7 ms·

The solution to the "50 minute meetings always stretch to an hour" problem is to start them at, say, 9:10am so there's a clean mental stop at 10am. If you sche

The solution to the "50 minute meetings always stretch to an hour" problem is to start them at, say, 9:10am so there's a clean mental stop at 10am. If you schedule them for 9am of course nobody will stop at 9:50am.

CogitoCogito 1y ago
I presume in that case each meeting would just stretch to 10 over the hour.
- lkirkwood 1y ago
  Well that's the claim, isn't it. People tend to see an hour tick over and think "well, better wrap up". The impulse is much less strong at ten minutes to the hour. It's a bit like pricing things just below a round number because it doesn't feel quite so expensive. GP's comment makes sense to me.
- singron 1y ago
  If "30" minute meetings start 5 minutes late, then you can only go 5 past reliably.
- bentcorner 1y ago
  My team does this, most scheduled meetings are scheduled 5m/10m after the hour. Meetings usually end at the hour or before. Our calendar defaults to start/end on the hour so sometimes one-off meetings will start/end on the hour but those are usually 2-3 people and focused on solving some problem so they don't usually last the full time anyway. For the larger scheduled meetings, if they drag over the hour because of some conversation our culture is that people leave/drop if they're not interested.
flerchin 1y ago
Heh some people are on time, some people are late. It's seemingly a culture thing, and neither side understands the other. You say "of course nobody will stop at 9:50am" and that is exactly what I would do.
- apercu 1y ago
  > neither side understands the other. Being late is viewed as rude or lacking respect for others by a lot of people. Do people who are habitually late view prompt people as rude for being on time?
  - SoftTalker 1y ago
    In my experience the people who are late are usually senior or exec types who arrive late with a lot of bluster and comments about how busy they are and then "Ok where are we?" like they are taking over the meeting.
  - shermantanktop 1y ago
    Not everywhere is like wherever you are. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-dec-11-tr-insider11-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-dec-11-tr-insid... Non-punctual cultures can view on-time people as clueless, over-eager, and annoying.
    - throwaway2037 1y ago
      The exact opposite can also be true, so not much is being said here. Try being late to a meeting in Germany or Japan. It is disrespectful. Are there any highly developed countries where the business culture is still "non-punctual"? I struggle to think of any. In short, if you have two businesses side-by-side, and one operates more punctually, then it will probably out-compete the other. To be clear, I'm not talking about social culture. Yes, Italians might be late by an hour to go to dinner with friends, but I doubt people in Milan will be so late to a sales meeting with client.
      - shermantanktop 1y ago
        Well, business cultures are social cultures. Firing off angry emails because somebody is “late” in Madrid won’t land you suppliers, resellers, contracts, or corporate customers. FWIW I am personally a very punctual person with heritage from one of the most punctual countries. But when in Rome…
metalliqaz 1y ago
Unfortunately that isn't the solution. As the article correctly notes, meetings continue, regardless of the wall clock, until the next group of people come and kick you out. This is a universal truth in office buildings.
- kibwen 1y ago
