Not even close. Here is how you deal with meetings: 0. Assume by default that there should be NO MEETING. Make sure you have always tried something to avoid

Not even close. Here is how you deal with meetings: 0. Assume by default that there should be NO MEETING. Make sure you have always tried something to avoid a meeting (E-mail, phone call, status web page, etc.). Web pages are useful because they serve as continuous references. 1. Assume by default that the meeting does not need a room. Do not further distract people by taking them away from desks, etc. where they might make progress on something else during the 80% of the meeting where you know they won’t really be needed anyway. Phones calls with VNC are good for this. Video calls are not, as it’s distracting to see people looking off to the side most of the time. 2. Do not ever start a meeting without doing your own homework. Before inviting yet another person to your meeting, strongly consider the overlap between attendees and ensure that the extra person is really going to help. If you must reserve a room, visit the room in advance so you know it’s actually big enough, isn’t missing a whiteboard and isn’t going to make you screw with AV equipment for 15 minutes. 3. Do not “fill” time. A 2 minute meeting is not a failure, it is a resounding success. 4. Do not waste time. Start on time or give like 2 hours notice if you cannot. Display short slides. Answer questions simply. Anyone who doesn’t know the details can ask. There should not be people fidgeting while someone rambles for 20 minutes about something that, it turns out, everyone already knows. Never hold meetings to request information you already have (e.g. no round-tables to update status when you already had everyone E-mail you a report). Do not use a meeting to go over slides on a projector where someone has painstakingly copy/pasted code or other things that would have been better reviewed in front of an actual terminal. 5. Meeting should rarely be scheduled automatically, and if they are then there should be no shame in periodically cancelling them. Do not meet every week “just to meet”; have something to talk about. Or, if you have hardly anything to say and it’s not time-critical, merge it into next week and cancel this week. 6. If time zones are an issue (e.g. other side of the world), send information-dense messages that anticipate as many issues as possible, containing answers to questions that may not have been asked yet, etc. Otherwise you will end up scheduling meeting, with half the team dialing in from home at 10:30 PM, to find out about stupid things that could have been handled with a document.