Stop drowning in meetings!
How to Reclaim 10 Hours a Week by Changing Your Relationship with Meetings
It's Monday morning.
You open your calendar and your stomach drops.
Back-to-back meetings from 9am to 5pm. Seven meetings. SEVEN.
And you think: When am I actually supposed to DO the work?
If this sounds familiar, you're not alone.
The average leader now spends 23 hours a week in meetings. That's more than half your working week just... sitting in meetings.
And here's the kicker: Most of those meetings? Completely unnecessary. They involve too many people. They're scheduled for an hour when they could be done in 15 minutes. Or they could just be an email.
Then you get to the end of the week and you can't even remember what half those meetings were about. But you DO remember feeling exhausted, overwhelmed, and like you achieved absolutely nothing.
Meanwhile, the actual transformation work you're supposed to be leading? The strategy you need to write? The team member who needs coaching?
None of it happened because you were too busy being in meetings ABOUT the work instead of actually DOING the work.
What Changed? Why Are We All Drowning in Meetings?
Meetings have completely taken over our working lives in a way that's actually quite recent.
Since we all went remote or hybrid, meetings became the default way to communicate about everything. Someone needs to discuss something? Let's put a meeting in. Don't want people to feel left out? Invite everyone.
And there's this feeling that if you're not in meetings, you're not actually working. A busy calendar full of meetings equals importance. Equals being valuable.
But that's complete rubbish.
Some of the most important work you do as a leader—strategic thinking, problem-solving, coaching conversations—requires uninterrupted deep work time. Not being pinged from one meeting to the next.
The Nursery Fee Wake-Up Call
Briony's wake-up call came when she returned to work after having her first child.
With a hard deadline to leave for nursery pick-up (£15 per minute late fees in London—no laughing matter), she'd be in meetings all day, have to leave by 5pm, and felt like she was constantly behind.
No time to take action on what was discussed in meetings. No time with her team. Just chronically anxious, worried someone would call her out for not delivering anything because she couldn't stay late to catch up.
She remembers the moment: "This has got to stop. It's making me ill. I'm going to reshape my relationship with meetings and decide what MY priority is."
That felt terrifying. What would people think if she didn't show up? Would she be invisible? Would they think she wasn't pulling her weight?
Here's what actually happened: No one noticed. Or rather, they noticed it was BETTER.
Because when she DID show up to meetings, she was prepared. She made impactful points. She knew why she was there and what she needed to do.
And she's never looked back since. It 100% changed her life.
The Three Strategies That Reclaim Your Time
Let's get practical. Here are three strategies you can implement this week to reclaim up to 10 hours.
Strategy #1: The Meeting Audit
What it is: Track every single meeting you're in for one week and ask yourself four questions.
The Four Questions:
What was the purpose of this meeting? (The ACTUAL purpose, not what it says in the calendar invite—if there even IS anything in the invite)
Did this meeting achieve that purpose? (Yes or no?)
Did this meeting need to BE a meeting? (Or could it have been an email, Slack message, async update?)
Did this meeting need ME specifically? (Was my presence essential, or was I just there because I got invited seven years ago and I'm still on the guest list?)
Why these questions are so powerful:
They force you to be honest about how you're spending your time.
You're probably already asking these questions in your head during meetings ("Why am I here? What is the purpose?"). But now you're taking notes. Creating data. Seeing patterns.
When to do this:
Once a year is helpful. Or when you start a new role (around the 3-month mark when you've settled in but haven't gotten trapped in unnecessary recurring meetings yet).
What you'll discover:
When Briony has done this in the past, she's been shocked. Sometimes she's saved 15-20 hours by identifying meetings that didn't meet all four criteria.
That's not just pinching 15 minutes here and an hour there. That's HUGE chunks of transformational time back.
And it made her quite angry. "Time is my most precious resource. How dare you waste my time like this?"
The secondary benefit:
It makes you a much more thoughtful convener of meetings. If YOU're ever calling a meeting, you have to be able to answer these four questions. It makes you a better leader who respects people's time.
How to implement:
Next week, track your meetings. Write down the four questions and your honest answers in a notebook or Google Doc.
At the end of the week, block 60 minutes to review the data. Then decide: What four meetings are you no longer going to? What changes are you making?
Important note: This isn't about judgment. It's about awareness. Once you can see the pattern, you can change it.
Strategy #2: The Default No Policy
What it is: Reversing the burden of proof on meeting acceptance.
How most of us currently operate:
Meeting invite comes in. Unless there's a really good reason to say no (already in another meeting, on leave), we hit accept. That's the default.
Sometimes it even feels nice to be invited. It's like a dopamine hit when you get a text message—someone's thinking of me!
What the Default No Policy says:
Unless there's a really compelling reason to say YES, your default response is no. Or at least: "Let me think about whether this actually needs to be a meeting."
Pause. Don't just hit accept.
Before you worry this sounds aggressive:
This isn't about being difficult. It's about being intentional about your time.
Every hour you spend in a meeting is an hour NOT spent coaching your team, NOT spent on strategic thinking, NOT spent on the transformation work you're actually responsible for delivering.
How it works in practice:
When a meeting invite comes in, ask yourself three questions BEFORE accepting:
Question 1: Is it clear what the purpose of the meeting is?
If it's not clear from the invite, go back to the organizer: "Can you help me understand what we're trying to achieve in this meeting?"
That question alone often makes people realize they haven't thought about why they're having a meeting. Sometimes just asking results in them going "Oh, actually, yeah, maybe this could just be an email."
