[f6v]

Programmers often think the technical aspect of the work is the most important. I’ve met many developers wannabe entrepreneurs who were convinced they had to spend as much time perfecting their app as possible instead of talking to prospective customers. We all know that doesn’t end well.

What I realized over my relatively long IT career is that maybe developers just don’t get why meetings are necessary. Not saying all meetings are equally useful, many of them are in fact a waste of time. But many engineers are narrow-minded and outright reject all the benefits of getting into the same room and discussing a problem.

[atoav]

As someone who worked as a feeelancer and on film sets, as well as in teams: communication is key. But that doesn't mean this communication has to happen in a meeting.

I am not a fan of meetings, but I like a weekly meeting for a project or our department. What I don't like is pointless meetings where things are repeated that are written more concisely in the gitlab issues or in an email everybody should have read.

The point of meetings is to bring all the relevant people onto the same information level and discuss potential issues, however a lot of the more detailed stuff should be consumed beforehand individually.

[ryanSrich]

I think we should make a distinction here.

Client, prospect and customer meetings are absolutely necessary and you should prioritize those no matter what.

Internal time wasting meetings are the pinnacle of the art of not working and should be avoided at all costs.

[f6v]

> Internal time wasting meetings are the pinnacle of the art of not working and should be avoided at all costs.

I’m yet to experience a 100% black-and-white phenomenon in the Universe. We’re all not equal in how we see the work and how we process the information. That’s why we need to compromise and try to underhand why meetings are scheduled.

Ok, suppose programmers are 100% exempt from the internal meetings. Engineering managers and product owners then go ahead and just make every single decision there is. How’s that? The meetings are often used for people to sync on the progress and issues. Moreover, technical people can give their input and help non-technical ones to better understand the limitations, issues, etc.

[ryanSrich]

> Ok, suppose programmers are 100% exempt from the internal meetings. Engineering managers and product owners then go ahead and just make every single decision there is. How’s that? The meetings are often used for people to sync on the progress and issues. Moreover, technical people can give their input and help non-technical ones to better understand the limitations, issues, etc.

That sounds horrendous. Those people shouldn't be making every decision. I don't know what that has to do with meetings. I'm not saying engineers should skip meetings. I'm saying abolish all internal meetings at your company. If you don't run the company then I can see how this is useless advice.

I find ad hoc "meetings" which are really just phone calls (we use Remotion at my company, it works great) to be far more useful. They aren't scheduled, so they don't take up mental space where you're dreading the meeting coming up. They aren't scheduled, so it's super easy to just say "hey I'm busy, can't talk". They aren't scheduled, so there's literally no pressure to take the call, and instead say something like "hey, can you just slack me what's happening and I can take a look in a bit?".

I also think overreliance on meetings leads to a lack of quality internal documentation, writing, and requirements gathering. If everyone is just shooting around ideas out loud, in a room, there's nothing making it on paper. I find that sitting down and actually writing out everything before I present the idea to anyone or discuss it, is far more useful than scrambling before a meeting I forgot that I had today.

[atonse]

The only black and white regarding this I’ve seen are status meetings where most questions could’ve been answered in a discussion or email thread.

And the counter point, is where we wasted days in an email discussion thread when a 30 min meeting would’ve been as effective.

[quickthrower2]

Internally you have clients, they are the stakeholders such as your boss or product managers.

Also customers can waste your time!