One of our values is to Work in the Open. Specifically for meetings, we pride ourselves on the hours we save from bureaucratic “syncs and connects”, and what that enables us to do creatively.

A big way that we live this out is being efficient in the way we work together, and intentional about how to collaborate asynchronously and when we actually need to ‘have a meeting.’ So use the following decision tree (it’ll become muscle memory over time):

But sometimes we need to meet. They shouldn’t keep you from your ‘real’ work, and if structured right, they can be where work gets done. So when you do meet, here are some tips to follow:

• Again, if you need a meeting to make a decision or have a discussion that’ll be faster in real time, cool. If you need to broadcast info, share it in writing or Loom.
• Think about who needs to be in the meeting; if they’re the driver or approver, sure. If they need to be informed or consulted, think about doing that before or after (or just ask ‘em)
• Craft and share the agenda. Either in the calendar invite or in a shared doc if it’s a recurring meeting. That’ll help people determine if they should go or not too.
• Take notes, assign action items to people, and follow up after
• As the meeting owner, make sure there’s a tangible result from the meeting: decision, plan, list of great ideas to pursue, shared understanding of the work ahead. And share the ‘result’ with others whose work may be affected. Oversharing is better than not.