According to Ron Ashkenas, most managers actually like meetings, and he enumerates the reasons in a recent blog post entitled Why We Secretly Love Meetings.

His key arguments are that:

• They encourage social interaction
• They keep everyone in the loop
• They often represent status

He also remarks that though we all know the rules of conducting a good meeting such as being upfront and clear about objectives, making sure the right people are attending, having an agenda in advance and so on, we often fail at respecting these rules.

Reference:

• Why We Secretly Love Meetings | Harvard Business Review Blog | Ron Ashkenas | 5 October 2010

Initially published on Brandon Hall’s Workplace Learning Today