Editorial summary. This is our text summary of an article published by theconversation. Charts, figures, and the author’s full voice are at the original — read it there .
Editorial verdict
Opinion-driven synthesis with credible empirical backing — the gender disparity and well-being findings are grounded in referenced research, but the prescriptive framing and lack of methodological detail limit its utility as a standalone evidence source.
Executive summary
This article addresses the organisational and human costs of poorly designed meetings, drawing on a series of studies conducted during and after the Covid-19 pandemic. The authors argue that the central problem is not the quantity of meetings but their design, purpose clarity, and the structural inequalities they reinforce. Key findings presented include: managers spend an average of 23 hours per week in meetings; excessive meetings correlate with burnout and turnover intent, while well-structured ones can enhance engagement; women report greater difficulty speaking in virtual settings due to interruptions, screen invisibility, and nonverbal cue deficits; and no single meeting modality is universally effective across all objective types. The authors classify meeting objectives into four categories — information sharing, decision-making, emotional expression, and relationship-building — and identify practical design levers such as pre-shared agendas, structured speaking tools, and active moderation. The article concludes that meetings function as mirrors of organisational culture and power dynamics, and that improvement lies in intentional design rather than reduction in frequency.
Key insights
- 1Excessive meetings can cause burnout and increase turnover intention, yet well-structured meetings can simultaneously enhance employee engagement — indicating that volume and design are distinct variables.
- 2Virtual meetings disproportionately suppress women's speaking time relative to in-person formats, driven by interruption patterns, screen invisibility, and dual cognitive loads from home-based participation.
- 3No single meeting modality — audio, video, hybrid, or in-person — is universally optimal; effectiveness depends on alignment between modality choice and the specific objective of the meeting.
Practical takeaways
- Meeting organizers can improve inclusivity and participation quality by using structured speaking tools such as hand-raising features, anonymous chat, and round-robin turn-taking to counteract dominance by vocal participants.
- Defining the primary objective of a meeting — whether informational, decisional, emotional, or relational — before selecting its format is identified in the research as a foundational design step.
References
- Unspecified publisher (2015).Meeting Science Handbook.
Source & Provenance
theconversation
Not specified
December 1, 2025
Opinion/Commentary
Global
Original source metadata is preserved. AI analysis is generated separately.
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