Does anyone else here hate meetings?

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I hate going to meetings. They tire me out very much.

One of my professors hated meetings too, because he considered them a waste of time, disliked their emphasis on interpersonal politics, and took up time he would otherwise spend on getting something done. He'd go for the food, though.

He never voted in elections, either, probably out of protestful abstention, not apathy, there being nobody who met his approval, and not any "none of the above" box to check.

I hated meetings too. They seemed pointless. It seems like it would be more sufficient just to skip the meeting and send out those "meeting minutes" in an e-mail. I think it's suppose to make it look like a collaborative effort but really it was the same people making the decisions and simply relaying them at the meeting.

Depends how the meeting is conducted.

I like the formality and structure of some meetings, particularly when the participants do not know each other and certain pleasantries are expected to be followed (eg a job interview panel).

Much easier than topic-less, "casual" conversation.

I despise them. I often wonder how anyone can be expected to get any real work done when so much time is spent in meetings..........

Where I work we have a 3 hour meeting every month, which can become 4 hour meetings if they decide to provide a training session also.

Suffice to say, I find it very hard work. I also find that when sat in the meeting I tend to realise that i'm constantly fidgeting and cannot concentrate. It will normally turn out that once the meeting has ended I haven't heard a thing that has been said and totally exhausted.

meetings. Waste of freaking time. Boring.

Many of my meetings are wastes of time. I frequently sleep through the dullest parts. I have one meeting in which I could just phone in my input. It would probably work better as a virtual meeting of those who are really interested.

When I call a meeting, I usually have no printed agenda and make it short.

I've been to a couple of good meetings -- the facilitator has said "this is what we're here to discuss, here are the things various people have been looking at in regard to this situation, and here is what we need to accomplish." Clear, direct, organized.

Unfortunately, too many meetings are sort of "free form" wanderings of six or seven minds. People all bring their own agendas and motivations, and I can never figure them out.

I loved meetings when I worked tech support, but that was because I hated my job so much that any break was welcome. They were still a complete waste of time, though. And now that my job consists of sitting at a desk, drawing stuff in AutoCAD, not talking to a soul, and listening to podcasts and audiobooks for 8 hours straight, I DESPISE meetings.
We have a team meeting every month, which has yet to produce anything useful that could not have been accomplished in an email. And every couple of months or so we are all required to attend a big marketing meetings. I am not in marketing. My job does not involve marketing in any way... I don't really get why we are required to attend. Those meetings are just terrible. They are conducted by loud, outgoing people with Nsync-like headsets. It feelings like sitting in the audience of an infomercial for 4 hours (or more).

I actually don't mind the occasional meeting, so long as I'm not the center of attention.

I can sit back, relax a bit, take a couple of notes in a notebook, doodle in the margins, and just watch the body language and facial expression of everyone in the meeting, see how they interact, try to understand the things each person at the meeting seems to think is important. I don't always understand what I'm seeing and hearing, but it can be entertaining.

Waste of freaking time, yeah. I could be working on much needed things instead.
Worst is when they call the damn meetings BEFORE WORKING HOURS. If it's a work-related meeting, why not have it during working hours, damn it? It takes me an hour long to get from my home to the office by bus... I have to wake up earlier (usually I get up by 7am, with the alarm clock set for 6:30-6:40, get out around 8am, and arrive there at 9am more or less), and since I'm the one who has one set of keys and never loses or forgets them, I can't skip the damn meetings...

Oh, no - I forgot about that! My previous job LOVED to do that!

They would schedule "mandatory" special meetings and trainings on my day off or even my vacation every time. I don't have my own car, so I would have to get someone to give me a ride all they way from my rural home to work in the city for a short, utterly pointless meeting. Sure, they would pay me for it, but gas and wear and tear on the vehicle and on my relationship with whatever family member or friend gave me the ride cost way more than I got from the meeting. I'm pretty sure they were doing it on purpose, too, just to annoy me, because they would make it a point of telling me that I had to attend a meeting that had nothing to do with me or I would lose my job, schedule it at the last minute so that I was not prepared for it, and it always happened on my day off or vacation, never on anyone else's, and I'd caught a couple of the managers laughing about it after I finally complained about it.

I'm glad my current employer is far more reasonable about the meetings!

Meetings are slow death... usually with tea and dry biscuits provided to prolong it.

Most of the time I'm waiting for everyone else to come to the logical conslusion that I reached in the first two minutes and 27 seconds. The rest of the time I'm watching the clock and ignoring the pointless debate between the killjoys who think that everything is impossible.

I like to hold anti-meetings... no agenda, no minutes, just questions and answers. Especially with site and system users. Then most people leave knowing more than they did when they walked in and everyone stays awake.

I start by telling them that I haven't prepared a 'death by powerpoint' presentation, haven't come with reams of handouts or copious notes to read in monotone and that I don't really know what I'm there to tell them. When the look of utter horror fades, I start asking them questions about how they use the websites, software, or system. Leading on to open ended questions and letting them ramble on... communication, productive debate. All very casual, very relaxed... the kind of conversation you'd have with the person at the next desk. The only time I stop anyone from speaking is if they hijack the meeting.

Within minutes the mood changes, they realise that no one is going to cut their comments short to keep to the agenda, no one is going to go around the table one by one, and they start to ask the kind of questions they wouldn't ask in a more formal setting. No one is agreeing with a bad ideas just to smooth someone else's ego, no one is getting their hackles up because someone got 30 seconds more time than another person. They're just talking amongst themselves.

I've scrapped complete systems in the middle of a build after an anti-meeting and ended up with end products that weren't what the users thought they needed, or even what I thought they wanted, but are now held up as a benchmarks in the business. All because I allowed communication to take place instead of holding a meeting.

Sadly, I'm only allowed to do this with my own meetings... *sigh*

I actually like meetings. In my last 2 jobs, I haven't been able to go to meetings, and I never have a clue as to what's going on. I've been to meetings that really devolve into nonsense, but if they stay on topic then I find them helpful to give me some idea of what I should be directing my energy towards.