Hamster Revolution for Meetings. How to Meet Less and Get More Done

Vicki Halsey

Mike Song

Tim Burress

Are meetings taking over your life? You’re not alone. Meet Iris, a sales director so overwhelmed by meetings that she feels like a hamster on a wheel—in fact, she’s turned into one. Just in time, she meets a coach—a leading meeting efficiency expert—with a simple system that helps her regain her sanity and humanity. The coach’s secret is a laser-like focus on the five biggest meeting pain points: 1. Meeting overload: Professionals waste twenty-four days a year in useless meetings. 2. Missing success ingredients: ninety percent of all professionals attend meetings that lack a clearly stated objective and agenda. 3. Virtual-meeting chaos: Disinterested participants + endless technical glitches huge amounts of wasted time. 4. Agenda adrift: Goals are missed when meetings veer off course. 5. Action distraction: Incomplete action items result in delayed projects and missed deadlines. The coach demonstrates that these five challenges are damaging Iris’s career and costing the world over a trillion dollars each year. He provides practical new solutions that rapidly transform Iris from victim to victor. These solutions are tailored to the technology-driven world in which Iris lives—she discovers how to use e-calendars, PDAs, and virtual meetings to make her life easier, not more complicated. She applies the solutions, gets immediate results, and reclaims her life. The Hamster Revolution for Meetings focuses on a small number of high-impact best practices that really work. Included is a landmark case study that shows how 3,000 Capital One associates reclaimed ten days per year while improving meeting effectiveness by over 35 percent.

Mike Song, Vicki Halsey, Tim Burress

The Hamster Revolution: For Meetings

More Praise for

The Hamster Revolution for Meetings

“Overwhelmed by meetings? Double your productivity with this fast, fun, and effective read.”

– Marshall Goldsmith, author of What Got You Here Won’t Get You There

“Practical, powerful, and easy to apply!”

– Betsy Myers, Chief Operating Officer, Barack Obama Presidential Campaign

“Take control of meetings and get more done!”

– Jack Forestell, Vice President of Marketing and Analytics, Capital One Financial

“A must-read business book! Grow your productivity, network, and career with these bold, new meeting techniques.”

– Keith Ferrazzi, author of ’Never Eat Alone

“Loved it! Effective meetings and a ton of time saved. Brilliant!’

– Beth Behnke, Director, Human Resources, Venoco, Inc.

“Go green! Boost virtual meeting results and reduce your carbon footprint!”

– Gus Kellogg, Chief Executive Officer, Greenleaf Biofuels

“Real-world meeting ideas that reclaim time and increase your treasure.”

– Garry Ridge, CEO and President, WD-4 °Company

“Join the Hamster Revolution and unleash your strengths!”

– Marcus Buckingham, author of Go Put Your Strengths to Work

“Who can’t identify with Iris? Get meetings under control with these clear, intuitive, and easy-to-implement tools.”

– Kate Sohl, Senior Manager, Training and Communications, Information and Business Solutions, Cubist Pharmaceuticals

“Become a virtual meeting virtuoso!”

– Stewart Levine, Esq., author of Getting to Resolution and coauthor of Collaboration 2.0

“A very useful book for meeting in the information age!”

– Svend Hovmand, Chairman Emeritus, Crossville Inc.

“Relevant, easy-to-apply meeting ideas that will help you escape the hamster cage!”

– Shawn Snyder, Development Consultant, Avnet

“Read this book and revolutionize your meetings!”

– Mike Nation, Senior Vice President, Colorado State Bank and Trust

“Simple, elegant, and essential meeting tools. You’ll use them every day.”

– Kurt Gering, Senior Training Manager, GreatCall, Inc., creator of Jitterbug

“Fantastic! End meeting insanity and reclaim fifteen days a year.”

– Noah Blumenthal, author of Be the Hero: