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Not every team or organization is ready for a meeting improvement project. This litmus test helps you quickly assess whether the conditions are right for success—and whether meetings are the real problem.
When to Recommend a Meeting Improvement Project
Executive Enthusiasm: Clear owner and visible participation
There must be an executive sponsor who is both clearly identified as the project owner and willing to update and model new behaviors in their own meetings. Without this, the project won’t have the social capital required for change.
Obvious Missing Skills
You see signs that teams were never expected to run effective meetings: meetings titled “Meeting,” no agenda or notes, spikes in 1:1s and ad hoc syncs, unclear who should attend or lead. These are coachable problems, and training + coaching can have real impact.
Clear, Repeated Complaints from a Representative Group
If multiple people across roles and levels report meetings as boring, useless, or overwhelming, that’s a real signal. Group behavior won’t change unless the group wants change.
Hybrid or Remote Frustration
People feel disconnected, uncertain about decisions, or unsure what’s going on. This often reflects meetings that haven’t been redesigned for distributed work.
Time Pressure: “Why now?” matters
Ask: Could this easily be delayed without consequences? If yes, it's a hard sell. If no—if timing is urgent or tied to real stakes—lean in.
Meeting Volume: Enough to matter
For full discovery work, there must be enough data to justify the investment. Team-level: at least 5 recurring meetings per week. Org-level: roughly 100+ employees. Smaller teams may benefit more from targeted training or a workshop.
⚠️ When It Looks Like a Meeting Problem, but Isn’t
If the group demonstrates healthy practices in several meetings (agenda, roles, follow-up, etc.) but people still feel overwhelmed, meetings may be a symptom, not the root cause.
Top suspects in the broader collaboration system include:
- Too many or competing priorities
- Unclear decision-making rights or pathways
- No reliable system of record (decisions, tasks, or async updates)
Improving meetings alone won’t fix this. You may still offer a light meeting tune-up, but should focus upstream.
Problems That Don’t Register as Meeting Problems, But Require Meeting Fixes
People often judge meetings by how they feel—not what they produce. Socially satisfying meetings may still be failing the organization. When sentiment is positive but results are weak, ask: What decisions are getting made? What changes after this meeting? How do we know it’s working?
These challenges are rarely framed as “bad meetings,” yet improving the meeting system is essential to solving them.
- Strategy-to-Execution Gaps:
What they say: “We’ve communicated the strategy, but nothing’s happening.” / “Teams are going in different directions.”
Why meetings matter: Without structured alignment meetings and decision checkpoints, strategic intent gets lost in translation. - Accountability and Follow-Through Issues:
What they say: “We talk about the same things every week.” / “People agree in the meeting, then nothing happens.”
Why meetings matter: Recurring meetings lack clear next steps, role clarity, or follow-up structures. Fixing this boosts execution and trust. - Escalation Overload:
What they say: “Everything ends up on my desk.” / “The team can’t resolve things on their own.”
Why meetings matter: Poorly designed meetings don’t support decision-making or constructive disagreement. Escalation becomes the default. - Disempowered Middle Management:
What they say: “Managers are stuck in the weeds.” / “People aren’t stepping up.”
Why meetings matter: Meetings don’t create space for sensemaking, delegation, or boundary-setting. Redesigning meeting roles can shift power dynamics. - Slow Decision Cycles:
What they say: “It takes forever to decide anything.” / “We’re stuck in analysis paralysis.”
Why meetings matter: No clear decision framework, unclear who decides, no convergence point in the calendar. Meetings are either missing or misused. - Poor Cross-Functional Coordination:
What they say: “Nobody tells us what’s happening.” / “We find out too late to adjust.”
Why meetings matter: Coordination rhythms are missing, fragmented, or based on informal backchannels. Designing shared forums is essential. - Team Misalignment and Conflict:
What they say: “We don’t trust each other.” / “We’re not on the same page.”
Why meetings matter: Meetings lack structure for voicing differing views, surfacing assumptions, or resolving tensions productively.
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