Meeting Etiquette

[MHS]

In the last 6 months to year, I've noticed this trend of my clients setting meetings without asking if I'm available. That seems so presumptuous and unprofessional and it just annoys the shit out of me. I assume that the people I work with are busy professionals, I would never just assume that they are available at my whim. It's especially annoying when I've already indicated my availability (which one would think would equally indicate lack of availability on days/times not listed) in a previous email and they ignored that and scheduled a meeting without verifying my ability to attend that meeting. I do project management and onsite training for 24 different states/territories across 5 different time zones and you seriously just assume you can schedule me for 2 hours without even asking?!? Ugh.

So, is this standard business practice now? I don't recall this being an issue in prior years.

[Isgrimnur]

If they feel that they can schedule you without etiquette, I would feel that I can decline with exactly as much thoughtfulness.

[MHS]

If they feel that they can schedule you without etiquette, I would feel that I can decline with exactly as much thoughtfulness.

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..." Or even better, the just aggressive, "Look fuckwit, read the previous email and pick from the 3 suggested days. If I can find time for this stupid meeting between being in 3 different cities next week, I'm sure you can too."

[morlac]

In the last 6 months to year, I've noticed this trend of my clients setting meetings without asking if I'm available. That seems so presumptuous and unprofessional and it just annoys the shit out of me. I assume that the people I work with are busy professionals, I would never just assume that they are available at my whim. It's especially annoying when I've already indicated my availability (which one would think would equally indicate lack of availability on days/times not listed) in a previous email and they ignored that and scheduled a meeting without verifying my ability to attend that meeting. I do project management and onsite training for 24 different states/territories across 5 different time zones and you seriously just assume you can schedule me for 2 hours without even asking?!? Ugh.

So, is this standard business practice now? I don't recall this being an issue in prior years.

LOL, I can so relate. I've noticed the bigger the Whale (ATT and NCR I am looking at you!) the more presumptuous they get. FFS this one clown at ATT will send out invites an hour before they start and then acts all surprised and hurt when only half the people join and he has to reschedule next week...an hour before.

[morlac]

If they feel that they can schedule you without etiquette, I would feel that I can decline with exactly as much thoughtfulness.

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..." Or even better, the just aggressive, "Look fuckwit, read the previous email and pick from the 3 suggested days. If I can find time for this stupid meeting between being in 3 different cities next week, I'm sure you can too."

I like to just mark tentative with no reply. Keep them guessing!

[noxiousdog]

We have 3rd party contractors who we provide email boxes for but they refuse to use our email system which prevents us from seeing each others' calendars. That's brilliant.

I have the same things happen that you do and I have no qualms with declining with a note that says, "I'm not available at that time."

[Skinypupy]

In the last 6 months to year, I've noticed this trend of my clients setting meetings without asking if I'm available. That seems so presumptuous and unprofessional and it just annoys the shit out of me. I assume that the people I work with are busy professionals, I would never just assume that they are available at my whim. It's especially annoying when I've already indicated my availability (which one would think would equally indicate lack of availability on days/times not listed) in a previous email and they ignored that and scheduled a meeting without verifying my ability to attend that meeting. I do project management and onsite training for 24 different states/territories across 5 different time zones and you seriously just assume you can schedule me for 2 hours without even asking?!? Ugh.

So, is this standard business practice now? I don't recall this being an issue in prior years.

LOL, I can so relate. I've noticed the bigger the Whale (ATT and NCR I am looking at you!) the more presumptuous they get. FFS this one clown at ATT will send out invites an hour before they start and then acts all surprised and hurt when only half the people join and he has to reschedule next week...an hour before.

Every. Single. Day. Add in the "government bureaucrat" factor, and it has me tearing my hair out on a daily basis.

I especially like when they schedule an early morning meeting, and then don't even bother to show up. Had two 6am meetings this week - at the client's request - that they just completely flaked.

[gilraen]

We have some clients who feel they are important enough to do this. They are not doing it to me as much as to their account managers (who have finally learned to just decline these meetings). I haven't had someone ask me about my availability and then outright ignore it, though.

