InformationWeek

Secret CIO: If It Isn't Vital, Let's Talk

There appears to be an inverse relationship between the importance of a subject and the time spent talking about it

By Herbert W. Lovelace
Issue date: Dec. 9, 1996

In my last two columns, I said that sitting in meetings provided me with what I thought were some real insights into the dynamics of this most popular of corporate pastimes. As a result of this bolt of inspiration, I formulated three laws of meetings, sort of like what happened to old Sir Isaac when the apple hit him on the head.

The first law is that you c an determine how long a meeting will last by counting the number of people in the meeting: The duration of a meeting is directly proportional to the square of the number of attendees.

The formula is T=kP2 ,where T equals time, P equals the number of people in the meeting, and k is a constant that depends on the culture of the company. The First Law of Meetings explains why a 10-minute, two-person meeting takes 1-1/2 hours when there are six people present.

The Second Law of Meetings deals with when decisions are made in the meeting. This law became clear when I had to watch the helpers of two key executives dance around a problem. The law is: All important decision-making occurs no later than two thirds into the meeting. The formula is D 2/3T , where D is the decision point and T is the length of the meeting.

It is obvious that the first third of a meeting is usually reserved for posturing and marking territorial boundaries, and thus is devoid of dec ision-making. So, as far as I can tell, the final third of the meeting, which is always anticlimactic, is reserved for political harmony-making and general time-wasting. The Second Law thus explains the ebb and flow of a meeting the way that the position of the moon explains the ocean tides.

The Third Law of Meetings, on the other hand, is of perhaps cosmic significance in understanding executive processes. While empirical evidence is somewhat sketchy--my research is still in its early stages--it appears that there is a simple inverse relationship between the time spent on a subject and its importance. In other words, the less important the subject, the more time it will take to discuss. The formula is: T=c/I , where T equals time, I equals the importance of the subject or decision to be made, and c is a constant that is specific to the bladder capacity of the most senior participant.

The Mailroom Battle
I formulated the Third Law during a budget review at which our executive committee was going over the costs of our various administrative functions. As I sat there awaiting my turn, Gornish, our chief financial officer, began questioning the cost of running the mailroom. Karen Lovell, our VP of planning, commented that because of consolidations, the number of people in the corporate office building had increased. More people bring more mail she added, and thus, more mailroom staff.

This satisfied not a soul and the conversation continued unabated. Lovell, to her credit, pointed her eyes toward the pile of work she brings to all meetings and tuned out, taking what I suspect was a mental coffee break without leaving the table.

The sole value I could see in the discussion that continued for the next 45 minutes was to provide the clueless among the participants an opportunity to express themselves eloquently on a subject over which we could have little control beyond obtaining an unlisted corporate address.

To further research on this subject, let me know of your experiences. In the meantime, I have to go to a meeting. It will be an unproductive one, but I plan on using it to develop a Grand Unified Theory of Meetings.

Herbert W. Lovelace is CIO at a multibillion-dollar international company. He can be contacted by E-mail at secret@cmp.com. He'll provide real answers (and whimsical comments) to your questions on his Web page, http://techweb.cmp.com/iw/current/secret.htm .

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