This is Steva Robbins. Welcome to the Get It Done Guys quick and dirty tips to work less and do more.

I just love meetings. No, no I don't. I hate meetings. One reason meetings are an abomination

against nature is because of the endless work it takes to schedule them. Thankfully, the good folks at MickeySoft came up with one solution.

If your company uses MickeySoft Outlook, you can look at everyone's schedules and see who's

available when.

Then, you choose the time where everyone will have to reschedule an existing appointment to

make it to your meeting.

After all, if you're going to have to run this

lameo experiment in apathetic multitasking, everyone else should share in the sacrifice. This approach

has you making decisions about other people's schedules. And, you know, isn't that doing their work for

them? That's not fair. But there's an even worse problem with Outlook solution,

which is that you have to act like a codependent spousal equivalent when forcing your time on

your colleagues, but then, just when you really need it, Outlook doesn't cross the boundaries

that you want. What kind of codependent software doesn't cross boundaries? If you have three

internal people, a client, and a freelancer on your team,

Outlook scheduling is useless because the external people don't keep their calendars on your server.

The Outlook solution is an outgoing model. You, the meeting planner, are looking out at the attendees

trying to bend them to your will. How, how crude, far better to use an incoming model.

You, the innocent black widow, recline at the center of your web

as your meeting attendees come to you groveling for the privilege of joining your

exclusive click.

Send out a message to all of your prospective attendees.

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