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Back in your inbox after taking a few weeks off to recover from surgery! I’m also starting a new graduate program to get an MA in Industrial-Organizational Psychology (my 4th degree from UGA!), so expect some interesting content in this newsletter that comes out of that program.
Picture this: you're starting a new job. It's hybrid, so for the first time in years, maybe ever, you actually have an office to go into. And hey, at least there's a great view of the city from the high-rise you're in.
Fast-forward six months. How many times do you think you've actually noticed that view? Chances are, not many at this point.
Meetings work the same way once you move into a leadership role. It's fascinating, really: getting invited to the meeting you knew existed but never got asked to join feels special the first time. And the second meeting. And the third. Maybe even the tenth. Before you know it, half of your week is meetings, and the allure of being in the room wore off a long time ago.
This isn't an "I hate meetings" newsletter. It's an "is this really a meeting I need to be in" newsletter. Calendars have their own kind of inertia—once a recurring meeting lands on the calendar, it stays there until somebody actually questions it. As a leader, that somebody has to be you. Revisiting your own calendar on purpose is part of the job.
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At Zapier, once a quarter, we run something called Deep Focus Week. You're asked to cancel anything non-essential for the week: 1:1s, team meetings, standing hangouts, all of it. It took me a while to get on board the first time. It was such a foreign concept. I was used to spending what felt like, and sometimes actually was, 80% of my workday in meetings, and I actually didn't know what to do with my hands with that "free time."
Now I think it's something every company should do, and if it's not happening company-wide where you are, I'd still encourage you to implement it for your own team. To make it work, you have to answer a few questions honestly.
How do you define non-essential? A sync on an imminent product release is probably a meeting you keep. That monthly coffee chat with a peer, though, can get canceled outright, or pushed a week if you genuinely want to talk to them.
What are you going to do with your new “free time?” If you're not used to having open calendar space, you can get stuck. I'd recommend updating your to-do list ahead of your Deep Focus Week so you're not scrambling to figure out what deserves it.
Which of these meetings actually need to resume next week or next month? This is my favorite part, and to me, is the whole point of Deep Focus Week. It's a forcing function to surface the meetings you were only attending because they were on the calendar, not because you found them useful. Cancel them outright, or at minimum take yourself off the invite if your biggest contribution tends to be "nothing from me" or "thanks, team."
Once you pick a week, stick to it. For managers especially, it can feel strange clearing out a calendar that's usually full. But you'll be surprised how much deep work you can get done when you aren't context-switching every 30 to 60 minutes.
By running Deep Focus Week once a quarter, you have a great opportunity to keep your calendar in check, and you’ll realize just how much more you’ll get done. That fancy office view may have gotten old, but at least you can control your calendar if you can’t control going to the office.