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The Useless Meeting Wack Jobs
$$$$$exyGal writes "Have you ever attended a useless meeting? Are you the wack job who always ask the same (or random) question during an all hands with the hope that simply by asking, you're going to change something? Rands in Repose points out the difference between an informational meeting and a conflict resolution meeting."
I usually ask "Why are we having this meeting? No. Really". It never gets answered satisfactorily. Am I asking anything wrong??
Free XBox, PS2
Full House! Man, I love Buzzword Bingo... and that article pretty much filled my card up.
Is this redundancy, they said no its a strategic realignment of the workforce to provide maximum efficency and flow. Then they made me redundant... Of course you can always play Bullshit Bingo
Rus
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Is this a an Informational Thread of a Conflict Resolution Thread? You decide!
Steal This Sig
... the infamous 'Pre-meeting meeting' though.. *shudders*
Doesn't this refer to modding /. posts?
God, I love being the boss.
Signed,
Your Crazy English Boss
The last meeting I attended was to decide our companies mission statement. I used something from Dilbert's mission statement generator and won!
We take bets on how times my boss will say Action Item, Paradigm Shift and Mission Statement.
Where am I going and why am I in this handbasket?
Bored during meetings? Why not try some of these neat little exercises, not only will it make meetings more interesting but your fellow workmates will become suddenly more alert and maintain a respectful distance:
During a meeting:
Discreetly clasp the hold of someone's hand and whisper "Can you feel it?" from the corner of your mouth.
Draw enormous genitalia on your notepad and discreetly show it to the person next to you for their approval.
When refreshments are presented, immediately distribute one biscuit to each of the attendees then systematically smash each one with your fist in front of them.
Wear a hand free phone headset throughout. Once in a while drift off into an unrelated conversation, such as "I don't care if there are no dwarfs, just get the show done!"
Write the words 'he fancies you' on your pad and show it to the person next to you while indicating with your pen.
Respond to a serious question with "I don't know what to say, obviously I'm flattered, but it's all happened so fast.
Use 'Nam style jargon' such as 'what's the ETA?', 'who's on recon?' and 'Charlie don't surf!'
Reconstruct the meeting in front of you using action figures and when anyone moves re-arrange the figures accordingly.
Shave one of your forearms.
Draw a chalk circle around one of the chairs then avoid sitting on it when the meeting starts. When someone does eventually sit on it, cover your mouth and gasp.
Turn your back on the meeting and sit facing the window with your legs stretched out. Announce that 'you love this dirty old town!'
Walk directly up to a colleague and stand nose to nose with him/her for one minute.
Mount the desk and walk along it's length before taking your seat.
Reflect sunlight into everyone's eyes off your watch face.
Gargle with water.
Repeat every idea they express in a baby voice while moving your hand like a chattering mouth.
Gradually push yourself closer and closer to the door on your chair.
Hum throughout.
Pull out a large roll of bank notes and count them demonstratively.
Bend momentarily under the table then emerge wearing contact lenses that white out your eyes.
Drop meaningless and confusing management speak into conversations such as:
'What's the margin, Marvin?'
'When's this turkey going to get basted?'
'If we don't get this brook babbling we're all going to end up looking like doe-eyed Labradors'
Produce a hamster from your pocket and suggest throwing it to one another as a means of idea-exchange.
Use a large hunting knife to point at your visual aids.
Announce that you've run off some copies of the meeting agenda for everyone. Then hand out pieces of paper that read:
My Secret Agenda
1. Trample the weak
2. Triumph alone
3. Invade Poland
Recollect them sheepishly and ask everyone to pretend they haven't seen them.
Attempt to hypnotise the entire room using a pocket watch.
Leave long pauses in your speech at random moments. When someone is prompted to interject shout 'I AM NOT FINISHED'.
I've never shoed a horse, but I once told a donkey to piss off!
We had Conflict Resolution meetings in high school.
The "Conflict Manager," as they were called, actually followed a script for the meeting, from a paper in plain view of those in attendance (the two kids that were fighting).
