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As someone who frequently laments a lack of focus time during work, I’m surprised to find myself mildly disagreeing with Anne Helen Petersen’s recent piece on meetings, and I wanted to think through that here a bit.
I’m not at all sure how much I’ve just bought into meeting culture, or whether there are some significant complexities that Petersen doesn’t mention (which, if so, no harm no foul; this is an exploration, not a sharp critique.)
My reaction stems from my current place of work, where I do almost certainly have too many meetings — but they don’t feel unproductive by default. Some do, but mostly, people are pretty good about having an agenda, etc.
And ... here’s the thing: IDK why this feels hard to say this morning: a meeting that progresses smoothly and quickly through an agenda implies working relationships & an understanding of ongoing work that almost certainly has to happen outside of the meeting.
This is especially true of libraries, and particularly true of libraries w/ several diff divisions (public services, digital infra & services, etc.), where even though we’re in separate depts. & divisions, our work is hugely interdependent.
(It’s probably true for at least some other institutions, too.)
Anyways: our trad org hierarchies, & the ways depts./divisions are managed imply an independence that is, at best, half true.
Anyways: our trad org hierarchies, & the ways depts./divisions are managed imply an independence that is, at best, half true.
I can say more about my argument for this later, but I’m trying to get myself to my point this morning — and for now, I guess it’s that relationships and understanding of each other’s work are as key to a successful meeting as a good agenda, and...
...that institutions aren’t always good at building that in (and this can indeed be a culture problem, if managers and senior managers tend towards narratives about other folks not working hard, etc).
So, a meeting culture that is really focused on Getting Shit Done might mean less meetings — but is maybe not going to help build the sort of solidarity that can be really powerful, and is often really needed.
Another way of putting this would be to note that “feminist leadership is slow leadership” . And I would argue that said slow leadership may well involve more meetings, rather than less. (NB: this doesn’t mean they’re not carefully focused meetings.) https://twitter.com/jessifer/status/1229193366929317889
There are plenty of challenges with doing this sort of slow-leadership and solidarity/respect building well. Do it badly, & people will likely dismiss you as having called a meeting, or an agenda item, that could have been an email.
Nonetheless, I think it often still needs doing, & needs to be done actively by leadership, rather than by assumption that it’ll happen. Similarly, org transparency doesn’t happen on its own; and building & maintaining that transparency takes time. And meetings (usually).
And there’s a real danger, I think, in a “too many meetings!” cry to feed into a neoliberal binary of some work being classified as productive, and other work being classified as unproductive, because it didn’t result in an immediate tangible (sellable) thing.
Not that I think that Petersen was trying to argue in favor of that sort of binary or measuring stick; not at all.
Anyhow: I need to shower and eat breakfast and all that — but thanks, y’all, for watching me think this through.
Anyhow: I need to shower and eat breakfast and all that — but thanks, y’all, for watching me think this through.
(I do have more thoughts, but I’m going to save them for later.)
