Navigating Meaningless Meeting Culture as a Developer

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Hey folks, we're going to go to the experience devs subreddit. We're going to talk through a topic that's around meetings, engagement, involvement, sort of wasted time, the purpose of meetings, this kind of this kind of stuff along with beeping noises in my car that will never stop. So yeah, this Redditor was sort of saying and they're framing that, you know, they're they're on a new team and there's this culture of uh, you know, in in meetings. It kind of just feels like people are getting there to discuss stuff that's either already known kind of just like the way they said it was regurgitating information just to clarify for an audience. They also say that they don't really feel like the meetings they're on are anything that they need to engage with and overall just like uh like a huge waste of time. So, I figured we haven't talked about meetings and stuff in a while.

They get to kind of uh you know walk through some different ideas on this. There's a lot of different Waiting for this thing to beep. No. Wow. Okay. Um, I think there's a lot of different angles and and kind of things to consider here. So, we can just try to chip away at it. I think my drive's not too long cuz I'm driving in to get to the office before my on call shift, it says it's only 30 minutes, which is wild because that's how long it should take. And every time I get in my car, it says it's going to be closer to an hour. So, let's jump into it. So I think one of the the angles to look at here is the sort of like intent of meetings. And I think there's different kinds of meetings. You'll have different people that value different things in meetings.

And um I I think like one one thing that's been on my mind a lot over the past few years especially with a lot more uh remote work like where I used to work this is uh prior to Microsoft which is also this is all lined up at the same time for me um sort of pandemic times uh switching jobs you know being in an office at a small company to having to being fully remote with remote employees um in a huge company. So, a lot of transitions there. And I think when it comes to and like different time zones too, I should mention when it comes to meetings. I think there's a lot of a lot of observed like inefficiencies or opportunities to consider, I guess. And I don't think that there's like a one-sizefits-all thing. So when we talk about this kind of stuff, I think it's important to think about different aspects and then you can kind of, you know, work with your team to figure out what works best for you.

Um because there might be things where I'm, you know, I'd list off 10 things and I'm like, "These these 10 things are awesome. We should do them. These 10 things are uh a net negative. We should avoid them if we can." And you might hear those and be like, "That makes literally no sense. Uh I would flip all of these different things around." And that's totally fine. I'm literally not going to try and convince you that these are the right things for you. They're just things to consider. Um, and you can come up with your own, too. So, I I do think that if you're doing meetings around like like standups or sync meetings, for us on a a bunch of my teams, we don't do like a daily standup. And that's because we're dealing with teams that are on completely opposite ends of the world for time zones.

And uh so we we opt for like once a week to do like a like a standup meeting. And then of course we have chat, we have email, we can communicate back and forth, but once once a week to kind of get together and chat through stuff. And so again on the time zone kind of thing like that works well because we're we're at such opposite ends that there isn't a good time for anyone. So the frequency is a big part of this, right? That's a factor. If we had to meet every day, um you know, would we try to alternate the time so that it's not crappy for one side every day? Would we do actually even for us with uh daylight savings time? We shift it twice a year kind of accommodate that. But regardless, the point is like do you like how do you balance that when you have different time zones so that you can meet um what are you discussing during those sync meetings?

For us, I think a bit of a trap to fall into is like because it's only once a week we come together to do a sync, it it feels like everyone wants to kind of go do a full status update, right? And I think for people that have been in standup meetings, especially if you do them every day, if you do a stand-up meeting every day, I think lots of people have been through this and your team is just giving a full detailed update on every work item that they have going on every single day. Like, you will hate it. It goes on for way too long. It's details that um that sound repetitive because you've heard the same thing a million times and uh sort of you're you're not using the time effectively to talk about the important parts. Right? If for example, if you are working on delivering a feature and you are actively making progress, you're not blocked.

there's nothing sort of interesting or just progressing through I don't know finishing writing your tests and you know getting things up for a pull request to get reviewed like instead of redescribing the entire feature and and talking through like all of the different things you've done in detail like if that's not interesting as an update then like omit it. I I would simply just say that you're not blocked and like it's about like it's hopefully going up for review by you know midday, end of the day, whatever. And I'll share the link so you guys can can check it out right now. It would be different if you were working on it and you were like hey you know that was the plan yesterday and I hit a huge blocker and I'm actively working through it with so and so or some team whatever to like let people know that this thing is delayed, right?

