Thanks for the comments. One of the best investments a company can make is to provide meeting facilitation training to their middle managers. Given how much time is spent in meetings and how much people complain about them, there is clearly room for improvement.

I worked in one such company and after the meeting facilitation training, meetings were not only shorter and more productive, but I’m sure we had a productivity gain in the company.

Given how much time is spent in meetings, I’m sure a company could see a gain of about 5% if everyone held efficient meetings with the minimum of staff, communicated the outcomes better and followed up properly on action items.

Gee I’m sold.