[MHS]

It's especially irritating when it's for a demo of our software. I'm the one giving the demo, shouldn't you verify that the person you 100% can't have the meeting without is available?

I'm sick of people.

[coopasonic]

I'm sick of people.

Congratulations on making it this far. You've outlasted many of us.

[YellowKing]

I am quick on the "Decline" trigger if I'm already booked. However, it's unusual for me to be in a situation where the meeting requester would be customer-level. So there's no real obligation on my part to make them happy.

It's a pretty rare occurrence all in all because 90% of my meetings are with internal staff and they all utilize the power of the scheduling assistant.

[ImLawBoy]

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..."

I have absolutely given that response and will continue to do so (provided it's not my boss or something). But the lawyers are kind of expected to be assholes anyway, so I don't think it surprises anyone.

[pr0ner]

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..."

I have absolutely given that response and will continue to do so (provided it's not my boss or something). But the lawyers are kind of expected to be assholes anyway, so I don't think it surprises anyone.

You probably have "Esq" after your name in your signature line, too.

[ImLawBoy]

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..."

I have absolutely given that response and will continue to do so (provided it's not my boss or something). But the lawyers are kind of expected to be assholes anyway, so I don't think it surprises anyone.

You probably have "Esq" after your name in your signature line, too.

I'm not that bad. I don't have Esq or JD behind my name, and I didn't do that even before I took a lawyer position (it's pretty common for lawyers in non-lawyer jobs to put that in their signature just so that they can get the "respect" they think they deserve). Besides, most people are sending meeting notices from inside the company where they already have access to my Outlook calendar, so they deserve a little snippiness.

Next you'll accuse me of putting something in my user name to indicate I'm a lawyer.

[coopasonic]

Next you'll accuse me of putting something in my user name to indicate I'm a lawyer.

Or a gardener...

[gameoverman]

If they feel that they can schedule you without etiquette, I would feel that I can decline with exactly as much thoughtfulness.

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..." Or even better, the just aggressive, "Look fuckwit, read the previous email and pick from the 3 suggested days. If I can find time for this stupid meeting between being in 3 different cities next week, I'm sure you can too."

I don't think that's passive/aggressive. You are not attacking them, you aren't attempting to undermine them, you actually want to work with them. Not everyone has the same ideas of how things should be. It could be that they schedule the meetings because they assume that if there's a problem with that then you'll say something. So you can see how if you say nothing, they don't know they are irritating you. I would go with "I'm sorry you didn't receive my previous email because it listed the times I'm available". After that it's merely a matter of sticking to your boundaries, you're available when you're available and that's it. This is unless they have leverage over you and can schedule you whenever they like, in that case it's pointless to get upset over it since you can't do anything about it.

[Kraken]

I always thought the Hee-Hoo rule applied to this: He who brings the refreshments determines the timing and importance of the meeting. Donuts and coffee? Optional. Deli platter and beer? Mandatory.

[Unagi]

technically speaking, 'passive aggressive' would be you accepting the meeting, and then just not showing up.

[em2nought]

My office hours are nailed on my door. It must be in some sort of ancient dialect that nobody around here is familiar with.

[McNutt]

I'm a project manager, so I schedule a shit ton of meetings. I ALWAYS ask the main attendee their availability before sending the request.

[gameoverman]

technically speaking, 'passive aggressive' would be you accepting the meeting, and then just not showing up.

Accepting the time of the meeting and not showing up falls into the aggressive category. Showing up and not taking part, so that the meeting is a total waste of time, would be what I'd consider passive aggressive.

I think of it in football terms. A player who refuses to show up for training camp, even though he's under contract, is aggressive. A player who shows up but puts no effort into it is passive aggressive.

[MHS]

technically speaking, 'passive aggressive' would be you accepting the meeting, and then just not showing up.

Accepting the time of the meeting and not showing up falls into the aggressive category. Showing up and not taking part, so that the meeting is a total waste of time, would be what I'd consider passive aggressive.

I think of it in football terms. A player who refuses to show up for training camp, even though he's under contract, is aggressive. A player who shows up but puts no effort into it is passive aggressive.

