How do you avoid having the same meeting over and over?
I’ve served on enough boards and committees for enough years to know that habit sets in quickly. If you aren’t careful, you find yourself having the same meeting, month after month, quarter after quarter, year after year.
That’s frustrating – and boring – enough to make people not want to serve on committees.
So how do you not?
I think it comes down to a planning, communication, and commitment.
If you’re in a position to plan meetings, design the next one to sidestep your usual traps.
If you want a meeting to change, communicate that with others and work together to lead that change. (That might mean speaking up at pitfall points, or in other ways leaving your comfort zone to lead.)
If you work together, you can get a firm commitment to collegially disrupt the usual order.
Remember that everyone else in every meeting, like you, can think of better things they can be doing with their time.
Take steps, make meetings different, and bring joy back into the work you do. (And, as a happy byproduct, productivity with tour colleagues!)
If none of this is possible, then it’s time to leave the group that plans the meeting. Be like Seth Godin, who repeatedly insists “I don’t go to meetings.”