I still remember the script (I had a lot of those meetings), and it went like this:
"So, you both agree that you are here to solve a problem?"
"Student X, what is it about Student Y with which you have an issue?"
"Student Y, what is it about Student X with which you have an issue?"
"Now, what can we do to resolve these issues?"
"Do you both agree to take the steps we have outlined here?" (Always "Yes.")
"Do you think we will need to see you two in the future?" ("No.")
"Well then, thank you very much."
And so it would be, until we fought again and were dragged into another Conflict Resolution meeting--held by a different CM this time, so as not to give the appearance of repetition. But like I said, I went a lot.
The coolest voice ever.
Actually, sometimes meetings serve a purpose. Or are planned that way. Sure, you could argue that we could have cleared the same question by email instead of having a two-hour meeting, but still. We could have just stuck to the point, explained the architecture to the client, or viceversa, answered a few questions, and been done with it.
But no. What I hate is the wiseguy that just has to ask _something_, _anything_, just to show participation. Among my "favourites" are(favourite poster children for euthanasia, that is):
- people who ask something that's been said before. Repeatedly. Bonus points if it's something obvious.
(Yes, for the 5'th time, we _are_ saving the data in an Oracle database.)
- people who, obviously, are stuck in a "misunderstand it" mental mode.
(E.g., no, just because there are two columns in the table, it doesn't mean you can only store two attributes. There's a reason why those two columns are called "key" and "value". It's for storing as many key/value pairs as you need. No, seriously. You can stop asking "what if we later need more than two attributes?")
- people who take some irrelevant detail -- often a tangent or metaphor used -- and, by Jove, they have to get that detail cleared out in detail.
(E.g., if we're discussing the workflow engine, you can jolly well stop picking on the exact font used in the dummy screenshots. Yes, you'll get any font you want, but you'll get it from the GUI team. Can we move ahead already?)
- the more extreme case of the above: people who ask something completely unrelated and completely irrelevant.
(Believe it or not, the "anyone else likes wood?" from a Dilbert strip actually happens in some real meetings. Just replace "wood" by some other completely irrelevant topic.)
- the client PHB who just is affraid to reach a conclusion, and instead just _has_ to show that he/she/it manages. So each time he/she/it will want something else wantonly changed.
(E.g., dude, we already gave you a template editor for those reports. Can we please, please, please not go yet again into whether to use landscape or portrait? Just use the editor and print them diagonally, for all I care.)
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Let us not forget the "team-building" meeting. Nothing like hanging out with people from work that I can barely tolerate during the work day on my own time. Yay!
Curb CO2 emissions: Kill yourself today!
I wouldn't mind meetings like that. Seriously. what I get is no coffee, no biscuits, the people are people I see every day and I need to spend the time paying very close attention to make sure I don't end up with yet another job to add to my 4-dimensional priority-queue based schedule.
Refreshment-accompanied, novel, low work meetings would be job heaven!
I prefer rumors and speculation. It makes me think there is more to my job than there actually is.
_____________________________________
http://github.com/gbook/nidb
You haven't lived until you've had the Meeting on Meetings. These basically consist of some exec talking for about 40 minutes about the structure of meetings meanwhile not following his own advice. The meeting concludes with an extra hour of a video about meetings.
Oh and the first rule of meetings is to 'Keep it under an hour.'
a pointless meeting.
true for most cases but let's say you need to meet with a colleague who accuses another person of making sexist remarks.
"ok, sandra, calm down"
"but he squeezed my bum and said it was really juicy!"
"well, he's hardly wrong there... but! we start with an agenda!"
"AGENDA?! I just want you to fire the bastard!"
"OK, point 1: fire... bastard...! point 2: discuss your ass. Do we agree on the agenda?"
"sob."
Are you Lonely ?
Don't like working on your own ?
Hate Making Decisions ?
Then Call a Meeting !!!!
YOU CAN...
- SEE people
- DRAW Flowcharts
- FEEL Important
- IMPRESS your collegues
All on Company TimeMEETINGS
The pratical alternative to work.
