Your calendar isn’t filling up. It’s compounding.
Every meeting you accept doesn’t just cost an hour. It costs preparation beforehand, context-switching afterward, and the follow-up meetings it spawns. Like credit card debt, the interest continues to accumulate.
The math is brutal: A weekly one-hour meeting costs your company 52 hours this year. But it also costs next year’s 52 hours. And the year after that. You just signed a three-year contract without reading the terms.
Three meetings earn their keep: Your weekly team planning session. Your daily huddle (three times weekly). Your 1:1s with direct reports. These are non-negotiable rhythms that create alignment and connection.
Everything else? Up for audit.
The Three-Step Meeting Audit:
Step 1 – The Renewal Test: If this meeting were a subscription service, would you renew it today? If you hesitate, you have your answer.
Step 2 – The Alternative Question: Could this be an async update, a Loom video, or a shared doc with comments? If yes, cancel the meeting. Schedule the alternative.
Step 3 – The Outcome Check: What decision or action must emerge from this meeting? If you can’t name it specifically, the meeting fails the test.
Let go of the hour: While we typically refer to meetings as being an hour long, they do not need to be. Be brutal, cut back, be efficient.. Provide agendas, premeeting preparation materials, and define the outcomes before you start. At the very least, start five after, end five before. Breathe in between.
The meeting tax compounds. But so does the dividend of ruthless prioritization.
