW and is dead set on getting everyone involved in our department (accept our supervisor). So she scheduled a meeting. It's never more obvious that this is a pointless meeting. While my presence was not mandatory, it was requested.

Sometimes your pointless meetings ARE mandatory. In today's installment I'm going to talk about a tried and true way you can avoid attending those meetings that amount to nothing. I like to call this:

- The Conflict Solution -



The first order of business is to make sure you are not expected to present, run, or otherwise contribute in any way to the subject matter of the meeting. If this is the case than proceed with the plan, if not, you're screwed... go to the meeting.

Assuming you know you're going to be an innocent bystander to this office "circle-jerk" you can now begin with your plan. Go check your calendar. Let's say you have another meeting (one of consequence), or a series of meetings later in the week. If there is any opportunity to provide input as to the date and time of the pointless meeting, chime in. Suggest to the organizer that your Thursday is wide open. Then when Thursday arrives you can bail for the more important meeting.

Other examples of conflicting schedules include a meeting with your boss or any other boss up the corporate ladder. Call up the Associate Vice-President and see if you can schedule some time. Nobody will fault you for skipping out of a minuscule little staff meeting when the AVP is expecting you!

Finally there is the silver bullet of "get out of jail free" cards - The client meeting/phone-call. If you feel that you would rather jump off a tall building than attend this dumb-ass meeting, then simply bail. Tell them you had to take an important client phone-call. Better yet, leave the office for an hour and go see a client on-site. The bottom line is you don't have to subject yourself to every excruciating little pow-wow that comes up when you know that it will never amount to anything. Your time and sanity is worth far too much. There it is another easy yet fun way of working around stupid people in your office. Much love to you all!