Half-Call November Initiative

GOAL: Reduce the amount of time spent in meetings and experiment with NEW WAYS to make decisions and drive alignment. Connect outside of meetings to make work more efficient, lighter, and reduce organizational drag.

PURPOSE: Encourage people to experiment with NEW WAYS to get the work done. 

WHY: There are lots of ways to make decisions, give updates, and build alignment outside of meetings. We implemented this initiative in 2023, and the feedback indicated the team felt it helped focus meetings on high-priority topics, improve productivity, and allow for more focused work time and collaboration. 

ACTIONS TO TAKE - If you are the owner of any meetings

1.Cut all standing meetings in half:

• Weekly meetings can stay weekly but be half as long, OR become bi-weekly.

• Monthly calls are cut by 25% 

• Use AI to support your review:

  You can use Gemini, our official organization-wide AI platform (available to all staff), to review your November calendar and reflect on:

  • Which meetings could be shortened, moved to asynchronous updates, or dropped entirely?

  • If you prefer using ChatGPT or Claude, feel free to use whichever AI tool you have access to - just remember to follow our AI Responsible Use Policy and guardrails 🙂

2.Experiment with new ways to get the work done

• Use a Loom video to share an update

• Ask for decisions from people over WhatsApp or email

• Request people do pre-work before the meetings to make meetings more efficient

• Examine priorities and ensure live calls are used to address the most important priorities

      Feel free to explore other new ways

EXCLUSIONS

• Do NOT apply this to meetings with frontline teams.

• Do NOT apply this to retreats

• Do NOT apply to this to one-off meetings

Remember,

By intentionally reducing meeting time or frequency and sharpening our focus, we can free up more energy for deep work and meaningful collaboration.

FAQ

What does Half Call November mean?: For the month of November, we ask all standing meetings (those that are internal and recurring) across the organization to be either half as long or half as frequent (unless a supervisor has deemed an exception necessary). For example, a standing meeting that is typically scheduled for 60 minutes every week would be changed to either 30 minutes every week (half as long) or 60 minutes every other week (half as frequent). 

What do I need to do?: If you are the organizer/owner of any standing internal meetings in November, perform an audit of those meetings’ length and frequency either cut to half the time or cancel one of every two meetings. You are only requested to do this for the month of November.  

This doesn’t apply to one-time calls on a specific topic or retreats - you are free to keep or schedule those as necessary. 

As a general best practice, please review the Educate! Guidelines for Effective Meetings, which contains a checklist of items to think about before, during, and after the meeting, guidelines for different types of meetings, a note about avoiding scheduling back-to-back meetings, and resources on overcoming organizational drag. If you are creating a new internal meeting in November, be sure to review the document above and think through how you can make the meeting as concise and effective as possible.

Does this also apply to 1-on-1s?: Yes it does.  

What If I think it’s really critical to keep a meeting?: If you think it’s critical to keep a meeting, you can do so by getting a supervisor’s sign-off. The reason for this is to create an accountability check to ensure you really can’t experiment with a shorter meeting for the month of November. 

You can also schedule a one-time call on a specific topic if you need. 

Does this also apply to meetings that occur only monthly?: If you are the owner of a meeting in November that only meets monthly, please cut at least 25% to experiment with different length (unless the meeting is currently 30 mins). We encourage you to think about ways to prepare attendees and engage them outside of the defined meeting time (i.e., through pre-work or reviewing information prior to meeting) so that the majority of the meeting can be spent on discussion. 

What do we hope to learn from this?: It is our hope that this initiative will allow us to better understand when meetings are and are not necessary, determine the most effective length and frequency for meetings moving forward, and improve efficiency and free up space for more focused time across teams.