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Email and Meetings
Jeff Kenton | Nov 17 2006
I'm sorry if this does not belong here. But, I have a comment and a couple of questions regarding using email to schedule and unschedule meetings? I found out this morning, upon arriving to my desk, that a meeting this morning had been cancelled. The decision to cancel the meeting had been made last night, after business hours. I'm a little frustrated because my preparation last night prevented me from doing things I would have rather done. Here are my questions: 1. Under what circumstances do you all expect to hear through email about a meeting being called or cancelled? How much lead time do you expect? In my case, a phone call to my home number would have been appreciated. (The first change I made to my home routine was to not check work email. It's been a nice change.) 2. Do any of you work in a workplace where the "canons" of email communication are codified? That is, where it is spelled out very precisely when and how to use email for making meeting changes? If so, I'd be interested in hearing about it. Obviously, if the meeting had been cancelled for emergency reasons, I would understand. The part that frosts me is that the meeting was cancelled for the lack of preparation among the others in the group. Cheers! 7 Comments
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 I get the feeling this...Submitted by noodle on December 8, 2006 - 5:18pm.
I get the feeling this may be easier and harder than you want. Easier in that you will not necessarily need supporting documents and harder in that you can just ask for what you want. From what you've shared, it sounds like this is kind of normal for your department and you're feeling fed up and frustrated. I imagine it's harder when your boss is the one leading the way to un-GTD-like behavior. I think a new policy isn't going to help you. For an unfocused boss, a new set of rules isn't, I think, going to solve the root problem. What's the root problem? I'm unsure. Is your boss terrified of being "mean" and requiring your co-workers be responsible? Is your boss completely unorganized and sees no problem with being that way? Is your boss simply unaware of how her/his way of doing things is affecting the lives of the employees? What would happen if you simply had a few words with your supervisor, noting how cancelling late in the evening affected your evening? As well as pointing out how a pattern of letting others off the hook for being unprepared [I'm assuming as much, because your co-workers were unprepared for the meeting and your supervisor cancelled instead of calling them out over being unprepared] is only encouraging more of the same? » POSTED IN:
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