> Important decisions aren't made in a meeting unless at least one person has thought through the options beforehand and come prepared to explain the pros and cons of each and why their recommendation makes sense.
Uh, yes. If people do not come prepared to meetings, they are a giant waste of time. (Exception - pure "information radiator" meetings) Meetings are the point where you align different well-founded opinions, not where you find a solution. But that alignment is critical to getting work done efficiently.
But note that OP didn't talk about meetings per se, just about people interacting. And in any group of people, the ultimate outcome in terms of work is always driven by interactions. If you don't collaborate, you can't build at group scope. How you collaborate depends on the group. Some groups have shared chat rooms. Some have meeting. Some angrily yell at each other. But it always shapes the work, and moves it in a defined direction.
A group without social interaction is the work equivalent of Brownian motion.
The OP says social interaction is "how work gets done". This is misleading unless we also add "and individual work is also how work gets done, in some ways to a much greater degree".
If I were to say "individual heads-down focus is how work gets done" I would be rightly criticized, even though this is somewhat closer to the truth than what the OP says.
Uh, yes. If people do not come prepared to meetings, they are a giant waste of time. (Exception - pure "information radiator" meetings) Meetings are the point where you align different well-founded opinions, not where you find a solution. But that alignment is critical to getting work done efficiently.
But note that OP didn't talk about meetings per se, just about people interacting. And in any group of people, the ultimate outcome in terms of work is always driven by interactions. If you don't collaborate, you can't build at group scope. How you collaborate depends on the group. Some groups have shared chat rooms. Some have meeting. Some angrily yell at each other. But it always shapes the work, and moves it in a defined direction.
A group without social interaction is the work equivalent of Brownian motion.