Lesson for the day:
Meetings without agendas are a waste of time.
Right now, I am working on projects for half a dozen different departments within the county, and all of them want more time, and none of them have any technical knowledge. This has made my life difficult, and various managers keep wanting meetings.
The worst part though is when I get an e-mail that’s a meeting request that says “To discuss the site” and includes three options: Accept, Decline, or Tentative.
There is no agenda, no other information. I can’t plan, organize or anything. I’m expected to come up with answers on the spot, while I get berated by various people. I have to defend myself and the work I am doing because they don’t understand and I don’t have time to teach them (not that they have any interest to learn in the first place).
In the end, I waste my time and their time. Even worse, people will include me in meetings where my co-worker is the only one that should be part of it, or they’ll expect me to include him in meetings he doesn’t really need to be a part of, thus wasting even more time and causing a cascade effect on the work that needs to be done.
No doubt, I’ll have another meeting soon to explain why I wasn’t able to work on a project due to a meeting I was in.
Malcolm's Ramblings 
2 responses to “Meeting Frustration”
This would but the onus on you, but perhaps when you get these, you could accept and then respond with a proposed agenda. …but then again, that might not work as well as one would hope, because then you would be “controlling”. 😉
Or just decline the meetings and say you’re too busy.
Sometimes deferring meetings a few days and asking them to send you a list of questions can help…
I’ve already tried to have them stop, write out what they need, give it to us, and then have a meeting, but that didn’t happen/work for them. Tomorrow is the delayed meeting. Also, I can’t propose an agenda when I think the meeting is useless…lol If they can’t articulate what they want, how can I come up with a reasonable response or solution?