In most cases, the proper translation is "We haven't made plans to lay anyone off yet because upper managment is still fighting it out. Once we figure out who won the power struggle, anyone hired by the losing side gets the axe." The other possible intrepretation is "We're so incompetent that we can't even figure out what redundant positions exist in the two organizations. Once we grow a clue we might be able to make some plans, if we can find someone with enough balls to actually make a decision."
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
(With bad project managers)
So be sure to show up and be quiet. Pay attention or you may miss an opporutnity to have tasks assigned to somebody who isn't present.
HLUAGHLUAGAGLHAUG
"Obligatory "Mmmmmmm....donuts" reference."
;)
Reminds me of a sure-fire laugh getter for these meetings... After 2/3rds of the attendees arrive, grab two cinnamon roles from the donut pile, hold them vertically next to your ears and state "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi! You're my only hope!" Works for me, anyway...
ThunderCube: Two interns enter, one intern leaves.
I remember the CEO coming out to give us a pep talk on how great the comany was doing and that we should all just keep working hard. My one question was "So, are you personally buying or selling your stock in the company?" Not only did he not answer the question, he seemed downright pissed off at me...
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
Have you considered the possibility that you are part of the problem?
You can always play "Boardroom Bullshit Bingo". You get all your co-workers together and set up cards like in bingo. However, instead of the usual numbers, what you do is fill in each space in the sheet with a timeless phrase of managment bs such as "out of the box", "synergy", "maximizing potentional", or any phrase that has the word 'motivation' in it without the word 'money'. You then set up an agreed upon sign to alert the others when you have won (for example: tapping the table with your pencil) since shouting 'bingo' in the meeting would not only look odd but also would alert the management as to what is really going on. Then during the meeting you all sit and look like you're paying attention and wait for the manager/management to start the spouting. As each phrase is uttered, you cross it off and hope for the win.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
If the meeting starts with an Org chart, get the hell out.
> half a man-day
Or, as it's known around my house, "wedding anniversary."
PHB: We're having a meeting to discuss employee retention.
Dilbert: Tell them that employees quit because there are too many useless meetings.
PHB: We won't be getting into reasons at the first meeting
Phemur
As one of the few people in this corporation who is willing to get involved in fixing things, I'm often asked to sit in on meetings so the dept heads can "pick my brain", or as it more commonly know "take credit for my ideas".
I've gotten in the habit of responding to these e-mailed or phoned requests by saying, "I'd be happy to attend but, I was in an industrial accident some years ago. Many people find my appearance....disturbing."
Works every time.
I do desktop support and at one job I was asked to go to about 8 hours worth of database meetings each week that I had nothing to do with. For the first couple of weeks, I tried to pay attention and input my opinion, but I found I really had no opinion on what they were doing with the various tables. I was sort of upset that I couldn't actually be doing work during this time but the boss insisted that the entire team be there.
Eventually I settled into playing chess on my palm Pilot at all these meetings. Eventually, somebody raised a questions about what was said several hours earlier in th meeting and somebody said "Ask Marc, he's taking notes." While I was slowly realizig they were talking about me and came out of my chess game, my co-worker looked over at what I was doing and anounced "He's playing chess!" Everybody just shruggd and went back tot he meeting. From then on I stopped gong to said meetings and stayed in the office doing work and nobody ever ever bothered me about it.
There are no plans to reduce staff following the merger.
How would you treat this information if you heard it in your current company?
I would give up that entire year's salary if the announcement was made in a meeting of an entire department (or three). I would fold my arms and say (at elevated volumes):
"thanks for the information you lying cheat fuck bastard."
Then I would walk out.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
I was a producer at a public radio station in the Midwest. This means that every staff meeting was filled with middle-market talk show hosts whose one marketable feature is that they love to talk and talk. Those are some awful meetings. One goes on and on, then the next one feels they haven't been listened to then the next. Man, it's painful.
Please allow me to fill in those gaps! *grin*
Conflict Manager: "So, you both agree that you are here to solve a problem?"
Conflict Manager: "Student X, what is it about Student Y with which you have an issue?"
Student X: "Student Y keeps giving me shit for using Windows and fueling the evil empire even though I didn't pay for it."
