[efsavage]

Standups are definitely status meetings, and there's nothing wrong with that. As someone else mentioned, it's the audience that matters. 5 or 6 good engineers and a clueful manager in a room are going to sync up and get back to work, usually in less than 10 minutes. Some people, including engineers, are prone to go on and on, perhaps even about something interesting like a bug or a new library they found. Make those people go last.

If the meeting takes longer than it's supposed to, walk out or hang up.

If someone is rambling on about something that isn't going to help the team move forward, say something.

Standups will not fix a bad team, or a bad manager.