Steve Firth wrote:
Roland Perry wrote:

But these sorts of
conversation on usenet are somewhat dominated by self-selecting people
who are comfortable with using email, rather than having face to face
meetings.

I grow increasingly exasperated by those who only seem able to work on
the phone/face to face. Meetings are usually a great big waste of time,
and usually exist only to stroke the ego of whoever arranged the
meeting. I've been doing "meetings" more than thirty years. I really
can't recall any that produced results worth having or that hadn't
already been decided long before the meeting was convened.


I have to agree.

I used to write the minutes of all the meetings I was forced to hold in
advance of the meeting. I rarely even had to edit them, since the
statements and reactions of every individual participant were
predictable and lets face it as the organiser all decisions were going
to be made my way no matter what. Just as every other chair of any other
meeting always had their own way.

I'm having to travel later this week for a "meeting" that could be done
by email, it's going to take three days and involve about 30
individuals. Each will get just a few minutes to get their point across.
Whereas if the conference were virtual each person could contribute a
full day's work to the issue still have plenty o time for discussion and
decisions and save 60 vehicle movements plus 60 days in hotels.


I couldn't agre more. Meetings to decide issues are seldom worth while.
They do have team building value, and a chance to brainstorm.

I remember one customer in Aberdeen, who we never visited, not from the
first contact, through several e-mails, to closing a sale, building a
computer system, with a modem, shipping it up by courier, and installing
and testing it using that.

Customers wanted to see us, for sure, but it wasn;t *necessary* and
indeed most of the work was always better done back at base before leaving.

I did one installation in 15 minutes. The bloke was angry and didn't
want to pay the £75 installation fee. I told him it was the 8 hours work
we had done before arriving that made it so simple.

Then the was the emergency phone call from Channel 4, that I insisted we
charge heavily for. I drive down, parked at huge expense,, and then sat
at reception for 50 minutes till he came out of the machine room, where
his mobile didn't work. In ten minutes I was able to demonstrate that
someone had buggered the configuration files, which he was gracious
enough to admit. No call out necessary, But we got paid,...a lot..

The default assumption is that you gho into a place of work, amnd meet
with people to discuss issue.

Remove that default assumption and its amazing how much MORE work can be
done at lower cost.