I've joked with a few project managers, "If you don't like meetings, you're in the wrong field." A friend used to tease me about having meetings to plan meetings about meetings. While this may reflect a reality many of us have lived, there is also truth in the idea that not everything needs to be a meeting.
I'm in a couple different weekly management meetings and one change we're trying to make is to submit and read status updates in advance, skip the status readouts during the meeting, and focus on actionable items, open questions, and decisions. We're getting better, but it can be hard to break old habits.
What steps have you taken to reduce the number of meetings on your projects, or to make your meetings more effective?
Omar JabbarProject Management and Digital Transformation Consultant| OGreen IT Service Inc.Ontario, Canada
I believe the effectiveness of a meeting depends on its type and the desired outcome. I keep meetings short and focused, steering clear of side discussions. Participants are encouraged to raise their hands to ask questions during the meeting. The agenda will be distributed one or two days in advance to ensure there are no surprises. This approach applies to team, vendor, and management meetings. Saving Changes...
One habit that helped me is shifting updates to written summaries so meetings focus only on decisions and risks. I also group related topics into one short session instead of multiple touchpoints. Clear agendas and strict timeboxing make a big difference. When people know the purpose and outcome upfront, meetings naturally stay shorter and fewer. Saving Changes...
What's helped the most is questioning whether every update really needs a meeting. We've had some success moving routine updates to written status reports and keeping meetings focused on decisions, blockers and alignment. It hasn't eliminated meetings, but it's made the ones we do keep much more useful. Saving Changes...
Program Manager| HARPER SRLSanto Domingo / Distrito Nacional, Dominican Republic
One thing that’s worked well for me is being very strict about why we’re meeting. If it’s just an update, it goes async. Meetings are reserved for decisions, blockers, or alignment. Clear agendas, timeboxing, and fewer participants make a huge difference, and if there’s no decision to make, we cancel. Saving Changes...
Oleksandr DogrykDirector of Operations| Globberry LLCKyiv, Ukraine
When people say they don't understand why meetings are needed, that's the core problem — they genuinely don't understand the purpose of meetings. And this isn't the fault of the people, but of the project manager who failed to organize proper communication and accountability within the project. Meetings are precisely needed so that people know what is required/expected of them (kick-off and explanatory meetings), and the project manager must ensure that everyone involved has everything they need to contribute effectively to the project. Of course, during implementation, meetings are necessary to resolve issues, but they should be truly focused — involving only the people who can actually address the specific issue. Having meeting after meeting with no time left for actual "work" is a problem caused by:
Lack of clear understanding of who is responsible for what / or lack of proper delegation of responsibilities, which leads to involving all project participants in meetings about every single issue.
And this is the responsibility of the project manager. Saving Changes...
Project & PMO Manager | Research & Enterprise Mentor| GFB HoldingSouth America, Brazil
To optimize effectiveness and reduce meeting proliferation in projects, I adhere to the fundamental premise that each gathering must have a clear and intrinsically collaborative objective, going beyond mere information dissemination. Meetings are, by nature, a stage for strategic alignment, multifaceted discussions, critical decision validation, constructive debates, and collaborative work on complex problems—never a mere channel for updates or status readouts, which can and should be communicated asynchronously. Thus, my main actions consist of: (1) Implementing a strict "Objective Gate": Before scheduling any meeting, I require the proposer to articulate a specific objective that can only be achieved through synchronous, collective interaction, such as resolving impasses or co-creating solutions; (2) Mandatory Pre-reading and Executive Summaries: Ensuring that all status information and supporting documents are distributed and read in advance, allowing meeting time to be entirely dedicated to discussion and deliberation on points of contention or pending decisions; and (3) Action and Decision-Focused Agenda: Structuring the agenda with actionable items, open questions, and decisions to be made, with a dedicated facilitator to maintain focus and ensure that each item results in clear next steps and assigned responsibilities, transforming every minute into tangible value for the project. Saving Changes...
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