15 Minutes

Scene: A conference room in a tall downtown office building
Players: The boss and a bunch of mah peeps.

Boss: "We need to have fewer update meetings on Big Ol' Project (BOP)."
Peep1: "That's great! We're all super busy. How are we going to do that?"
Boss: "By getting efficient. Project Manager (PM) and I will sit in a conference room for several hours, and each group will have 15 minutes to come through and provide BOP updates."
Peep2: "Great, so what kind of updates are you looking for?"
Boss: "Well, you'll need to create a task list and send it to the update team before the weekly update meetings."
Peep1: "Um, on a project the size of BOP, that kind of custom list is going to take an hour to put together and check for status."
Boss: "Right, so just make sure you send that out the day before your update meeting. Also, I need you all to attend a 15 minute meeting this afternoon."
Peep2: "An update meeting?"
Boss: "No, this meeting will be an opportunity for PM and I to show you a PowerPoint on how the update meetings will work."
Me: "Wait. So we're having a 15 minute meeting to learn how to have 15 minute meetings that we have to use an extra hour to prepare for?"
Boss: (Blank Stare)
Me: "So which update meetings can we take off our calendars?"
Boss: "We'll decide that after we get the 15 minute update meetings running smoothly."

So much for efficiency. The mechanics of a large, multi-national corporation are truly an amazing thing to behold.