Prepare better for meetings and calls

It’s amazing to me how many people I’ve worked with over the years who seem to put absolutely no thought into how to prepare better for meetings and calls.

Look, the sad fact of the matter is — much of our work these days is task-driven, and many of those tasks occur across three spheres:

• Meetings
• E-Mails
• Phone/Conference Calls

I guess you could add ‘business travel’ as a fourth here.

All 3 (or 4) are incredibly fraught in their own right: for example, meetings are typically a rehash of things everyone knows and don’t drive any ‘strategy’ forward. E-mails are basically just the purest representation of business hierarchy. Conference calls are typically where people do other things — like eating, or catching up on e-mails. And if your whole life is work travel, good luck proving any ROI there.

All this said, how could you prepare better for meetings and calls — and maybe make them a bit meaningful?

Prepare better for meetings and calls: The pre-context

I’ve done variations of this throughout my career, but now that I’m mostly doing freelance work, I do it a lot more. Basically, think about who you’re calling or meeting with. Think about how…