My son, Jack, introduced me to the TED Talk by Jason Fried, titled "Why work doesn't happen at work". 

One key aspect of his TED Talk - Jason talked against business meetings.

He shared his view - Employees don't call meetings, only managers call meetings...and meetings are a waste of time.

When I watched and listened to that part, I felt a Thought Post coming on. Here it is...

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When Jason Fried said, "Only managers call meetings....employees don’t call meetings"... that got me thinking, 'Why don’t employees call meetings?'

I think employees don’t call meetings for 4 reasons:

1. They favour being on their own over being in meetings with other people,
2. They don’t believe they have the right to call meetings,
3. They know they are doing the right things and they see no need to spend time talking with others about it, &
4. They know they are not doing the right things and they see no need to spend time talking with others about it.

Those are some examples of why employees don't call meetings. On the other hand, the reality is most employees do call meetings…it's just, when they do it, they don’t call it calling meetings.

Most employees initiate conversations with co-workers. Those qualify as meetings. In office environments, these conversations take forms ranging from helping one another with work problems to chit-chat about family woes. We could call the one end of the spectrum 'work' and the other end 'personal'. We could claim the one end of the spectrum illustrates an advantage of having office environments for employees while the other end illustrates a disadvantage. However, some employees would argue we have that backwards.

We must not underestimate the extent of people's needs for social interaction.

Even if we hear and watch it in a compelling TED Talk, we cannot accept as fact the claim employees don't call meetings.

Yes, it is true managers do call meetings.

Managers call meetings for a number of reasons:

1. Habit…they have accepted the habit - 'meetings are a necessary process of business', 
2. Their egos enjoy being front and centre and meetings provide a vehicle to feed their egos, 
3. They believe their people need help [whether their people agree with that or not], 
4. They see meetings as an efficient way to communicate with many people, 
5. They see value in team communications, 
6. The see value in people being accountable to a team, & 
7. They know physical presence is key to inspiring people.

The Thinking Behind The Tweet

It takes courage to face adversity. It takes courage to face criticism. It takes courage to face change. 

Children are born courageous and independent-minded. But, often, that is discouraged.

It takes wisdom to re-build courage.

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