In 2017, the Harvard Business Review published a survey that highlighted an uncomfortable truth: 71% of respondents regard meetings as a sheer waste of time. An all-too-typical tale illustrates the absurdity. One meeting organizer routinely distributed slide decks for every subteam in a department to review in advance. When members dutifully showed up, she just walked them through the decks. Why waste everybody’s time so flagrantly? If you must drag workers away from their genuinely productive tasks, at least try to make the most of each occasion.