You leave the meeting feeling accomplished. Everyone nodded, a few key points were reiterated, and there was even a moment of alignment. But a week later, nothing's moved. The decision isn't implemented. The action points were vague. And that sense of progress? Gone.

The Productivity Theater

Meetings often serve as the stage for what Cal Newport calls "productivity theater", where looking busy and sounding aligned replaces actually making progress. In this theater, the presence of conversation is mistaken for the presence of decision-making.

The symptoms are familiar:

"A flurry of discussion but no clear owner"

"Agreement without clarity on what was agreed"

"Action points that feel like polite suggestions"

"The same topic revisited in the next meeting"

The result? A high cost of time and morale with very little to show.

Why It Feels Productive

There's a psychological reason meetings give us a dopamine hit. Humans are wired for social validation. When we speak and are heard, we feel accomplished. When everyone nods, we interpret that as consensus. It's comforting. It feels like movement.

But feeling like a team isn't the same as functioning like one.

The Real Cost

Harvard Business Review found that senior executives spend an average of 23 hours a week in meetings, and often rate them as inefficient. Multiply that across a team and you're looking at a massive productivity sink.

Beyond time, there's opportunity cost. Every hour in a fuzzy meeting is an hour not spent doing deep work, building, shipping, or solving. And worse, decisions deferred in meetings often fester, leading to rework or conflict later.

So Why Do We Keep Doing It?

Because synchronous meetings are familiar. They create a sense of urgency and visibility. You can say, "We talked about it", even if nothing happened.

But the truth is, most meetings are bad at three things:

- Capturing clear outcomes

- Assigning real ownership

- Creating shared memory

Without those, meetings become conversations that evaporate.