I should start counting the number of times I hear that phrase every day. Is it that hard to pay attention to your phone to see when you are on and off mute?? Add this to my big long list of pet peeves about meetings. 

At my client, no meeting starts on time. In fact, it’s only gotten worse now that the majority of people are working remotely. You can now write off the first 5-10 minutes of any meeting. I think I will start scheduling my meetings to start at 15 minutes past the hour. This way there should be no excuse to start on time. This cuts a typical one-hour meeting down to 45 minutes, but who set the arbitrary meeting time to one hour anyway? Some Microsoft programmer who created Outlook?

If you are working remotely, you need to use a headset, headphones, earbuds, or some ancillary equipment. Speaker phone or holding a phone to your ear does not cut it. It’s 2020 and yet phone conference connections vary wildly in quality. Sometimes it sounds like people are talking through foam or from the bottom of a well or while out in a grassy field during a thunderstorm.

Can you tell I had such a great week of meetings?