Why Most Meetings Waste Time (And How Great Teams Make Decisions Faster)

Ever leave a meeting wondering what was actually accomplished?

Most teams don't struggle because they lack smart people. They struggle because they lack a process for making decisions. Without a framework, conversations drift, opinions compete for airtime, and meetings become expensive exercises in going nowhere.

In this episode of On the Shoulders of Giants, Jeff Wells introduces the POV (Point of View) Process—a practical framework designed to help teams collaborate more effectively, build alignment faster, and make better decisions without endless debate.

You'll learn:

•  Why meetings often feel unproductive 
•  The difference between collaboration and chaos 
•  How to create alignment without requiring consensus 
•  The seven components of a strong Point of View (POV) 
•  How to run faster, more effective decision-making meetings 
•  Why great leaders build processes, not just discussions 

Whether you're a founder, executive, manager, or team leader, this episode provides a repeatable system for turning conversations into decisions and decisions into action.

Because the goal isn't to have more meetings—it's to make better decisions. 

What got your revenue here won’t get it where it needs to go next. On the Shoulders of Giants is the podcast from High Achiever
 for founders, executives, revenue leaders, and operators responsible for accelerating growth in complex organizations.

Hosted by Jeff Wells, each episode explores the leadership principles, operating systems, and decision-making frameworks behind scalable, sustainable performance.

We go beyond tactics to help organizations align strategy, execution, and resource allocation through a Revenue Operating System designed for clarity, accountability, and measurable growth.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey y'all, if you ever struggle with running effective meetings, especially meetings where you're solving complex problems and you're trying to make those effective, here's a throwback episode for you of a POV process that we've used extensively with customers and with our own business to help people solve very complex problems and run meetings effectively.

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Check it out. I hope you love it. There might be a little dust on the bottle, but don't be fooled because what's inside is wisdom. I'm Jeff Wells, and this is on the shoulders of giants. First principles.

