Is 15 the New 30? How to Run a Productive 15-Minute Meeting
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Here's your Money Briefing for Tuesday, October 17th. I'm J.R. Whelan for The Wall Street Journal. Ask people what bothers them the most about their job, and many are likely to say the amount of time they spend in meetings. 30 minutes here, 30 minutes there. It adds up to a lot of time away from their desks. But some are trying to solve that by cutting meeting times in half.
If you take away the hemming and the hawing and the warmup, 15 minutes is really enough time to get most of what you want to get done in a meeting done.
We'll talk to Wall Street Journal reporter Anne-Marie Chaker about the art of the 15-minute meeting after the break.
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Is 15 the new 30? Bosses and workers feel they can be more productive by reducing typical half-hour meetings to 15 minutes. Wall Street Journal reporter Anne-Marie Chaker joins me. So Anne-Marie, a lot of people feel that meetings slow down productivity, but they've been a mainstay of the workplace seemingly forever. Why the push to reduce meetings to 15 minutes?
What learning curve do employees face when switching to 15-minute meetings?
We're all tied to our calendars more acutely than ever before with video conferencing calls tied to our calendaring systems online. We feel it very acutely when we're one minute over or under. So, you know, there's just more of an awareness that time is money. And the normal default when we calendar something tends to be 30 minutes. And that can feel like too much time.
But is 15 minutes enough time to get things done?
If you really look long and hard at your blocks of time, you feel if you're focused, that most, maybe not all, but most of what you can get done in a meeting can get done in 15. If you take away the hemming and the hawing and the warm-up, 15 minutes is really enough time to get most of what you want to get done in a meeting done.
So the pleasantries, what'd you have for dinner last night, that all can go away.
Yeah, it's not to say that you can't do a little bit of it, but we tend to get nervous and do too much of it. And then the other person feels they need to respond to it. And then it just ends up taking half the meeting. If you can just bring in a little bit of confidence, a little bit of warm up, but then just say something like, let's get straight to it because we only have 15 minutes.
But is there a learning curve for people to be able to make their points or make a presentation in a short amount of time, like 15 minutes in a work meeting?
There are a few things you can do to get people more on board. You can give them a heads up. Hey, I want to hear all about your weekend. You can use your voice for warmth. We discount how the voice is really a powerful way to convey warmth. And we shouldn't be afraid to use it to our advantage.
How should you structure and prepare a 15-minute meeting for maximum focus?
And just to say something that kind of is personal, but also moves it along. Like, I want to hear all about your weekend, but let's get right to it because we only have 15 minutes. I've actually fixed my calendaring to blocks of 15 after this story from blocks of 30 before. And I feel it's been very effective in kind of setting things up better.
But if 15 minutes means that somebody might have less time to do their actual work in a meeting as opposed to a longer meeting, would that be a learning curve for them to economize how they're going to present to their group of coworkers?
When we're nervous, we hem and haw, we overthink. And then when something is scheduled for 30, people on the other end feel like they're going to need to take up all that time. So there's just a lot of time wasted anyway.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:02–0:55
2
Why are companies experimenting with cutting 30-minute meetings to 15 minutes?
0:55–1:01
3
Can 15 minutes really be enough time to accomplish meeting goals?
1:01–1:51
4
What learning curve do employees face when switching to 15-minute meetings?
1:51–3:40
5
How should you structure and prepare a 15-minute meeting for maximum focus?
3:40–5:49
6
What scheduling tactics reduce disruption when adopting 15-minute blocks?
5:49–6:31
7
Will adopting 15-minute meetings actually free up time for deep work?
6:31–6:54
Speakers
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