Conflict Manager: "Student Y, what is it about Student X with which you have an issue?"
Student Y: "Student X is a fucking tool and a n00b for not being 31337 enough to love the process of mastering Linux, FreeBSD, or any other Open Source OS."
Conflict Manager: "Now, what can we do to resolve these issues?"
Student X: "Nothing. Nothing at all. Student Y's bigotry will go on until he grows up and breaks away from the Slashdot herd mentality. Everyone being 'different' and 'noble' like some new age vegetarian in a futile, destructive effort to sculpt self image and core beliefs."
Student Y: "STFU n00b"
Conflict Manager: "Do you both agree to take the steps we have outlined here?"
Student X: "What steps?"
Student Y: "OMG, a future PHB!"
Conflict Manager: "Do you think we will need to see you two in the future?"
Student X: "That depends on how much abuse and belittlement I can take."
Student Y: "Not if n00b over there finally realizes that his kind is soon to be extinct as Linux continues to dominate the market and keeps making Microsoft ph34r!"
Conflict Manager: "Well then, thank you very much."
Please note that the poster does not have anything against Linux users. Rather, the poster (a former Mac evangelist and current NT, Linux, FreeBSD, and Solaris user) has something against people that are closed minded due to an elitist attitude. I could have just as easily replaced OSS with MacOS, BeOS, or OS/2 for that matter.
-Lucas
Hurry, someone strangle him immediately!!!
So I read the entire article and then I realized... the joke's on us...
*Condense fact from the vapor of nuance*
Well two actually.
The first: Manager of Operations: "No one will be laid off as long as I am here." Two weeks later he was fired, a month later the layoffs started.
The second: The manager of my group had mentioned that Java was going to be the new standard soon. Every meetingwe had with her, the same annoying guy would stand up and ask when we were going to get training on the "new Standard". A year after her announcement and we were still using Dynasty, but this guy kept asking, even though it was apparrent that we were never gonna switch.
I worked for a story teller once.
3 hour meeting, entirley about his Navy experiences.
at the end he asks:
"So, why is everybody behind?"
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
funny, it told me there where going to be layoff before the merger.
Probably a deal with the incoming company.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I am posting too late for anyone to see but anyway. At my last job we had some useless meetings happenning sometimes so at one of them I just decided to stenograph, take notes on what people are saying. Of-course it is funnier to me since I know these people, but still, here it is:
.. (fifteen more minutes)
.... (another half an hour)
Meeting: Architect, VP, PM, BA, Tester, DBA, QA Manager, Developer1 (me), Developer2.
1. Architect is going over the use cases, he is saying: blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah... blah, blah, blah, blah.
PM: What? OK.
2. BA: blah, blah, blah, blah, blah?
3. Architect: blah, bleh, bleh, bleh, blah, blah!!! WTF?
PM: What? OK.
4. QA Manager: Blah???!!! I have to do work? BLAH #)$! *twit @%@$!
5. VP: Blah, Bleh, Blah, Bleh, Bleh, Bleh, Blah, Blah, Bleh, blah, blah, Bleh, Bleh, Blah, Blah, Blah.
6. QA Manager: ?
PM: What? OK.
7. VP: Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah,
(goes on for 5 minutes)
8. Developer2: WTF?
PM: What? OK.
9. Architect: Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, DAO, blah, blah, blah, EJB, blah, blah.
10. BA: Blah, blah, quering mechanism... (what???) Blah.
11. Architect: ?!!!
12. Developer1: ?!!!
13. Developer2: ?!!!
14. QA Manager: Buy on eBay! (his other business)
15. VP: Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, (5 minutes) Blah, No Limitations, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, (5 more minutes)
16. PM: What? OK.
17. VP: Blah, Blah, Blah, (5 minutes) years of experience, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, (ten minutes)
18. QA: bbblllaaaaaaaabbbbbhhllllaaaaaalllllllbbbbb.
19. VP: Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah,
20. BA: blah......
21. VP: Blah, Blah,
---
Can you guess whether we solved the problem in that meeting?
You can't handle the truth.