Question 2: Do I specifically need to be there, or could someone from my team go instead? Or could I just get the notes afterwards?
You're often invited as "the leader" when actually someone on your team has better expertise, better experience, or NEEDS this opportunity for their development.
Quick story: Briony and some leadership peers have a weekly meeting that's "the very definition of corporate chaff." So they buddy up and take turns. One person goes for all of them to get their 30 seconds of airtime, get approval, get it done. Way more efficient than eight people sitting there for an hour.
Question 3: Could this be achieved in a shorter time or through a different format?
Default settings in email providers are often 30 minutes. People don't change it. They don't think "Does this genuinely need to be 30 minutes? Could it be 10?"
The FOMO Challenge:
The thing you have to let go of is FOMO—Fear Of Missing Out.
There WILL be meetings where stuff happens and you're not in the room. That can be hard.
But here's what Briony realized: The meetings where genuinely important decisions get made? You'll know about them. The information will reach you.
And honestly, most meetings? Nothing earth-shattering happens.
Also—when YOU'RE not in meetings and other team members are, it creates space for them to step up and present. It's a development opportunity. Often people behave differently when their leader's not in the room. Give them that moment to shine.
How to implement:
For the next two weeks, before you accept ANY meeting invite, pause. Ask yourself the three questions.
If you're not getting clear answers about purpose, your specific role, and whether it needs to be a meeting, push back politely.
Offer alternatives: "I think So-and-so on my team would be well-placed for this" or "I can't do that time but here are three alternatives."
You'll reclaim hours every single week.
Important note: This also gradually creates a culture shift. People start thinking more carefully about whether they really need that meeting.
Strategy #3: Timeboxing for High-Impact Work
What it is: Blocking specific chunks of time (2-3 hours) in your calendar and protecting them like they're the most important meetings you have. Because they are.
These are meetings with yourself to do your highest-impact work.
What counts as high-impact work?
NOT admin. NOT emails. NOT busy work.
High-impact work is:
Strategic planning for your transformation project
Preparing for a difficult conversation
Writing that proposal for senior leadership
Designing new processes your team needs
Actually coaching someone through a challenge
Deep thinking time
How it works:
Step 1: Know your priorities.
You can't timebox effectively if you don't know what your three priorities are for the week (linked to your quarterly priorities).
If you don't know your priorities, that's Step Zero. Figure those out first.
Step 2: Block the time in your calendar.
Look at next week. For each of your three priorities, block the time you need to actually DO that work.
Maybe one needs an hour. Maybe one needs three hours for research, writing, and reflection.
Put it in your calendar with a SPECIFIC title. Not just "focus time" but "Write strategy slide for away day" or "Prepare talk for conference."
So when you see it in your calendar, you know exactly what you're doing. When you get to it, you're not thinking "Gosh, what should I work on?" You already know.
Step 3: Protect these blocks like they're meetings with your CEO.
Don't let people overwrite them. Don't move them unless there's a really compelling reason (and you can move it to another time that same week).
Treat them as seriously as if your biggest boss had booked that time.
What if something urgent comes up?
Use judgment. Sometimes truly urgent things happen.
But often, what people think is urgent really isn't. It's their poor planning becoming your emergency.
You can make these blocks private appointments so people don't know you're declining their request for a "meeting with yourself."
And offer alternatives: "I'm busy at that time, but I think So-and-so on my team would be perfect for this" or "I can't do that time but here are three alternatives."
Why this is game-changing:
It gives you back that sense of calm and control.
You're not getting to Friday thinking "I haven't done ANY of my priority work this week because I've been in meetings about non-priority stuff."
You KNOW you have time blocked to do the work. So you can relax.
The signal you're sending:
When you protect this time, you're also signaling to your team: This is important. Protecting time for high-impact work matters. Don't let other people's emergencies override your priorities.
That's a habit your team should be creating too.
But What If My Boss Won't Let Me Do This?
We hear this a lot: "Yeah, but I can't do this. My organization won't let me. My boss expects me to be available."
Here's what we've learned: You have a lot more agency than you think you do.
Start small. Don't turn up to nothing next week. Gradually implement these strategies. Experiment.
Briony got very little, if any, pushback. And here's the thing: We think people are WAY more aware of our actions (and inactions) than they actually are.
Most people aren't watching your calendar as closely as you think. They're too busy worrying about their own.
And when you DO show up to meetings after implementing these strategies?
You're prepared. You're purposeful. You make impactful points. You're fully present.
People notice THAT. Not that you declined three other meetings that week.
Your Action This Week
Don't try to do all three strategies at once.
Pick ONE:
Tight on time this week? Start with the meeting audit. That gives you the data you need to implement the other two strategies.
Feeling bold? Implement the Default No Policy for every invite that comes in this week.
Need to protect your sanity? Block timeboxed slots for your three priorities for next week RIGHT NOW before your calendar fills up.
Then let us know how many hours you save.
If you save more than 10 hours, DM us on Instagram or email hello@leadtheroom.co.uk—we'd love to celebrate with you.
Because here's the truth: You don't need permission to take control of your calendar.
No six-month change program. No approval from your boss.
Just you, deciding that your time is your most precious resource and you're going to be intentional about how you spend it.
The transformation work you're here to do—the strategy, the coaching, the thinking—it depends on you having the time and space to actually do it.
So reclaim that time. Your team (and your sanity) will thank you.