Like that's an that's interesting to share so that people know that there's an adjustment but if things are just progressing on track like keep it short just say that right so what's we have to think about what the purpose of these meetings actually are and so on on one of my teams uh I I haven't I don't think I've mentioned this before but as a like my kind of stance as a manager is I don't I don't like prescribing how things have to run. I have lots of ideas and opinions on this, but I don't like prescribing it unless I see that there's a really big problem. If there's a really big problem in terms of efficiency or anything else, then like I'll kind of step in and kind of try to put us back on track.

But otherwise, if the team is feeling like things are pretty good, I'm not going to like tell them they have to change how they do sync meetings or or other sort of like team rituals and stuff like that. Uh I would much rather that's driven by the team. And that means that I my goal is to create a you know a safe place for people to to to share their concerns or pitch their ideas and then and support them like let's go try it, right? And if it doesn't work then great like we learn something that doesn't work for us at this point in time let's try something else but I want that to come from the team and then I want to support them because I have found as someone who is a manager and having been a software engineer at the same time too I find that when things are prescribed by someone it's uh you don't it's hard to buy into it.

So I I don't like prescribing things if I don't need to. Anyway, uh on one of the teams, we're trying out doing a bit more of an async kind of a little bit more regular async updates throughout the week and then making sure we have kind of like a good snapshot of things going into our sync meeting. And then in our sync meeting instead of just going through everything, it's like anyone can go look at the status updates and then we can use that time together to actually discuss things that would be maybe a little bit more challenging to do um you know over 24-hour periods of sending messages and stuff like that, right? You send the message, you wait for the next group of people to come online at the end of the day when you're signing off. So you'll check it in the morning kind of thing.

So instead of doing that um you know we'll we'll do a bit more async stuff whether that's on teams chat, email, whatever it has to be and then we use that sync meeting to talk about more pressing um things that really need a dialogue around them. So we're changing like the use of that time together. Right? So that's one of the things I want you to think about is like especially if you're working cross geos, remote people, a mix like a hybrid, uh having like considering what needs what's most valuable to talk about together. Like you're spending time together. If it could be an email, it could be an update, it could be a summary, it could be a chat message. Like if it can be that, make it be that. Right? Getting people together at a fixed time is challenging and it's like it's expensive.

It's expensive not only because it's literally like people are being paid to be on a meeting and if it's not relevant to spend that time, it's a waste and it's also literally their time. They could be doing other that's more important uh in general like especially to them if they're not really needed there. I've heard some counters to this uh and you know I say on this channel I always try to make sure that I talk about different perspectives as much as I can but I've heard some counters to this where like um say for reviewing uh a document that's going to be discussed right so let's say there's a design review or uh post incident review or or something that uh actually having some dedicated time at the start of the meeting. So say just to make up numbers, say it's an hourong meeting, you actually carve out 10 to 15 minutes at the beginning of that meeting so everyone is forced to read it together.

Um I've heard people suggesting this format. I don't know where it comes from. I think there's a I don't know like some one of the big tech companies someone had said like this is their way of doing it. I don't know if it was uh Bezos or someone else. Don't quote me, but I think that's uh where some inspiration came from. So, I've I've heard that before. I I get it because some people will say that sure, everyone's supposed to read it ahead of time, but then inevitably no one does and then they go into this meeting unprepared. So, to me, it sounds like we're we're trying to fix like we're trying to address a symptom versus like go to the root cause. And I don't know like I don't have a solution a different solution for addressing the root cause but to me it feels like it's a crutch instead of trying to address uh what I think is probably a different root cause.

