🎒 Microlesson

🪞 Reflect

Does your team rely on meetings to keep projects on track? 

💡 Concept

Many project teams schedule recurring check-ins to make sure that projects move forward. But relying heavily on meetings often has the opposite effect: it slows everything down. 

Meetings consume valuable work hours and disrupt the flow of individual and collective productivity. And if meeting synchronously is the sole method of holding team members accountable, it creates a dependency on real-time interactions, slows down decision-making processes, and hinders the amount of progress possible between scheduled meetings. 

An over-reliance on meetings may also delay responses to urgent issues and limit the team's ability to adapt swiftly to changing project dynamics. Plus, the need for everyone to be present simultaneously can lead to scheduling challenges, especially in globally distributed teams, causing further delays and inefficiencies. 

Emphasizing asynchronous communication and accountability measures beyond meetings—such as project management tools and written updates—can foster a more agile and responsive project environment, allowing team members to proactively contribute to the project's momentum at their own pace and in a manner that aligns with their individual work preferences and schedules.

🎬 Take Action

• Use project management tools to track progress. By establishing a centralized digital space for project updates, task assignments, and real-time collaboration, team members can stay informed and engaged without the need for frequent meetings. Tools like Asana, ClickUp, and Trello facilitate seamless communication, enabling team members to share progress, discuss challenges, and provide updates asynchronously. This not only minimizes the disruptions to individual workflows but also ensures that information is readily accessible to all team members at their convenience.

• Send regular, concise status updates. Adopt a practice of sharing brief, written updates outlining any accomplishments, challenges, and upcoming tasks. This approach keeps everyone in the loop without sacrificing valuable work time for meetings. It also holds team members accountable for their progress and contributes to a transparent work environment where communication is both streamlined and accessible.

• Create an environment where communication is fluid. Encourage team members to actively share insights, seek assistance when needed, and engage in informal discussions through communication channels like Slack or Teams.

• Cancel recurring meetings. Delete recurring meetings from your team’s calendars and only schedule meetings when completely necessary. Use the Placeless Taxonomy to help you decide.

🧠 Keep Learning

Learn more about how to adopt asynchronous practices with Async at Work. 

✅ Check In

🎁 Learn with your team!

Refer our weekly microlessons to your team members to learn as a group! Just follow the instructions in the section below to get started.