Some Amazon meetings begin with silent, independent reading of a preparatory memo. After reading and adding notes, participants who have no further contribution are encouraged to leave. This respects individuals' time and ensures that only those essential for the synchronous discussion remain.
A simple yet powerful technique to maintain customer-centricity is to place an empty chair in the meeting room, explicitly symbolizing the customer. This physical reminder forces participants to consider the customer's perspective in every discussion and decision, preventing internal focus from dominating the conversation.
Instead of incrementally auditing meetings, a "meeting doomsday" involves deleting all recurring meetings for 48 hours. This forces teams to consciously rebuild their calendars from scratch, questioning the necessity, cadence, and attendees for every meeting, which is more effective than defending existing ones.
Instead of listing vague topics like "team discussion," structure each agenda item with a verb and a noun (e.g., "Decide Q4 budget," "Align on launch strategy"). This simple framing forces clarity on the desired outcome for each item and helps determine if it even requires a synchronous meeting.
Before scheduling, ensure a meeting's purpose is to Decide, Debate, Discuss, or Develop (4Ds). Then, confirm the topic is either Complex, Emotionally intense, or a One-way door decision (CEO). This rigorous filter eliminates status updates and other low-value synchronous gatherings from calendars.
"Bike shedding" describes the tendency for teams to spend disproportionate time on simple, low-stakes agenda items (like a bike shed's color) because they are less cognitively taxing than complex, high-stakes topics (like a nuclear power plant). Acknowledge this bias to keep discussions focused on what truly matters.