So anyway different perspective on that but yeah my my opinion is like when it comes to meetings if things can be asynchronous and you don't need people to be together then don't. Um, I think some exceptions to this I would say are like uh sometimes morale things. I think it's really it's nice to bring people together. So yes, maybe that could be an update where you send out, you know, a big big team success, right? Like you send that on an email or something and that's all done asynchronously. I think yes, that would work. That kind of fits into what I was saying a little bit earlier. But I also think that there's some value. I think there's a lot of value in having people brought together if possible for that. So I would say do both, right? If there's like team has delivered something awesome, you've reached a milestone.

There's something to celebrate as a team. Like I would recommend like get it documented, put it out in an email, right? You could send it to uh partner teams. you could send it to some of the other stakeholders, right? So maybe if there's especially if you're in larger companies kind of sharing with like some people that might be in other leadership positions to kind of say like hey look like we did some awesome stuff um you should be aware of it and like the you know this is kind of a celebratory milestone. I think that's great to do over email. And then I think also if you can bring together people for a a quick call, whatever, schedule it at a time, have it recorded, right? If you can't make it, it's cool. It's it's really just to to be able to express gratitude and kind of uh and celebrate together.

I just a bit of a tangent. I think that for folks that haven't really thought about this before, um there's there's probably people watching this that have been in situations where it feels like, you know, you're you're being pressured to get stuff delivered on time and then like you do it right, like you get there, hit the finish line, and then like you want to celebrate cuz you're like, "Hell yeah, we did it." But then you're on to the next one already. And then on to the next one. And it's you kind of fall into this cadence of like it's not a one-off thing. That's just like how we how we live now. It's how we operate. And it's it's demoralizing, right?

And I think what's often missing is that like we wait until these and maybe sometimes never, but we often wait until these really big milestones to be like, "Hell yeah, you know, the last year of work is all coming together and here it is." And it's such a brief, fleeting moment to be like, woo, and then keep going, right? Like, see you see you in 12 months when we have something else worth, you know, worth celebrating that that's this monumental. And I think that's kind of Uh, and I say that as someone who like also like fell into this trap of just like not paying attention to it. But I think it's really important to like to celebrate small wins and stuff. I know the word celebrate might sound like maybe overkill. Like what are are you saying pizza party every week, Nick? Because we, you know, we made it to Friday.

Like, no. But I I think that it's good to be able to acknowledge like progress. I think that's helpful. I think it's a it's a small thing when you do it regularly and I think it's very helpful. just that we don't we often don't think about it. But you know, saying thanks or like acknowledging that people are making progress, I think goes a really long way. Uh if you don't believe me, try it. Like what what do you have to lose, right? If you don't believe me and you're like, "This guy's full of shit." Try it. And you don't have to be a manager. Like lit try this out in like the next sprint or whatever you have. At the end of it, pick one or two people or something. message them on the side or like talk to them in person, whatever, and just say like, "Hey, like you did awesome this, you know, this sprint or whatever." Like, "Good work." Just say like say thanks, be appreciative, acknowledge them.

See what that's like. It's like such a little effort for you to do and I bet you it will make that person's month. It makes a huge difference. Okay, back to meetings. So, async when possible, right? I think record as much as you can. So this way if people can't be present, they can watch the recording. They get all the information they need. AI tools are incredible with summarizing. Now, um there's like almost I don't know. Uh if your company's not using some type of AI summary tool, like I would recommend that you pitch this, get something going. This person not want to drive the speed limit. Okay, we can solve that. Um, yeah. So, people can catch up on stuff as necessary and then that way if you're like, "Oh we can't have everyone together." It's not, "Well, we have to go schedule it out 2 weeks from now.

The next opportunity people are together." Just get it done. And one more thing on that. If you're like, well, this person has to be present at some point. Think about it this way. Tough luck, right? If you think one person is so critical that they can't be replaced by someone else to be present in a meeting, you have a different problem, right? Um, it's kind of maybe different for like promotion conversations and stuff when it needs to be like one-on-one. Um, but if you're talking about like projects, team meetings, stuff like that, if one person can't be present, you and and that screws up the whole meeting, I think you have a bigger problem. So, if that's something that you're experiencing and you're like, "Hey, I need this person and they're never available or whatever these three people I can never get their time." Ask them.

