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The Meeting Epidemic: Why 78% of Your Workforce Would Rather Watch Paint Dry
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Here's a thought that'll make you uncomfortable: your weekly team meeting is probably the biggest productivity killer in your organisation. And before you roll your eyes and think "here we go again with another meeting-basher," hear me out. I've been sitting in boardrooms, training rooms, and virtual meeting spaces across Australia for seventeen years now, and I can tell you with absolute certainty that most meetings are worse than useless—they're actively destructive.
The numbers don't lie. Research from Melbourne University showed that 78% of employees would rather perform mundane tasks than attend their regular team meetings. When watching paint dry becomes more appealing than your Monday morning catch-up, you've got a serious cultural problem on your hands.
The Meeting Addiction Crisis
We've become addicted to meetings. Absolutely addicted.
Walk into any office in Sydney or Perth, and you'll find conference rooms booked solid from 9am to 5pm. People rushing from one meeting to another, clutching their laptops and coffee cups like lifelines. It's madness. Pure, unadulterated madness.
I worked with a client in Brisbane last year—won't name them, but they're a major financial services firm—who had managers spending 67% of their working hours in meetings. Sixty-seven percent! When did we decide that sitting around tables talking about work became more important than actually doing the bloody work?
The problem isn't just the quantity, though that's certainly part of it. It's the quality. Or complete lack thereof.
What Makes Meetings Toxic
Most meetings fail because they violate the fundamental principles of human psychology and business efficiency. Here's what I see repeatedly in organisations across Australia:
The dreaded "Status Update Meeting" where everyone takes turns reciting what they did last week. This isn't collaboration; it's performance theatre. If you need to hear what everyone's working on, use a shared document or project management tool. Don't trap eight people in a room for an hour to play round-robin.
Then there's the "Let's Brainstorm" session where the loudest voice wins and introverts check out mentally after the first five minutes. Real innovation doesn't happen when you put people on the spot in front of their colleagues. It happens when you give them time to think, research, and formulate ideas properly.
And don't get me started on meetings without agendas. That's like starting a road trip without knowing your destination. You'll end up somewhere, but it probably won't be where you wanted to go.
The Melbourne Method That Actually Works
About three years ago, I was consulting with a tech startup in Melbourne that was drowning in meetings. Their CEO was brilliant—really brilliant—but had bought into this Silicon Valley mythology that constant collaboration equals productivity. Wrong.
We implemented what I now call the Melbourne Method. Revolutionary? Hardly. Common sense? Absolutely.
First rule: Every meeting must have a written agenda distributed 24 hours in advance. No agenda, no meeting. Period.
Second rule: Default meeting length is 25 minutes, not 30. Parkinson's Law tells us that work expands to fill the time allocated. Give people 30 minutes, they'll use 30 minutes. Give them 25, they'll accomplish the same objectives in 25.
Third rule: Standing meetings only. Yes, literally standing. People make decisions faster when they're slightly uncomfortable. Plus, it eliminates the "lean back and zone out" posture that plagues conference room chairs across corporate Australia.
The results were extraordinary. Within six months, they'd reduced their meeting time by 40% while actually improving decision-making speed and employee satisfaction. The CEO now credits this approach with helping them secure their Series A funding.
The Silent Meeting Revolution
Here's where I'm going to lose some of you, but stay with me: some of the best "meetings" I've facilitated have involved almost no talking.
I learned this from a former client who ran logistics for Rio Tinto. Tough industry, tougher deadlines. He introduced silent planning sessions where teams would spend the first 15 minutes of any strategic meeting reading background materials and writing down their thoughts individually before any discussion began.
Game changer.
When you force people to crystallise their thoughts in writing before opening their mouths, the quality of discussion improves dramatically. You eliminate the "thinking out loud" rambling that kills momentum. You reduce the influence of office politics and personality dynamics. And you discover that your quiet team members often have the best insights.
Technology: Friend or Foe?
Video conferencing tools like Zoom and Teams have made meetings more accessible, but they've also made them more frequent. Just because you can connect 50 people from five different time zones doesn't mean you should.
I've observed that virtual meetings suffer from a unique form of attention decay. People multitask more aggressively when they're not physically present with colleagues. They think they're being sneaky checking emails or Slack messages, but their engagement levels drop significantly.
However, virtual meetings excel in certain contexts. Technical troubleshooting sessions work brilliantly online because participants can share screens and work through problems collaboratively. Training sessions with clear learning objectives translate well to virtual formats. But strategic planning and creative brainstorming? Those need human proximity and energy that screens can't replicate.
The Authority Problem
One thing that drives me absolutely mental is the "everyone must have input" mentality that's infected Australian business culture. Democracy is great for governments; it's terrible for meetings.
Someone needs to be in charge. Someone needs to make final decisions. And sometimes, that someone needs to cut off discussion and move forward, even when not everyone agrees.
I worked with a Perth-based mining company where their safety meetings would run for hours because everyone felt obligated to contribute. Lives were literally at stake, and they were debating procedure minutiae instead of implementing solutions. We introduced a "decision owner" role for each meeting topic. That person listened to input for a set time period, then made the call. End of discussion.
Results matter more than consensus.
The Preparation Paradox
Here's something counterintuitive: the best meetings require the most preparation. Yet most people show up completely unprepared, expecting to figure things out in real-time.
If you're calling a meeting to solve a complex problem, do the analytical work beforehand. Come with data, options, and recommendations. Use the meeting time to refine solutions, not to educate attendees about basic facts they should already know.
This preparation paradox explains why smaller companies often make faster decisions than larger ones. When you have eight people around a table instead of twenty-eight, you can assume higher baseline knowledge and move more quickly to substantive discussions.
The Follow-Up Failure
Most meetings die in the follow-up phase. People nod enthusiastically, agree to action items, then forget everything by Thursday.
Effective meeting management doesn't end when people leave the room. It requires systematic follow-up, clear ownership of deliverables, and accountability mechanisms that actually get used.
I recommend the 24-48-7 rule: action items must be documented within 24 hours, initial progress updates required within 48 hours, and formal check-ins scheduled within 7 days. Sounds bureaucratic, but it works.
The Culture Shift
Changing meeting culture requires leadership commitment that goes beyond lip service. Leaders need to model the behaviour they want to see.
If you're a CEO or senior manager reading this, start by auditing your own calendar. How many meetings did you attend last week? How many added genuine value? How many could have been handled with a quick phone call or email exchange?
Lead by example. Cancel unnecessary meetings. Keep the ones you run focused and time-bound. Demonstrate that you value your team's time as much as your own.
What Actually Works
After nearly two decades of consulting across industries, here's what I know works:
Clear purpose, defined outcomes, prepared participants, and decisive leadership. Everything else is negotiable.
Some organisations thrive with daily standups. Others need weekly deep-dives. Some teams collaborate best in person, others work better asynchronously. The specific format matters less than the underlying discipline.
Your meeting culture reflects your organisational values. If you tolerate rambling, unfocused discussions, you're signalling that clarity and efficiency don't matter. If you let the loudest voices dominate, you're telling quieter team members their contributions aren't valued.
Moving Forward
The meeting epidemic won't solve itself. It requires conscious effort and sustained commitment to change ingrained habits.
Start small. Pick one recurring meeting and apply the principles outlined here. Measure the results. Adjust based on feedback. Then gradually expand the approach across your organisation.
Your people want to do meaningful work. They want to solve problems and create value. Most meetings prevent this from happening. Fix your meetings, and you'll be amazed how quickly everything else improves.
Because at the end of the day, work should feel like work—not like an endless series of conversations about work.
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