There's never a possibility of me showing up and not taking part. Any meeting I'm a part of is because I'm the project manager for the meeting or because I'm giving a demo of the software.

[hentzau]

This happens to me daily, but it isn't from outside clients, it's from within our own corporation, so people have access to my calendar, but then schedule meetings anyway whether I'm blocked or not.

And I get it, I have tremendous sympathy for people trying to schedule meetings against my calendar. But now that we're down another engineer, it's even worse for me (and them.) I'm going to have a talk with my team lead about refusing meetings, especially meetings that occur during my commute (which is very specifically blocked off.)

[LawBeefaroni]

If someone schedules without checking calendar (internal) or asking for times (external) then I just assume my attendence is optional and plan accordingly.

[Jeff V]

When I schedule meetings, I try to accommodate as many calendars as I can see. For internal people who choose to block this feature, they get no consideration. For external people, they can expect the date and time to have been vetted as well as possible at my end -- they are free to propose alternatives, which I would then check for availability at my end. It usually isn't too difficult to find common ground after one or two emails.

When I get meeting requests from any source, my decision tree is:

Do I have to attend?
Yes
No/decline

Can someone stand in for me?
Yes invite someone else and then decline
No - check my availability

Am I already busy?
Yes - decline
No

Does the schedule impinge upon my lunch time or before/after end of day?
Yes - decline
No

Is there any consequences for missing this meeting?
Yes - grudgingly accept, preferably with a "maybe"
No- decline

If I'm a load-bearing participant, I will request a reschedule if the decision tree otherwise calls for decline. Most meetings I'm involved with are internal, so there is no excuse to be invited to something that demands my presence when my calendar says I'm unavailable, and rarely does this occur. For meetings with external participants, it's the nature of the beast and I am quite tolerant. While it is quite rare to have to ask a scheduled, accepted meeting to reschedule, it does happen, not so often that it's any bother though.

[pr0ner]

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..."

I have absolutely given that response and will continue to do so (provided it's not my boss or something). But the lawyers are kind of expected to be assholes anyway, so I don't think it surprises anyone.

You probably have "Esq" after your name in your signature line, too.

I'm not that bad. I don't have Esq or JD behind my name, and I didn't do that even before I took a lawyer position (it's pretty common for lawyers in non-lawyer jobs to put that in their signature just so that they can get the "respect" they think they deserve). Besides, most people are sending meeting notices from inside the company where they already have access to my Outlook calendar, so they deserve a little snippiness.

Next you'll accuse me of putting something in my user name to indicate I'm a lawyer.

Ha. Was just messing with you a little!

I will say from my own professional experience, attorneys who sign their name "Esq" tend to be real pains in the ass to work with.

[naednek]

My boss is incredibly hard to find, so the other day I found a free time slot on his calendar and scheduled a meeting. I showed up, he wasn't there. I camped out as two other people showed trying to meet with him without a meeting. I told them I'm first and I have a meeting on the calendar. 15 minutes of waiting in his office, I sent him a text, stating I'm here waiting He finally showed up right when my meeting was supposed to end. I only needed 5 minutes to talk. He gave me "the look" when he saw me there waiting.

[em2nought]

My boss is incredibly hard to find, so the other day I found a free time slot on his calendar and scheduled a meeting. I showed up, he wasn't there. I camped out as two other people showed trying to meet with him without a meeting. I told them I'm first and I have a meeting on the calendar. 15 minutes of waiting in his office, I sent him a text, stating I'm here waiting He finally showed up right when my meeting was supposed to end. I only needed 5 minutes to talk. He gave me "the look" when he saw me there waiting.

Seems like an excellent opportunity to take a nap at his desk.

[Jolor]

Excellent thoughts on this, team. I'd like to set up a conference call for tomorrow at 0900 Eastern to discuss how we can embrace this as an organisation. For those on the west coast, you are welcome to join from home.

MHS - as you kicked this off, I'd like you to take the lead by documenting tomorrow's highlights and socialising across teams.