Be like, "Hey, I need you for this, but I can't get you at a good time. Is there someone we can delegate to? I think that this is the only like in my opinion this is one of the only ways that you're going to at some point be able to have timely meetings with people that uh are important because they're always going to be busy and you'll never get them all together at the same time unless the stars align. So don't don't make that, you know, the the make or break. That's the goal. And if you can't do it, it's okay, right? Have them get it delegated to someone else. You know, just clarify with them that they can follow up. Uh another strategy you can do, this isn't just for other stakeholders. This could be for uh colleagues on your team, this could be for if you're a manager, um individuals on your team that have to miss meetings that you think would be important.

Is this guy going to move over? No. answer is no. Um, you can just, you know, talk with them ahead of time and say, "Hey, like if you're not present for this, is there anything that I can represent there for you? And is there anything that if you're not present that I could help you follow up with?" Right? Like I will be your delegate and it doesn't matter your reporting hierarchy. It's like if can I can I represent you there and or can I follow up with you on things? I think that's a helpful strategy, too. Um, another sort of angle on this I want to talk about, and sorry I'm kind of going all over the place. This drive is just significantly faster than usual, which is great. Um, I think another angle I want to talk about is like uh meeting goals and meeting intention upfront and uh and being able to say no.

So, kind of like two different things here. Absolutely. As someone who is a manager, I have three different sub teams and there's going to be conversations where like I mean it it's going to be impossible that I can be in every single meeting for my three teams all the time. It's just it's just not going to work right. As much as I can, yes. But going back to what I said earlier, like I can't make my team wait for me to be present for everything cuz it's just it's going to be silly. We need to make sure we have flexibility. Um, so the idea is that like I number one, when I get a meeting invite, I want to make sure that I have a clear understanding of what we're doing in that meeting. And this is an uncomfortable thing, but I do recommend you try it.

I think that people should get in the habit of doing this more because it's also a learning opportunity for the other person. when you get an invite and it's like meet to talk about X and you're like cool like I think I know what X is like what what's the goal of this meeting and then you look at the invite and you're like oh there's nothing or there's there's a dock right and you're like okay like there's a dock on thing X cool like what what is the goal that we're trying to accomplish or why am I needed here if you don't know the answer to those things like instead Instead of just being like, "Oh, I hate I hate meeting life. This is the worst." I highly recommend you just message the person or talk to them if they're physically available and ask them, right?

Hey, I saw that we have a meeting on thing X. Um, I guess couple things. Like one, I don't know if I know a ton about X and I'm not sure like uh I don't really know what what we're trying to accomplish in the meeting and I actually don't know um if I need to be there. So I saw that I was invited uh and I just wanted to ask you like you know did were you uh just including a bunch of different people? uh did you need me for something in particular like so that I can have some context on like on what you're expecting my involvement is you know ask whatever you want frame it however you want the point is like you get an invite and you're like I'm just going to be wasting my time for an hour just ask right

like just ask I I don't think there's anything wrong with it like I said I think it's sometimes uncomfortable because the goal is that you're You're not challenging this person. You're not like, "Oh, you dummy. I can't believe you invited me to a meeting. Like, how could you? And you didn't even put a goal, you idiot." Like, it's not like that. It's just, hey, I didn't see a goal. This is the learning opportunity for them, right? Like, hey, maybe I should be making things clear in my meeting. Um, and then just getting clarification, right? And if you're like, after they clarify with you, maybe you're like, okay, like it actually doesn't make sense for me to go. Great. Your quick conversation just saved you an hourong meeting, right? Um, just not really that hard, but we often don't do that. We just kind of get fed up and we're like, I guess I have to go.

