Entrepreneur and creator Codie Sanchez knows she has a “kind of intense” approach to meetings.
“Meetings should only be for people who need to be in them, because nobody wants more meetings than you need,” she said. “So I’m always asking: Does everybody at this meeting need to be in here?”
The ex-Wall Streeter made a name for herself by buying “boring” businesses like laundromats. She founded the Austin, Texas-based company, Contrarian Thinking, which helps owners buy and build businesses. Sanchez also has a big social media presence, including 3.3 million Instagram followers, and hosts the No. 14 business podcast on Spotify.
Here are Sanchez’s rules for effective meetings at her company.
1. People can leave a meeting at any time
Sanchez said a “big thing at the company” is that anyone can leave any meeting if they feel they’re not supposed to be there. It’s not to be rude, but to maximize efficiency.
“We’re not that big of a company, so they might just be like, ‘Anybody need anything for me? I think I’m not needed here. I’m going to go work on X,'” she said. “And everybody would be like, ‘Okay, cool, bye.'”
2. Prioritize agenda items
Sanchez’s boundary-setting approach also applies to meeting agendas.
She’ll often say, “Do we need to talk about that? Should we sideline this?”
“That can be seen as kind of intense, but in my mind, what I’m saying is, ‘I’m saving you time,'” she said. “So it’s more important to be efficient than sugar coat it and be nice.”
3. Work how you need to
Sanchez wants people to work the way they need to to get stuff done.
For her, that means no meetings before 10 a.m., so she can save the mornings, when she’s most productive, to do work that requires deep thinking.
“My brain’s smarter in the morning than it is in the evening,” she said. “By the end of the day, I’ve had decision fatigue. And I think that’s true for most people.”
She said most of the success she’s had in her career has come down to making good decisions.
“I used to think it was hard work,” she added.
CEOs have strong feelings about meetings
Helping owners find efficiencies so they can run their business without being constantly present is a theme of Sanchez’s new book, “Own or Be Owned: Build a Business So Good It Doesn’t Need You.” It’s a follow-up to her New York Times bestseller “Main Street Millionaire.”
Sanchez writes about cutting people from processes, like meetings and projects, then automating them.
She frequently cites Elon Musk, advising owners not to spend too much time in meetings and status updates so they can focus on solving the big, hard problems.
Other CEOs have expressed strong opinions about meetings. JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon has set out rules for making meetings productive, like having them start and end on time and making sure they have a purpose. Instagram head Adam Mosseri has canceled the practice of recurring meetings and encouraged employees to decline meetings if they interfere with their work.
Other habits she swears by
Sanchez shared other practices she follows to keep herself on track.
She calls herself forgetful and “terrible” with dates, so she uses a virtual assistant to remind her about upcoming events on her calendar, so she doesn’t arrive late to meetings.
A self-described optimizer, she has a red light on her desk that’s pointed at her face and a treadmill she jumps on during phone calls.
She’s also protective of her time. She lives by her calendar, and if she needs to buckle down and focus on a task, she sets a timer for herself.
“That’s just because I think I have a little bit of ADHD, and if I didn’t do that, I wouldn’t be able to focus on anything,” she said.
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