The Meeting Trap: How we turned collaboration into procrastination.
Why 35 hours of monthly meetings might be the most expensive way to avoid real work.
I had a moment last week that stopped me cold. I was rushing between back-to-back meetings when I realized I hadn’t actually done anything in three days.
I’d been busy - incredibly busy - but I couldn’t point to a single meaningful outcome. Just an endless parade of status updates, brainstorming sessions, and “quick syncs” that somehow stretched into hour-long discussions about discussions we needed to have.
We’ve all hit some flavor of this realization along the way, but on this day, the reminder hit me harder than usual. Meetings aren’t a productivity problem. They’re a courage problem.
A $532 billion question.
We’re spending 35 hours per month in meetings - an entire work week is consumed by discussions that accomplish very little. Picture your calendar right now. Those colored blocks aren’t work. They’re coffins for productivity.
That 30-minute “quick sync” at 10 a.m.? That’s when you could’ve written the strategy doc everyone’s been waiting for.
The numbers get worse: 67% of executives admit these meetings are complete failures. The people scheduling them know they don’t work. Yet we keep showing up.
Only 37% of meetings result in a decision being made. Meanwhile, 73% of us are multitasking during them - desperately trying to get real work done while trapped in yet another discussion that should’ve been a document.
We’re scheduling these productivity killers during our peak cognitive hours. Half of all meetings occur between 9-11 a.m. or 1-3 p.m. - exactly when your brain is wired for complex, focused work.
When’s the last time you had four uninterrupted hours to actually think?
Why we keep choosing comfort over progress.
I’ve come to believe meetings are the socially acceptable form of procrastination. There’s something seductive about a packed calendar - it feels important, collaborative, necessary.
We get to avoid:
The vulnerability of putting our ideas on paper
The discomfort of making hard decisions alone
The challenge of deep, uninterrupted thinking
Instead, we gather in rooms (virtual or otherwise) and talk about the work. We discuss next steps without taking them.
We brainstorm solutions to problems we haven’t clearly defined.
We schedule follow-ups to meetings that should’ve resulted in action.
Every brainstorm you schedule is a decision you’re postponing. Every sync is deep work you’re trading away. And the cost of that trade is steeper than most of us realize.
Our two-minute problem.
Your brain needs 15-20 minutes to achieve a state of flow. It takes 23 minutes to fully recover from each interruption.
The average knowledge worker gets interrupted every two minutes during core hours.
Do the math. We’re never actually working at full capacity.
You know that foggy feeling after a meeting where you stare at your screen trying to remember what you were working on? That’s your brain spending 23 minutes climbing back up the mountain you just fell off.
Tomorrow morning, count how many times you’re interrupted between 9 and 11 am. That number will haunt you.
So what do you do when you realize your entire work culture is designed around interruption?
Some companies chose the uncomfortable path - and what they discovered will likely make you angry at every meeting on your calendar.
Basecamp’s two-decade war on meetings.
Basecamp didn’t experiment with fewer meetings. They built their entire company around avoiding them.
For 20 years, Jason Fried and DHH have operated on one principle: meetings are the last resort, not the first option. Here’s what that looks like at their company:
No shared calendars. You can’t book someone’s time without asking. Most requests get declined.
98% of communication happens in writing inside Basecamp. Decisions get documented in threads. Updates happen asynchronously. No performance theater required.
Thursday is “Library Rules”—the entire company operates in silence. No chatter. No pings. No meetings. Just work. They’ve protected Thursdays this way since 2012.
All-hands meetings happen every 6-8 weeks. Most teams have zero standing meetings.
When meetings are unavoidable? They set a 30-minute timer. When it rings, the meeting ends - finished or not.
Jason Fried’s math is simple: “Five people in a room for an hour isn’t a one-hour meeting. It’s a five-hour meeting.”
And the uncomfortable truth? While most companies spent 20 years adding meetings, Basecamp eliminated the need for them. They’ve built multiple profitable products, written four bestselling books, and grown from 40 to 171 people - all without VC funding forcing them to “scale” into dysfunction.
They didn’t gradually optimize their way here. They just stopped scheduling meetings and started writing things down instead.
Your escape plan: The Peak Productivity Protection Protocol.
After researching this extensively and testing it with some of my own teams, here are a few things I’ve found that actually help:
1. Block 9 a.m.-12 p.m. religiously.
This is when your cortisol levels prime your brain for complex analytical work.
Mark it as “External Meeting” if necessary - whatever it takes to protect these hours.
No status updates. No brainstorms. No “quick syncs.” This is where your best thinking happens.
2. Default to async-first.
Before scheduling any meeting, document the context in writing first. Tools like ClickUp or monday.com excel at this - you can create decision docs, add context, tag stakeholders, and let people respond on their own time.
I’ve found that 80% of my “urgent” meetings can be handled effectively in a ClickUp comment thread, resulting in better outcomes with zero interruption.
(Full transparency: These are affiliate links, but I genuinely use both tools, and they’ve saved me probably 10 hours a week)
3. Apply the Decision Test.
Before any meeting makes it to your calendar, ask: “What specific decision will we make, and who has the authority to make it?”
If you can’t answer clearly, it’s a document, not a meeting.
4. Move routine check-ins to 2-4 p.m.
Your brain naturally dips between 2-4 p.m. - that post-lunch fog is real and predictable.
Perfect for team syncs, client check-ins, brainstorms, and administrative discussions. Stop fighting your circadian rhythm.
Use it strategically.
5. Create meeting-free zones.
Pick one day. Protect it completely. Wednesday works well, but any day you can defend will do.
Block your calendar as “Client Research Day.” Set an autoresponder: “Deep work Wednesdays. Available Tue/Thu. Urgent? Message me - I check every 2 hours.”
Organizations with one meeting-free day per week report 35% productivity gains. Three meeting-free days? 73%.
The first week feels selfish. By week three, colleagues ask how you’re suddenly shipping so much. That discomfort is the price of reclaiming your best work.
The choice you’re making right now.
We’ve confused collaboration with constant interruption. We’ve trained ourselves that being busy is more important than being effective.
But here’s what I’m doing this week: I’m blocking 9 a.m.-12 p.m. as “Deep Work” on my calendar. I’m declining three standing meetings with a polite note explaining I’ll review async updates instead.
I’m moving status updates to written threads where people can respond when their brain is ready, not when Outlook tells them to show up.
I’m scared. It feels selfish. But I’m more scared of reaching December, wondering where my best work went.
Which meeting on your calendar this week exists because saying no feels more complicated than showing up?
Cancel it. Replace it with focused, uninterrupted thinking. See what you can build when your brain actually has time to work.
Hit reply and tell me what you’re protecting. I want to know.
Until next week,
Mike @ Product Party
Want to connect? Send me a message on LinkedIn, Bluesky, Threads, or Instagram.
Further Reading:
Stop the Meeting Madness (Harvard Business Review)
Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport
My question here is: what about when the meetings ARE the work? So much of my strategic work has been getting technicians, business leaders, community leads, administrators, etc to buy into change and evolution. So much of my managerial work is to get a team of specialists to see each other as humans and to collaborate effectively. In my experience, meetings are often incredibly useful—exhausting, yes, but useful. What are your thoughts?