TGIF – When Is A Meeting Not A Meeting?

As the week winds down, we wind down with some tidbits for your information, education, health, and enjoyment.

Meeting Quote:    “A meeting is an event where minutes are taken and hours wasted.”  James T. Kirk

Humor: “I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency — even if I’m in a Cabinet meeting.” – Ronald Reagan

Stat of the Week: 4 valuable questions for a successful meeting.  Forbes writer Christopher Frank has written an interesting and in some respects provocative article about business meetings.  Perhaps the most interesting quote from the article concerns the costs of meeting, something most of us rarely think about: “the weekly cost of meetings for a 10-person team is approximately $23,760. If you have 100 people in your company, this comes to almost a quarter of a million dollars per week spent on meetings. This price tag does not factor in the opportunity cost of not accomplishing other tasks, missed sales calls or lost customer face time.”  Perhaps that is also why he says that being lonely is not a sufficient reason to call a meeting.

Action Step: This article could be very valuable to those you work with.  Pass on this link and plan to discuss the 4 questions at your next meeting.  If you don’t, who will?

Weight Watch – Week 14:  (A personal 16 week Healthy Life Style report)

The 14th week’s results are in: I LOST 3.4 pounds on the official digital scale. Fourteen weeks into the program and I am down 18.2 pounds.  I followed my diet (okay, a one meal exception) and exercise program rigidly.  I am a little confused though.  That seems like a lot of weight loss in one week.  Maybe my body doesn’t go on a week-to-week basis but on a long term average.  I shall see.  Only two weeks to go to get my final results for the test period.  Wonder if I can get to -20 pounds?

I guess the big news this week is that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Belviq, or lorcaserin hydrochloride for weight control.  What was most interesting to me was (1) it’s not for everyone, (2) the best guess is that it will only help you lose 5% of your weight, and most importantly (3) it is to be combined with a reduced-calorie diet and exercise.  I wouldn’t qualify for the treatment, but that’s okay.  So far I have lost about 8% of my weight just by living a healthy life style.

Bill Bradley

Bill Bradley (mostly) retired after 35 years in organizational consulting, training and management development. During those years he worked internally with seven organizations and trained and consulted externally with more than 90 large and small businesses, government agencies, hospitals and schools.