8 ways to make meetings more tolerable

Changing the venue, appointing a facilitator, and starting on time are just a few techniques for keeping your gatherings efficient while spurring creativity.

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“Meetings are indispensable when you don’t want to do anything.”— John Kenneth Galbraith, economist.

As we can all attest, business meetings often waste valuable productive time and tend to last far longer than they should.

Until we learn to communicate telepathically, they will remain a necessary evil—not just as a means of exchanging ideas and information—but also as a way to build relationships.

That doesn’t mean we have to like them.

It’s all about the value of time

As economist and social theorist Thomas Sowell quipped, “People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything.” Whether he meant it facetiously or not, there’s a grain of truth in Sowell’s statement. Someone who enjoys meetings might actually prolong them and anything else they laid their hands on.

Making the most of meetings

You might never actually enjoy meetings, but you can make them more tolerable with these tips:

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