Issue 102: Set fire to your meetings

Busy is measured in meetings. Progress is measured in conversations.

Hey, how are you?

Tonight the sky will be full of fireworks. Bonfires lit in back gardens and parks up and down the country, sparklers writing names in the dark, and that smell of smoke that clings to your coat for days.

So here’s my Bonfire Night challenge for you. If you could throw one thing from your working week on the fire, what would it be?

I’ll go first. More than half the meetings I get to observe, I’d throw straight on the bonfire.

Busy isn’t progress

Count the meetings in your calendar this week. Go on, I’ll wait.

Now count the conversations. The real ones. Where something was said that mattered, someone was properly heard, and you walked out in a different place from where you walked in.

If you’re anything like most leaders I work with, the first number is big and the second is painfully small.

Somewhere along the way, we started measuring busyness by the number of meetings we have. Back to back has become a badge of honour. “Sorry, I’m in meetings all day” is said with a sigh, but also with a little bit of pride.

But progress isn’t decided by how many meetings we sit in. It’s decided by how many productive conversations we have.

And just because we’ve had a meeting doesn’t mean we’ve had a conversation.

Meetings tell us where we are today. Conversations move us on from it.

That gap costs far more than time. It costs the idea nobody shared, the concern nobody raised, and the person who quietly decided, somewhere around the third update of the morning, that their voice doesn’t really count here.

Five signs you’re in a meeting, not a conversation

1. The same few voices fill the room. Everyone else is an audience, not a participant.
2. It’s a broadcast. Updates read out, slides talked through, information moved from one head to another and back again.
3. “Anything else?” is met with relieved silence. Laptops snap shut before the question has finished.
4. Attention is elsewhere. Cameras off, emails answered “while I listen”, phones face up on the table.
5. Nothing moves. You leave knowing exactly what was said, and the same actions roll over to next week.

Five signs you’re in a conversation

1. It’s two-way. Ideas go back and forth, build on each other, and sometimes collide.
2. Voice is balanced. Not always perfectly equal, but nobody dominates and nobody disappears. The quiet person gets asked, and then gets waited for.
3. It’s curious. More questions than statements. “What else?” instead of “anything else?” People listening to understand, not waiting for their turn to talk.
4. It’s honest. People say what they actually think, including the awkward bits, because it feels safe to.
5. It moves you forward. You leave somewhere different from where you started, with a decision, a shift, or a next step that someone owns.

Strike the match

So this week, take your recurring meetings and ask one question of each: is this a meeting, or a conversation?

If it’s a meeting that could have been an email, put it on the bonfire. If it should be a conversation, rebuild it. Fewer slides. More questions. And a clear answer to “where do we want to be when we leave this room?”

You don’t need more meetings. You need better conversations. Happy Bonfire Night.

A night with no agenda

On Friday 13 November, I’ll be sleeping out at Chorley FC with my daughter India for the Big Chorley Sleepout.

No agenda. No slides. No laptops. Just a cold night, a sleeping bag, and a whole evening of conversation with one of my favourite people in the world. I already know it will be one of the best conversations I have all year.

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But I’m very aware that for us it’s one night, and we get to choose it. For a lot of people in our own town, it isn’t a choice. The sleepout raises money for the Chorley FC Community Foundation, Let’s Make a Difference and SVP Chorley Buddies, three local organisations helping people facing homelessness, hardship and isolation, ideally before they reach crisis point.

We’re aiming to raise £300. If this newsletter has given you something to think about this week, I’d be so grateful if you could sponsor us, even a few quid makes a real difference.

👉 Sponsor Lee and India here​

Have fun,

Lee

Co-Founder of Get Knowledge

National Coach of the Year 2025

Author of ‘The People Puzzle’