  > meetings continue, regardless of the wall clock, until the next group of people come and kick you out. The meeting itself might continue, but as an individual, once the meeting passes the scheduled finish time, you stand up and say "sorry, I've got another meeting to get to". The worse your company's excessive meeting culture is, the better this works.
  - AStonesThrow 1y ago
    I always felt this was wholly ineffective coming from someone who wasn’t contributing or necessary to any given meeting, but it’s important to establish and hold boundaries like this. Even more points when a participant speaks up at the very beginning, to announce, “I’ve got a hard-stop at 9:50, so I’ll need to leave at that point no matter what.” Then the responsibility for wrap-up is placed squarely on leadership. Unfortunately I’ve also found that a poorly-run meeting won't get around to the wrap-up on time, and so leaving early may only hurt that participant, by missing something important.
    - metalliqaz 1y ago
      If you're not needed at the meeting, probably best not to be there in the first place.
      - AStonesThrow 1y ago
        Someone who is neither contributing nor necessary to a meeting may still be required to attend the meeting. For example, a mandatory training meeting includes people who are being trained, who are in this category. If the meeting fails to accomplish its objectives in 50 minutes, then participants may excuse themselves with a clear conscience, but they may find themselves less-informed than coworkers who chose to stay for the entire session. Especially if there is "Q&A" for clarifications at the end of it.
NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago
>The solution [...] is to start them at, say, 9:10am so there's a clean mental stop at 10am. Unfortunately, I've been in a few meetings scheduled for 9:00 that only really started at 9:10. I think if they were scheduled for 9:10, they would've only started at 9:20...
- bombcar 1y ago
  You can NEVER knowingly trick yourself with clock tricks. Because all it will do is make you really good at time math. I've seen it even back when people would set all their clocks in their car and home 5 minutes fast, they just got real good at doing five minute math.
  - cruffle_duffle 1y ago
    Haha. I was one of those “set clock fast” people until one day realized that all it did was make the time I was supposed to be somewhere even more ambiguous than before. It never helped me arrive somewhere exactly on time, but certainly contributed to me arriving late because my mind forgot precisely what time my clock was set to relative to real time.
- Dylan16807 1y ago
  In that case you can just keep scheduling it for 9:00 to 10:00, I guess? But I agree with the parent, if you need to move something then move the start.
yegle 1y ago
Our team collectively decided all meetings should start 5 min late and end at the half hour boundary (we do 55min instead of 50min). This can be easily enforced because other neighboring teams would knock the door at the half hour mark and you can't really blame them or be grumpy about it.
neilpa 1y ago
This was the de-facto practice for courses at U of M and I loved it. Although it appears they may have ended that practice in 2018 https://record.umich.edu/articles/university-updating-start-end-times-classes/ https://record.umich.edu/articles/university-updating-start-...
globular-toast 1y ago
In most places I've worked it's de rigueur to give people at least 5 mins to arrive before proceeding. Do people really just start meetings the instant they get in the room?!

