Don’t dish the meeting, it’s a cheap call option
When 37signals in Getting Real dished meetings it really smacked of what I call zero math opinion. I really enjoy reading their blog but on occasion I disagree with their opinion. I was reminded today when Seth Godin posted a funny cartoon on the topic of too many meetings.
Meetings can be good, very good. Meetings can be cheap options, investments with uncertain pay-offs and a premium price, maybe an hour of your time. You can treat your meetings like buying cheap call options. Many will expire worthless, but occasionally one will hit pay-off in the form of sales, capital raising, a change in strategic direction, new ideas, an acquisition or a new channel. Theoretically at least, an unlimited upside.
So the maths is all about the premium cost of these options, say an hour of your time, versus the pay-off probability.
You can practise a portfolio approach where you try and pick the eyes out of the market, pick the best meetings for you and your business but clearly recognise you stand to miss the big one every time you decline a meeting or think it’s better handled via emails and phone calls.
In my experience meetings I thought were valueless have ended up being the ones they have had huge pay-offs. One meeting I didn’t really want to go to at an investment bank I worked at ended up resulting in one of our best customers adding seven figure revenue to the bottom line over the subsequent year. Obviously this altered my thinking on meetings.
Humans are very bad predictors of outcomes. On a portfolio basis we are quite ok at predicting but in isolated circumstances and incidents such as a single meeting we are a bad predictor.
So spin the maths in your favour and have a few more meetings than the time efficiency champions would allow you.
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:09 am
Absolutely totally agree. I understand what the “time efficiency champions” are saying, and I really understand after a bad meeting!! However you are right when you say that you can’t predict what the results will be every time. The amount of times that an idea or a direction change has occurred from talking with other people is amazing.
Add into the equation the amount of times that email communication has turned sour - people either not reading the email properly or taking it in a way that it wasn’t meant, you can come up with some very good reasons face to face is still the best.
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:22 am
email is a classic example, i’d forgotten all about that. i use a lot of smiley faces etc so people don’t take things the wrong way. feels a bit childish sometimes but it’s better than offending someone through an ambiguous statement.