SPEAKER_01 0:42

Hey, do you ever find yourself in meetings where you begin the meeting with the greatest of intent, bouncing through the conference room door with hope and anticipation that this meeting might be different? We might actually solve something today. Then, an hour later, you exit the room deflated, feeling like you just burned precious time circling a cul-de-sac that took you an hour to find your way out of. Well, there are two reasons that we quote unquote circle the cul-de-sac, if you will. The first is that in a lot of cases, we don't begin the meeting with a thoughtful framework to guide the conversations. The second is that in the absence of a thoughtful framework, because people feel the need to be heard, our meetings often get out of control. We see people jockeying for position and sharing opinions that might not have any prethought related to the topic we're addressing. Conversations tend to take on a life of their own, quickly becoming unconstrained and rapidly moving off topic. By the time everyone is heard, the meeting's over and we've often accomplished little to nothing. Now listen, if this is a common experience for you, trust me, you're not alone. And this is the very reason we created the POV process we're about to talk through. So in this session, we're going to go talk more about what a POV is, how to leverage the process, and how to streamline the way we support, communicate, and solve our priorities to improve, better known at this point as your PTIs. So let's dive in. To start with, you probably already realize that POV is an acronym for point of view. We use the term point of view on purpose because the key stakeholder leading the POV process will share a thoughtful perspective and insights focused on solving the problems related to a specific priority to improve. The POV at this point, however, is not expected to have all the answers. Knowing this openly sets the expectation that solving the problem is a collaborative work in process and one that the broader team will participate in rounding out the point of view to make sure that it eventually does address the problem. More dialogue is not only needed from others, but it's a welcome part of the collaborative process. The key is to collaborate effectively. That effective collaboration is the outcome we're looking for from the POV process. So let me pause for a minute to make sure we're on the same page at this point. If we were kicking off the actual building of a POV, the assumption would be that we have worked through the strategic decision-making process, we've agreed on at least one PTI, and you have assigned the task of creating an initial POV to a primary stakeholder on the team. We often call this primary stakeholder the driver. Now, as you'll quickly recognize, the initial POV is the conversational framework that will keep us focused and allow us to rapidly progress. Before I go into how to build a POV, it's really important to make sure that the collective team that's participating understands the why and the how behind the process. So I want to literally walk through how we explain it to the team. This is how. Our goal with the POV process is to give our teams a tool that will help them accelerate their momentum to solve our most critical PTIs. POV stands for point of view. We use the term point of view on purpose because it implies that while the primary stakeholder or a thoughtful perspective on the problem we are attempting to solve, we also know that we don't yet have all the answers. The POV process will serve as a way for us to effectively collaborate across teams to get the necessary inputs needed to ultimately frame a holistic point of view that will lead to the right solution. Now it's important to understand that the initial point of view is not a finalized policy or process. The intent of the POV is to provide the framework to facilitate open dialogue that will ultimately move us to an educated conclusion. That is how we explain the process to the team. Now, ultimately, as a team, we're looking to align first around what we call a go slash no-go decision. So I want to take a second to define what a go versus a no-go decision is for you. A go decision means that we are aligned around a common point of view and that we have a commitment from the collective team to move forward together. Keep in mind that in some cases moving forward together means coming to a conclusion both to do or not to do something. You see, all of our ideas are not good. So agreeing to stop doing things is as important as agreeing to doing things. Also, a commitment does not always mean consensus or that you completely agree with every aspect of the proposed POV and associated next step actions. It means that you can commit to partner with, follow, or enforce the next actions. There might still be some level of disagreement, but the gaps are slight enough that you can live with the POV as it currently is, or that with minor tweaks agreed upon at the time of the discussion, we can indeed move forward. A no-go decision means we probably don't have enough defensible context for us to align around the appropriate next steps. So we're not prepared to align around a solution yet. In the absence of gaining alignment, the goal is to identify the primary gaps that need to be further addressed in an effort to move towards getting aligned. Now there is a really important value to keep in mind here. We might go into a meeting divided, but when we come out of the meeting, we're aligned and committed. Now you can think of this as literally the stacking of hands in the middle of a table prior to leaving the room and heading back into the business. That's the goal that we're looking for. John Thompson, the chairman of the board of Microsoft, who I worked with when he was the CEO at Symantec, used to say, we can go into a room divided, but when we come out, we are either one more or one less. Here's my point. My point is that we need to protect the integrity of our commitment to alignment. If we just agree and then leave the room complaining about the project, then we're undermining the entire process. And I bring this up because unfortunately, it's not uncommon behavior. And so I want to encourage you to not only choose against it, but be overly intentional about protecting the process by managing our own attitudes. Now let's quickly run through the step-by-step process of how to build and run the POV. When we're building a POV, we use a standard framework. As you will see, a lot of the inputs come directly from the work done in the strategic decision-making process. There are actually seven key inputs that frame a good point of view. They are, first, the problem statement. What problem are we trying to solve and why? This is literally just the problem statement that came out of the strategic decision-making process and it's put into the POV document. Secondly, what is the desired outcome? Meaning that at the end of this work stream, what will the outcome of this be? Third, the measurement. How will we measure success? Fourth is a timeline. When do we need a go slash no go decision made by with a date? Ultimately, what is the date for our next formal POV discussion? Literally, what is the date and time? Who are the decision makers? We typically frame the formal decision-making steps to avoid delays and where things get stuck in the process, or if things get stuck in the process, we'll know where they're stuck. And then ultimately, there's the hypothesis. Now, this is your point of view. It can be driven from the answers to these following questions, but before I go through the answers, I want you to understand this is literally just a summarized statement of your point of view around what the problem is and how we shall go about solving the problem. The questions