Um, and I think I said this in uh some other videos around like uh budgeting time, but I do think that it's important that you block your calendar. Literally go into your calendar, whatever tool you're using, block time for focus work. Then when people have to schedule a meeting, there's already a bit of a barrier where they're like, "Oh, like Nick isn't free at this time. Because if it's important and they need me and I'm not free, either they will schedule around me or they'll say, "Hey, most people will say, "Hey, like I'm trying to get this meeting at this time and I notice you're not available." Now I can make a decision, right? I can have this conversation. What's the goal of the meeting? Why do you need me there? Right? Cuz I'm going to be trading time I blocked. And maybe it's important and I it's maybe not as important as the thing I need to do at that point in time.

Cool. Can I delegate it to someone else? Right. Oh, Jimmy's going to be there. I'll just sync up with Jimmy. We have a, you know, we have a meeting later in the day together. I'll catch up with Jimmy. Like whatever, right? It's finding opportunities like that, I think, is going to be like something to lean into for sure. And what was the last kind of thing I wanted to talk about as I get close to the office? Oh, uh, scroll through some of the comments. Uh, I thought this was a really interesting one I hadn't thought of before, so I'm glad I kind of scrolled through, but I think some of the way that this person wrote about this, and I kind of only skimmed through their post, but kind of just seems like it's kind of a common like Reddit thing, so I'm not trying to like poke at them, but like, you know, I'm on this new team.

Everything they do sucks, right? that's focused around meetings in this case, but like you know, the new team is the team that's crappy and like their way of doing stuff sucks and I hate it. I'm using stronger language, but that's kind of the the vibe you get when you read it. And it's pretty typical on on Reddit and forums. And so someone was like, "Hey, like you know, you're probably feeling like a lot of stuff's not really relevant to you because you're not actually getting engaged in it. So of course it's not going to be relevant to you." So they suggested something interesting, I thought, which was like get engaged, right? Like you might not know where to start, but like instead of just sitting there being like, I don't know why I'm here. This sucks. It's such a waste of time. Instead of doing that, um, ask questions, right?

Like just get involved. Do a do a bit of pre-ereading. See what's going on. Like how can you make yourself not an idol participant, right? Like it it just I thought it was an interesting uh take on it because a lot of the stuff I was talking about was like how do you how do you avoid the meetings that aren't a good use of your time? Did I just find the best parking spot in this whole garage? Yep. Give me one sec. This is awesome. I don't think this has ever happened. Probably won't ever happen again. That's cool. They can't park his car. I got to do one more take on this. Totally not embarrassing. No one's watching, right? This isn't on the internet. You can't actually see what I'm doing. Oh, that guy saw me. Damn it. Cool.

Um, yeah, I thought it was a an interesting alternative to instead of like avoiding so you can get your time back or um, you know, changing what the meeting's about, like reframing it so that it's more effective. It's like you you become part of the meeting, right? Like that's one of the reasons why some of these feel like they're shitty is like you're like I don't even know why I'm here. So be part of it. And that could be challenging. I don't think that's an easy thing to do, especially if you're new. Like how am I supposed to be part of this? I don't know. Ask questions, right? I think I find myself I'm not saying I'm a great example of this, but there's some meetings that I'm in where I'm like I feel that way. I'm like I don't know how I can be helpful, but I engage in the chat, right?

So I'm often a person that's in the chat. So, if there's other participants, someone's talking, whatever, there's a discussion, if I'm like, I'm not really in this, sometimes I'll ask questions in the chat or I will put things into the chat that are like more open-ended, like, you know, have we considered this or does anyone have any background on this I can follow up on so that I'm a little bit more engaged and then I can learn about it. Um, so it happens with me, too. But I I do think like I thought that just was an interesting take is like instead of avoiding or be like acknowledging you're just a passive person there that doesn't really add any value. I don't know like genuinely try to get involved and be curious and ask stuff, right? I think that was a a cool take. So yeah, I think that's all I got for this one.

So thanks for watching. If you have questions about software engineering, career development, that kind of stuff, leave them below in the comments. Otherwise, go to codeccommute.com. You can submit totally anonymously there and I will make a video followup for you. And now I'm going to go be on call. I won't see you later.