Which meeting should I cut first?

The recurring one where people mostly read out updates. If the same information is already written down somewhere, the meeting is a second copy of it. Start there, not with the meeting where real decisions get made.

Won't people feel left out of the loop?

Some might, for a week. Give them a written update they can read in two minutes, and a clear place to ask questions. Being in the loop is about knowing what matters, not sitting in a room.

How short should the meetings I keep be?

As short as the decision needs. Start at 25 minutes instead of an hour, invite only the people who have to decide or do something, and end early when you're done.

Said Out Loud · 26 October 2026

That weekly meeting? Nobody would miss it.

What people usually say instead: ~~“It keeps everyone aligned.”~~

The short answer

To reduce meetings at work, start with the recurring ones, because they run on habit, not need. Pause one for two weeks and ask for written updates instead. If nothing breaks, keep it cancelled. If something does, bring back a shorter version with fewer people and one clear reason to meet.

Drafted with AI for Coach42 · coach review pending · 3 min read

The scene

It's Thursday, 10am. Eight people join the weekly update. You go round the room, each person reads out what's already in the tracker, and Dev unmutes once, to say he has nothing new. It ends at 10.58 and everyone goes back to the work they paused.

Why do weekly meetings keep going when nobody needs them?

Because stopping one feels riskier than keeping it. You won't get blamed for a meeting that happened. Somebody might get blamed for the one that didn't.

So it stays. It was set up eighteen months ago, for a project that shipped. The project ended. The meeting didn't.

You don't notice, because it's your meeting. You run it, and you get something from it: the sense that everything is covered, and a room full of faces looking at you. The other seven people get an hour of hearing updates they could have read in two minutes.

What does "it keeps everyone aligned" really mean?

In our experience, it means it keeps you informed. That's a fair thing to want. But being informed and being aligned are different things, and the team pays for the gap.

Aligned means people know what matters this week, and make the same call you would when you're not there. A status round doesn't build that. It builds a habit of saving things up for Thursday. Dev has a question on Monday, and he waits three days to ask it in front of everyone, because that's where questions go now.

So ask who the meeting is for. If the honest answer is "me", there's a cheaper way to get what you need. Ask for it in writing.

How much does one weekly meeting cost?

More than it looks on your calendar. One hour on your calendar is eight hours of your team's week. Across a year, with a few weeks off, that's about 400 hours, or ten working weeks of somebody's time.

We call this the meeting tax: the time a team pays for meetings, counted in people, not in slots. Our post on what recurring meetings cost your team breaks it down, and the Meeting Tax calculator runs the numbers on your own calendar in a few minutes.

Hours are only part of it. A meeting at 10am cuts the morning in two. It's hard to start the hard thing at 9.15 knowing you'll stop at 9.55. So the real bill includes the work that never got started.

How do you cut a meeting without upsetting people?

Say what you're doing and why, and make it a trial. "We're pausing the Thursday update for two weeks. Post your update in the channel by Wednesday night. If something breaks, tell me and we'll bring it back."

Then keep a list of what goes wrong, and be honest with it. Some meetings earn their place: a decision that needs people in a room, a problem nobody can solve alone. If one of those turns up, you've learned what the meeting was really for. Bring back that part, shorter, with fewer people.

We'd bet nobody asks for the rest back. Dev won't. He'll spend Thursday at ten doing the work he was hired to do, and he won't say a word about it.

The picture

One hour on your calendar is eight hours of your team's week.

The cost

Eight people for an hour, every week, is eight hours. Over a year, that's about 400 hours: ten full working weeks spent hearing things that were already written down.

Try on Monday

Pick the weekly meeting you'd least like to defend and pause it for two weeks. Tell the team why, ask for updates in writing by Wednesday night, and write down anything that goes wrong because it didn't happen.

The mirror

Answer it for an ordinary week. Your answer stays in this browser.

Take Meeting Tax: what your team’s recurring meetings cost.
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Questions people ask

Which meeting should I cut first?: The recurring one where people mostly read out updates. If the same information is already written down somewhere, the meeting is a second copy of it. Start there, not with the meeting where real decisions get made.
Won't people feel left out of the loop?: Some might, for a week. Give them a written update they can read in two minutes, and a clear place to ask questions. Being in the loop is about knowing what matters, not sitting in a room.
How short should the meetings I keep be?: As short as the decision needs. Start at 25 minutes instead of an hour, invite only the people who have to decide or do something, and end early when you're done.

Signed

Drafted with AI for Coach42 · coach review pending.

Scenes are composites; names are made up.

Sources

No figures in this column: everything here is opinion or a made-up scene.