that you can use as guidelines are these. First, how do we solve the problem? Answer that question. Secondly, what are the consequences of solving or not solving it? Third, what unintended consequences might we run into? Ultimately, what assumptions are we making that are part of solving this problem? And I want to give you a little technique here because the next question is what are the hidden assumptions? Now, that may sound funny because if they're hidden, how would you know what they are? But asking the question of what hidden assumptions exist will cause you to dig underneath the surface to look for areas of bias or hidden biases that might be framing or reframing our perspective. What are the barriers? Let's talk about what stands in the way. Those questions will help you frame a really solid point of view. Your goal is to summarize that point of view in the POV document. Now let's work through step by step how the primary stakeholder leads the process. They start with step one. Step one, the primary stakeholder's job is to build obviously the initial point of view. Now to do this, they'll work across the team as necessary to make sure they have all of the inputs and perspectives necessary to build out the initial document. In step two, the primary stakeholder will then send the POV doc out to the broader team for their initial review. Now, the expectation is that the broader team will digest the initial point of view and begin to think through their own perspective against the thesis. In step three, the team will review the document, frame any clarifying questions or concerns back to the primary stakeholder. It is then the primary stakeholder's job to work one-on-one through those concerns with the broader team. In step four, we're looking to build alignment from each individual on the team prior to going back into the formal POV discussion as a collective team. This means that if there are points of contention, outstanding inputs or opinions that might influence the broader POV, it's the primary stakeholders' job to capture and validate those inputs and update the POV by walking through them one-on-one with the collective team. You see, this is where we're leveraging collaboration, but doing most of it outside of the chaos of a larger meeting. If we do this right, 95% of the great ideas and concerns will be reflected and summarized in the POV before we get back together to talk about the go or no go decision. Now in step five, once the primary stakeholder has revised and updated the POV based on the collective inputs, they'll push the updated document back to the team for another review and one more round of feedback. They are running the same process as before with the intent of getting more and more clear and concise on a holistic point of view. Now, in most cases, by the time we've run through two passes of this, we have a POV that is ready for formal review. We generally have a team that has been heard and their perspectives are represented in the POV. Let me give you a few guiding principles that might help you as you work through the process as a collective team. Ask clarifying questions in advance of the discussion. So, in essence, ask and seek to really understand prior to the formal discussion so that you really have clarity and a deep understanding of the point of view and that you've weighed in on the point of view. Second principle is keep the greater good of the company in mind as you work through it. Pay attention to your own personal biases and uplift the greater good of the overall company. Next, respectfully challenge areas of concern, and then ultimately respectfully receive areas of concern. Both of these areas talk about the interaction between the primary stakeholder and the broader team as it relates to the feedback in the one-on-ones. The point is that we should mutually respect one another's points of view and perspectives and make sure that we engage in those dialogues in a respectful way, both giving feedback and receiving feedback. Next, understand that friction in the conversations are okay. And friction in conversations are okay because they are the give and take of a conversation. But if you refer back to the level of respect and the engagement, you'll never have a problem with friction as long as there's mutual respect. But understand friction is part of the process, so value the friction. And as much as you can when you share a concern, try and propose a solution. You may not always have one, but at least have a solution-based mindset that's focused on helping solve the problem, not just pointing out all the flaws in it. And then ultimately, and maybe the most important principle here, is if you don't participate, you don't get an opinion. And what that means is that oftentimes we'll see people who sit on the sidelines and they wait to share their opinion in the formal POV discussion when we're ready to make a decision. That doesn't work here. And so if you wait and you don't dig into the process and contribute, you lose your voice. This means that if you don't participate in the pre-work, you don't have a voice as we enter into the formal POV discussion. So keep that in mind. And then ultimately we move into step six. And step six is to run the formal POV meeting. Now the meeting is framed the way it is for the sake of being effective. If you use the framework, you'll find that your meeting can run short and you can accomplish the specific outcomes you're looking to accomplish. As compared to most meetings that run long and you leave with a lack of clarity. So let me walk you through how a primary stakeholder would lead the formal POV discussion meeting. First, the stakeholder starts by spending about 10 minutes doing a formal POV overview, basically making sure everyone is working from the latest POV, and so they're reading out the POV. They then facilitate a timed, 10-minute open discussion. If there are any outstanding clarifications needed by the team, they should be addressed here. Keep in mind this is a timed discussion. At 10 minutes, we're going to shut it down. We will then move to a formal go slash no go decision point by taking a vote across the team. Now, if there are disparate votes, then the question will be: can we move forward in alignment or are the disparate votes in essence so vocal that someone can't align around the next step actions? Now this should not be common, but it does come up in some cases and it needs to be addressed at this point to attempt to clear any obstacles. Next, the primary stakeholder will spend 10 minutes summarizing next step actions, owners, and a timeline for updated communication. Now keep in mind, at first, running this process is hard. It's a new discipline. So getting this right like anything else takes practice and discipline. I predict that at first it will feel really awkward the first time you go through it. I would suggest running the process in a pretty simplistic decision first. Now you'll find in some cases you don't even need a meeting or a POV discussion. If you go through the process of the preliminary work appropriately, you'll find in a lot of cases that people either need a really short meeting just to affirm that everybody's aligned and moving forward, or in some cases, when you get good at it, they'll just do that online remotely. People will sign off on the POV without even needing to talk more about it. So let me end this session by saying that look, this is just one method of running an effective meeting and decision-making process. There are a lot of ways to improve the way you make decisions. And you may not choose this process, but the point is you have to have a process to make sure that as a collective team, you can ultimately answer this one single question. And the question is how do we make good decisions?