When it comes to schedules, James Goodnight hates being fenced in. So the CEO of SAS Institute, a $1.5 billion maker of business software based in Cary, North Carolina, attends as few formal meetings as is humanly possible. He talked to us about why useless meetings proliferate and what he views as good alternatives. Everyone hates meetings, but aren’t they a necessary evil? Most of them aren’t necessary. Weekly meetings, in particular, in which you’re seeing the same people and going over the same kinds of information are mostly a waste of time. Managers and leaders should be constantly having casual interactions with people at all levels, in elevators and hallways and just popping into one another’s offices. The important thing is to be visible and accessible, which you’re not when you’re sitting behind a closed door in a conference room for the better part of your days. Why are so many meetings a waste of time? There’s a tendency when you’re looking at an issue to want to cover yourself. So you copy everyone on your e-mails or ask them to attend your meetings. And they feel like if they don’t answer the e-mail or attend the meeting, that means they’re not engaged or they’re out of the loop. How do you tell your boss, “I don’t need to be part of that discussion,” without it sounding like you aren’t important or you don’t care? But if you’re not part of it, and you spend that time doing something that’s actually related to your job, your productivity goes way up. We talk about the need for companies to be flexible, but what they’re often not flexible about is people’s time. People tend to think that a full calendar means they’re working hard. What it really means is that they haven’t given themselves time to explore new ideas or just visit with folks. And if they have to respond quickly to something, they have the additional headache of having to cancel a bunch of meetings. My best days are ones when there is nothing on my calendar. By the way, not all meetings are a waste of time. At certain levels of the organization, it’s appropriate to meet with your team on a regular basis to keep them on focus. Meetings can also be effective for brainstorming. But it’s important to continually question: Will this meeting boost or bust productivity? How long will it really take to cover the issue? Who really needs to be there? Does every meeting need to last an hour because that was the default appointment in the electronic calendar? How do you keep meetings short? I have left many meetings once I stopped getting anything out of them. James Goodnight (jim.goodnight@sas.com) is the CEO of SAS Institute.
