Survey after survey shows:

• Top management spends as much as 4 out of every 5 working days in meetings
• Mid-level managers spend anywhere from 25% to 60% of their time in meetings

Yet... when asked about the effectiveness of their meetings, top management reported *:

• 48% run out of time before the most important issues are addressed
• 65% are not focused on making decisions
• 88% do not produce important strategic and organizational decisions
• 50% are considered to be a waste of their time
• Employees say ineffective meetings are the top time wasters that make them unproductive over 30% of the time

The reasons include: inadequate preparation, unclear objectives, inefficient processes, low involvement, conflict, hidden agendas, ineffective communication, high stress, dominance by the few, poor decision making and lack of accountability and execution.

The 'visible' costs of a single meeting (including the cost of people's time to prepare for, and participate in the meeting) range from thousands to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The 'invisible' costs (opportunity cost and the consequences of poor, or no decisions and poor or lack of follow through) are significantly higher.

When asked the dollar impact of a single inefficient meeting, respondents typically estimate the real costs from thousands to millions of dollars!