Team meetings can be a complete waste of time. Here is a template for how to make a regular meeting useful.

1. Process

The meeting starts at the scheduled time, whether or not everyone is present. Use a little judgement with this, but consider that for a 6-person team, every minute that one person is late wastes 6 person-minutes of time.

Maybe your advisor will have some beginning announcements that can’t be communicated in an email.

1.1. Lightning round

Next, the person to the right of the meeting leader answers the three questions:

  1. What did you do yesterday? (or since last time)

  2. What will you do today? (or until the next meeting)

  3. What is blocking your progress?

The next person to the right then addresses the questions. Continue around the room until everyone has talked.

  • Do not solve problems during this round.

  • The goal is to hear from everyone first before having any related discussions.

  • The scribe makes notes on items to discuss after the 3Qs round.

1.2. Next phase

Whomever called the meeting should have distributed an agenda ahead of time. If not, you should be annoyed and make a note-to-self that you will not have your teammates annoyed at you for not having an agenda.

2. Three questions

2.1. Q1: Past work

What tasks were completed? What was planned but is not yet finished?

2.2. Q2: Future work

What task(s) do you reasonably plan to complete in the next timeframe?

2.3. Q3: Impediments

What is slowing down task completion?

What tasks are waiting on others?

What would you do but can’t yet?

  • My BlinkerFluidPump broke and I need a new one today

  • I still haven’t got the software I ordered a month ago.

  • I need help debugging a problem with FooBar

  • I’m struggling to learn FROBINATORS and would like to pair with someone on it.

  • I can’t get the vendor’s tech support group to call me back.

  • Our new contractor can’t start because no one is here to sign her contract.

  • I can’t get the OrangePeppers group to give me any time and I need to meet with them.

  • The department VP has asked me to work on something else "for a day or two."

  • I will be out of town tomorrow for a YakShavingConference.