Best,
JFMF

[Jeff V]

While on the subject of meetings, when I worked for a hospital I found I could avoid late Friday afternoon meetings merely by marking the time as unavailable. I used to be a sub in the golf league, and once found myself paired up with a former VP of Hospital Administration. This topic came up in the 4-some as we waited our turn on the final home. I mentioned what I did and this 60-something woman glared at me and said "I'd never put up with that shit. If I had ever caught you doing that I'd have fired your ass." I simply smiled and replied, "Well, Stacy, you know Friday afternoon meetings haven't even been an issue since you left."

Yes, she still talks to me whenever our path's cross.

[naednek]

My boss is incredibly hard to find, so the other day I found a free time slot on his calendar and scheduled a meeting. I showed up, he wasn't there. I camped out as two other people showed trying to meet with him without a meeting. I told them I'm first and I have a meeting on the calendar. 15 minutes of waiting in his office, I sent him a text, stating I'm here waiting He finally showed up right when my meeting was supposed to end. I only needed 5 minutes to talk. He gave me "the look" when he saw me there waiting.

Seems like an excellent opportunity to take a nap at his desk.

well my reward\punishment is now I have to present my project to the managers meeting... GRRR

[GreenGoo]

It takes a special kind of a executive to fire someone because they don't want meetings late Friday afternoon.

I mean, who *wants* meetings then? As Jeff points out, sociopaths, that's who.

[Jaymann]

We used to have a client named "Earl" who would always call us at 4:45 pm on Friday afternoon and start demanding outrageous BS. It was so regular that we called it the Friday night bed check.

[Unagi]

It takes a special kind of a executive to fire someone because they don't want meetings late Friday afternoon.

While in spirit I entire support you and Jeff V here, I will just point out that her declared 'firing offence' was Jeff declaration that he would block off every single Friday afternoon. Which is kinda saying he is off on Friday afternoons - forever... which, as a Boss, I would find a little unacceptable in it's 'grab'.

BTW, I did the SAME THING as Jeff. And it wasn't at all like I had every Friday Afternoon 'off'. I just reserved it so that I wasn't 'on the hook' should my afternoon look pretty clear (clearly, IT is --NEVER-- 'off' on Friday afternoon).


I guess my only point being this-- while I agree that "it takes a special kinda...", I think that the scenario presented was including someone that wanted to show how tough they were, in reply to what Jeff V presented them...

I doubt anyone would have done any firing...

When I marked my Friday afternoon time as 'occupied' , I told my 'above' that I was entirely available, but generally trying to put a 'bow' on the week's issues - that I liked to keep that time for myself and not for meetings ... which was entirely true.

[GreenGoo]

There's a big difference between "off" and unavailable for your bullshit meeting that could be scheduled literally any other time, all of which are more convenient and less intrusive to peoples' personal lives.

Presumably she was not serious, but suggesting she was will result in responding as if she was. I.e. she needs to be clear about her seriousness.

[Hrdina]

If they feel that they can schedule you without etiquette, I would feel that I can decline with exactly as much thoughtfulness.

It took everything I had not to go with the passive aggressive, "As you can see in my previous email, I am not available on the suggested day and time. Once again, here is my availability for the upcoming week..." Or even better, the just aggressive, "Look fuckwit, read the previous email and pick from the 3 suggested days. If I can find time for this stupid meeting between being in 3 different cities next week, I'm sure you can too."

I like to just mark tentative with no reply. Keep them guessing!

That's my default response to most meeting requests. It makes me very popular.

[EvilHomer3k]

Friday afternoons (well, after 2;30) I have meetings for learning new skills. I only get to actually do it about a fourth of the time but i schedule it. Usually something else has come up and I have to deal with that. My calendar, however, is used as much for scheduling my own time as it is scheduling meetings. If I need to work on something I put it on the calendar. So it's not uncommon (actually it's more common) for me to have meetings that are only with myself and are totally movable. Where I used to work we made everyone's free/busy time viewable (by default) for everyone at the college. Here, it's off by default so we have people sending out scheduling doodles constantly. Annoys the crap out of me. Lets add another tool to do something that a tool we already have does better. No, no, no. Let's not.