CogitoCogito 1y ago

I presume in that case each meeting would just stretch to 10 over the hour.

lkirkwood 1y ago
Well that's the claim, isn't it. People tend to see an hour tick over and think "well, better wrap up". The impulse is much less strong at ten minutes to the hour. It's a bit like pricing things just below a round number because it doesn't feel quite so expensive. GP's comment makes sense to me.
singron 1y ago
If "30" minute meetings start 5 minutes late, then you can only go 5 past reliably.
bentcorner 1y ago
My team does this, most scheduled meetings are scheduled 5m/10m after the hour. Meetings usually end at the hour or before. Our calendar defaults to start/end on the hour so sometimes one-off meetings will start/end on the hour but those are usually 2-3 people and focused on solving some problem so they don't usually last the full time anyway. For the larger scheduled meetings, if they drag over the hour because of some conversation our culture is that people leave/drop if they're not interested.

flerchin 1y ago

Heh some people are on time, some people are late. It's seemingly a culture thing, and neither side understands the other. You say "of course nobody will stop at 9:50am" and that is exactly what I would do.

apercu 1y ago
> neither side understands the other. Being late is viewed as rude or lacking respect for others by a lot of people. Do people who are habitually late view prompt people as rude for being on time?
- SoftTalker 1y ago
  In my experience the people who are late are usually senior or exec types who arrive late with a lot of bluster and comments about how busy they are and then "Ok where are we?" like they are taking over the meeting.
- shermantanktop 1y ago
  Not everywhere is like wherever you are. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-dec-11-tr-insider11-story.html https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2005-dec-11-tr-insid... Non-punctual cultures can view on-time people as clueless, over-eager, and annoying.
  - throwaway2037 1y ago
    The exact opposite can also be true, so not much is being said here. Try being late to a meeting in Germany or Japan. It is disrespectful. Are there any highly developed countries where the business culture is still "non-punctual"? I struggle to think of any. In short, if you have two businesses side-by-side, and one operates more punctually, then it will probably out-compete the other. To be clear, I'm not talking about social culture. Yes, Italians might be late by an hour to go to dinner with friends, but I doubt people in Milan will be so late to a sales meeting with client.
    - shermantanktop 1y ago
      Well, business cultures are social cultures. Firing off angry emails because somebody is “late” in Madrid won’t land you suppliers, resellers, contracts, or corporate customers. FWIW I am personally a very punctual person with heritage from one of the most punctual countries. But when in Rome…

metalliqaz 1y ago

Unfortunately that isn't the solution. As the article correctly notes, meetings continue, regardless of the wall clock, until the next group of people come and kick you out. This is a universal truth in office buildings.

kibwen 1y ago
> meetings continue, regardless of the wall clock, until the next group of people come and kick you out. The meeting itself might continue, but as an individual, once the meeting passes the scheduled finish time, you stand up and say "sorry, I've got another meeting to get to". The worse your company's excessive meeting culture is, the better this works.
- AStonesThrow 1y ago
  I always felt this was wholly ineffective coming from someone who wasn’t contributing or necessary to any given meeting, but it’s important to establish and hold boundaries like this. Even more points when a participant speaks up at the very beginning, to announce, “I’ve got a hard-stop at 9:50, so I’ll need to leave at that point no matter what.” Then the responsibility for wrap-up is placed squarely on leadership. Unfortunately I’ve also found that a poorly-run meeting won't get around to the wrap-up on time, and so leaving early may only hurt that participant, by missing something important.
  - metalliqaz 1y ago
    If you're not needed at the meeting, probably best not to be there in the first place.
    - AStonesThrow 1y ago
      Someone who is neither contributing nor necessary to a meeting may still be required to attend the meeting. For example, a mandatory training meeting includes people who are being trained, who are in this category. If the meeting fails to accomplish its objectives in 50 minutes, then participants may excuse themselves with a clear conscience, but they may find themselves less-informed than coworkers who chose to stay for the entire session. Especially if there is "Q&A" for clarifications at the end of it.

NoMoreNicksLeft 1y ago

>The solution [...] is to start them at, say, 9:10am so there's a clean mental stop at 10am. Unfortunately, I've been in a few meetings scheduled for 9:00 that only really started at 9:10. I think if they were scheduled for 9:10, they would've only started at 9:20...

bombcar 1y ago
You can NEVER knowingly trick yourself with clock tricks. Because all it will do is make you really good at time math. I've seen it even back when people would set all their clocks in their car and home 5 minutes fast, they just got real good at doing five minute math.
- cruffle_duffle 1y ago
  Haha. I was one of those “set clock fast” people until one day realized that all it did was make the time I was supposed to be somewhere even more ambiguous than before. It never helped me arrive somewhere exactly on time, but certainly contributed to me arriving late because my mind forgot precisely what time my clock was set to relative to real time.
Dylan16807 1y ago
In that case you can just keep scheduling it for 9:00 to 10:00, I guess? But I agree with the parent, if you need to move something then move the start.

yegle 1y ago

Our team collectively decided all meetings should start 5 min late and end at the half hour boundary (we do 55min instead of 50min). This can be easily enforced because other neighboring teams would knock the door at the half hour mark and you can't really blame them or be grumpy about it.

neilpa 1y ago

This was the de-facto practice for courses at U of M and I loved it. Although it appears they may have ended that practice in 2018 https://record.umich.edu/articles/university-updating-start-end-times-classes/ https://record.umich.edu/articles/university-updating-start-...

globular-toast 1y ago

In most places I've worked it's de rigueur to give people at least 5 mins to arrive before proceeding. Do people really just start meetings the instant they get in the room?!