Every Monday, eight of us used to spend an hour taking turns reading status updates aloud. Most of it could have been written down. So we wrote it down.
The problem with status meetings
Status meetings feel productive because everyone is talking. But most updates only matter to one or two people, and the rest of the room waits. By the time we reached the real discussion, we had ten minutes left.
One shared note, written before the meeting
Now each person adds three lines to a shared note by Sunday evening: what they finished, what they are working on, and where they are stuck.
What goes in the note
Done: one line per finished item, with a link
Next: the one thing that matters most this week
Blocked: anything that needs a decision from someone else
What stays out
Long explanations, screenshots of progress, and anything nobody needs to act on.
The meeting is now only for decisions
We read the note before we join. The meeting starts with the Blocked column and ends when every blocker has an owner. Most weeks that takes thirty minutes.
What we learned after three months
Meetings got shorter, but the bigger change was the note itself. It became a searchable record of what we decided and why.
Try it with your team
Start with one week. Share the three-line format on Friday, ask everyone to fill it in by Sunday, and keep Monday’s meeting to the Blocked list. You can always go back.
MP
Mina Park
Writes about product and process at Tidely.
