How to get out of meetings and add valuable hours back to your week

There’s an effective way to get out of that meeting and add some extra hours to your schedule as a result.

The niceness trap

The reason so many of us find ourselves trapped in meetings we don’t want to be in comes down to the fact that we don’t want to

offend anyone. But there’s a real cost to being nice.

Mission-critical only

Evaluate the meetings you attend and make an objective analysis about the ones you are truly mission-critical to. Do you find yourself going to a regular, non-critical update meeting? If you’re dealing with meetings where you are regularly asked to make decisions on the big objectives for the company, then yes, mission critical. Make your list and then

circle all the ones that aren’t mission critical to prepare for the next step.

Communicate one-on-one

Once you have identified the meetings you want to excuse yourself from, schedule some private conversations with the leaders and organizers of those meetings to communicate with them why you no longer can attend the meeting. The key is to communicate that you still value the need for the meeting, and that you trust this leader to continue moving forward. You also need to make it clear that you remain

available to attend the meeting in the future on an ad-hoc basis when needed.

Jim Schleckser, Inc.

Group communications

Once you have established your exit plan with the leader of the meeting, your last step is to do something similar with the other attendees. Again, what you want to avoid is sending the message that this meeting isn’t important. Send the clear message in your final appearance about why you’re not attending the meeting going forward, that you appreciate all the work that everyone is doing, that the meeting itself remains important to continue, and that the leaders of the

meeting have your full authority and trust.