Gosh darn meetings

If there is one constant criticism I hear from healthcare insiders, it is this: we meet too much. Meetings dominate calendars. Most of it is for good reason: healthcare, with all its disparate players, requires extensive levels of collaboration.

So barring a dictum from above, we’re left with a revolutionary concept: make meetings more effective. There are plenty of methods to try, but Tony Golsby-Smith suggests one with real potential: turn your meetings into conversations.

He concludes with an optimistic reality check:

Of course, I am not arguing that an organization should throw out all of its agenda-driven process meetings and replace them with conversations. But by holding more conversations and fewer meetings, you will find that people begin to solve your company’s wickedest problems faster, and in a richer way. And instead of complaining about being bored to death, people will talk about how much fun they’ve had.