(^76) 97 Things Every Project Manager Should Know
Meetings Don’t Write Code
Meetings Don’t Write Code
William J. Mills
Castro Valley, California, U.S.
Too oFTEn, people who could be doing something more productive are
trapped in meetings—meetings that have wandered off their intended pur-
pose, run over time, or trapped an entire team in the room when a more lim-
ited set of people would be just as effective. Only schedule meetings that have
a specific purpose, and only include people on the invitation list who need to
be there. Here’s an obvious list of things to avoid, as software project manager,
when you are planning your team meetings:
• Chit-chat. If you have participants who use this time to have informal
project-related exchanges, remind them to come a few minutes early or
plan to spend time together after the meeting. You can’t afford for the
entire group to wait until they finish chatting.
• Not getting in, getting done, and getting out. Plan a clear agenda that is
distributed beforehand. If you assemble the entire team, be sure your top-
ics are relevant to everyone.
• Diving too deep. It is good to bring up risk issues or roadblocks that have
arisen. However, this is not the place to hammer out the solutions. Form
smaller groups, or designate the appropriate team member, to pursue the
issue after the meeting.
The minute software engineers start talking about specific implementa-
tion details, have them make a note to remain after the main meeting and
move on with your scheduled agenda.