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Is this how you feel about meetings? Then you are not alone. I've rarely met anyone excited about going to another meeting. Unless of course they read my last blog  [Boardroom Dancing](https://steemit.com/management/@firststeps/boardroom-dancing).  In that case they might be very anxious to try out my self entertaining tactics.

But honestly if you need tricks just to get through a meeting then something's terribly wrong. And if you want to find out why your meeting sucks just ask yourself why you are having the meeting in the first place.

A bad purpose makes a bad meeting. A good purpose makes a good meeting. Pure and simple. 

My late husband was always quite vocal about his hatred of meetings. Back in the 90's he worked for a rather large company, so I asked him why they had meetings.

'To demoralize the slaves," he said. Both of us laughed hysterically, calmed down a bit and then laughed some more. 

Hopefully you don't feel like a slave at your job (at least not all the time.)  But I'm willing to bet you have felt demoralized. That's because it's easier to put someone on the spot in a group setting. But group settings also make us more defensive. 

So that management TEAM meeting quickly degrades into a blame game accompanied by a song and a dance. In the end nothing changed and nothing was accomplished. Just another worthless meeting.

But how did this happen? I'm pretty sure the agenda never included "demoralizing". But it actually snuck out from behind the driving force of most meetings - Department (or project) Reports. 

These reports can easily be collected, summarized, and disseminated by e-mail. Consistent failures or lack of productivity should be handled individually by direct supervisors not put on display at a group meeting. 

Like I said a bad purpose makes a bad meeting. Tradition, information, and beating a dead horse also fall into that category.  But if you want a good meeting you need to focus on one of the following. For now I am just going to list them cause each one will be a topic for my next three blogs.

* Problem Solving (also known as brainstorming)
* Celebration
* Team building

So what do you think? Have any horror stories of meetings gone wrong? Or maybe you have your own ideas about what makes a good meeting. I would love to hear your comments.

(*Photo by Breather on Unsplash*)