Please Don’t Invite Me to Another Pointless Work Meeting

When you <a href="https://level.medium.com/my-new-direct-reports-are-a-trip-d080e5aa7cdd" rel="noopener">become a manager of people</a>, there’s always someone who will emphasize that with great power comes great responsibility, as if they’re dropping some novel wisdom on you (and not cribbing from Spider-Man comics). However true this may be, there’s an actual bit of useful advice that isn’t forewarned enough: With great power comes a great frequency of meetings. And quite frankly, for the most part, I don’t want to be bothered talking to any of these people. The meetings that have crowded my calendar since I was promoted and onboarded to upper management are as <a href="https://level.medium.com/level-presents-the-black-mens-hair-hall-of-fame-e755f448b9df" rel="noopener">varied as Snoop Dogg hairstyles</a>. There are company-wide meetings, senior leadership meetings, departmental meetings, <a href="https://level.medium.com/its-all-fun-and-games-till-a-white-person-asks-to-fondle-your-fro-ce0aff74136b" rel="noopener">mandatory fun meetings</a>, project update meetings (often with no actual updates), meetings where attendees feel like hostages on a conversation between two people, meetings where Janice hogs the damn mic with endless musings about farfetched hypothetical scenarios, late Friday afternoon meetings (ugh!), <a href="https://level.medium.com/per-my-last-message-your-condescending-emails-make-me-uncomfortable-f352a18e5513" rel="noopener">meetings that could’ve been emails</a>, meetings that could’ve been canceled, meetings that could’ve been merely a thought that evanesced in the brains of their hosts long before ever being forced upon the rest of us. So. Many. Meetings. I hate it here! Folks who’ve spent <a href="https://level.medium.com/knock-knock-corporate-america-its-me-a-black-professional-e7470c08242d" rel="noopener">enough time in corporate America</a> or startup culture realize more often than not, said gatherings are aimless, redundant, prolonged, or some combination of all three. I’ve long suspected that the main reason for most meetings is so people can feel busier than they really are. <a href="https://level.medium.com/please-dont-invite-me-to-another-pointless-work-meeting-a91d87b0446">Website</a>