■ · People

Meetings and reviews that actually help

Bad meetings waste hours. No meetings means problems surface too late. A small business needs a few meetings, each with a clear job, a set agenda and a fixed length, and nothing more. Get the rhythm right and meetings start saving you time.

5 min readTools: Meeting agendasGo deeper ↓

Meetings are where the plan meets reality

Andy Grove, who ran Intel, wrote in High Output Management that a manager's output is the output of their team, and that meetings are one of the main tools managers have to influence it. Good meetings exchange information, make decisions and solve problems. Bad ones just fill the calendar.

The meeting rhythm

Meeting	How often	Length	Its job
Daily check-in (optional)	Daily	10 min	What's today's priority? What's blocking you?
Weekly team meeting	Weekly, same time	60–90 min	Scorecard, priorities, solve the top issues
One-on-ones	Weekly or every two weeks	30 min	The employee's agenda: progress, problems, growth
Quarterly planning	Every 90 days	Half day	Grade the quarter, set the next priorities
Performance review	Quarterly, short	30–45 min	Outcomes against the scorecard, values, goals

■ Copy-ready agendas

Agendas you can use this week

Weekly · 60–90 min

Weekly team meeting

WEEKLY TEAM MEETING
1. Good news, personal and business (5 min)
2. Scorecard: each number on or off target? (5 min)
   No discussion yet. Off-target numbers go to the issues list.
3. Quarterly priorities: on track or off track? (5 min)
4. Client and team headlines (5 min)
5. Last week's to-dos: done or not done? (5 min)
6. Issues: pick the top three and solve them (30–60 min)
   For each: what's really going on? What are the options?
   Decide. Who does what, by when?
7. Recap new to-dos and owners (5 min)

Weekly or biweekly · 30 min

One-on-one

ONE-ON-ONE (the employee's meeting)
1. What's going well since we last met?
2. What's getting in your way?
3. Progress on your outcomes and priorities
4. What do you need from me?
5. Feedback, both directions:
   What should I start, stop or keep doing?
6. Anything else on your mind?
7. Agreed next steps, with dates

Quarterly · half day

Quarterly planning

QUARTERLY PLANNING
1. Review last quarter's scorecard trends
2. Grade each priority: done or not done? Why?
3. Lessons: what did we learn? (run it like a dossier review)
4. Check the one-page plan: still the right direction?
5. Choose 3 to 5 priorities for the next 90 days
   Each one: one owner, due date, what "done" means
6. Update the scorecard targets
7. Everything else goes on the "not now" list

Quarterly · 30–45 min

Performance review

QUARTERLY PERFORMANCE REVIEW
1. Outcomes: each one from the role scorecard,
   met / partly met / not met, with evidence
2. Values: where did they show our values?
   Where didn't they? Specific examples only.
3. What went well this quarter (their view first)
4. What to improve (their view first, then mine)
5. Goals for next quarter
6. Support: training, tools or help they need
7. Anything that should change in the role

Make reviews short, frequent and fair

A once-a-year review asks everyone to remember twelve months of work, which nobody can do fairly. Short quarterly reviews against the role scorecard keep feedback fresh and remove surprises. Nothing in a review should be news. If it is, the one-on-ones weren't doing their job.

Feedback that lands

Describe what happened, the effect it had, and what you'd like next time. Keep it specific and about the work. Ask for their view first. For the wording, see Clear at Work.

The BBG take

Meetings are the tight ship's weekly inspection

Tight ship

The weekly meeting is where drift gets caught: a number off target, a priority slipping, a to-do not done. Same time, every week, no exceptions.

Detective

In the issues section, find the real problem before solving. The issue people name is often a symptom.

No yes man

As owner, speak last when solving issues. Ask "what am I missing?" before deciding.

Dossier

Big issues don't get solved in 10 minutes. Make them a Class II or III case and open a dossier.

Go deeperCase file, step-by-step how-to, common mistakes and questions to work through

Case file: Cutting meeting time and getting more done

A fictional example

Ray manages a team of six at a regional moving company: dispatch, sales and customer service. His team had a Monday meeting that usually ran 90 minutes, plus a daily check-in that often stretched to 30. Nobody could say what the meetings decided.

Ray added it up. Seven people (his six plus himself) in a 90-minute meeting is 10.5 hours of people's time every Monday. The daily check-ins added about 3.5 hours of people's time per day, or about 17.5 hours a week. That's roughly 28 hours a week of meetings, close to a full-time person's week.

He changed three things:

The daily check-in became a 10-minute stand-up with three questions: What's today's priority? What's in the way? Who needs help?
The Monday meeting got a written agenda sent the Friday before. Each item was labeled "decide," "discuss" or "inform." Inform items moved to a short written update instead.
Every meeting ended with a list of decisions and actions: who does what by when.

The Monday meeting dropped to 45 minutes. With stand-ups at 10 minutes, total meeting time fell to about 11 hours a week of people's time. More importantly, things that used to come up week after week finally got decided, because each item had an owner and a deadline.

How to run a meeting that decides things, step by step

Ask if it needs a meeting. If it's just information, send a written update.
Send an agenda ahead, with each item marked decide, discuss or inform.
Invite only the people needed for the decisions.
Start on time and put the decision items first, while people are fresh.
Name a decision-maker for each item, so discussion leads somewhere.
End with actions: who, what and by when. Read them out loud.
Send the notes the same day and check last week's actions at the next meeting.

Closing a meeting

"Let's confirm what we decided. Item one: we're doing X, and Sam owns it by Thursday. Item two: we're waiting on pricing, and Lee will bring it next week. Did I miss anything?"

Common mistakes and how to fix them

Mistake	Fix
Using meetings to share information	Send it in writing. Meet to decide and solve.
No clear owner for a decision	Name the decision-maker before the discussion starts.
Ending without actions	Leave the last five minutes for who, what and by when.
Letting one person take over	Ask quieter people directly: "What do you see that we're missing?"

Questions to work through

How many hours of people's time do your regular meetings use each week? Multiply people by hours.
Which meeting could be replaced by a written update?
What decision keeps coming back without being made? Who owns it?
Do your meetings end with clear actions? How would you know?
Who rarely speaks in your meetings, and how could you draw them in?

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