BHP shows how five minutes of feedback delivers more than an hour of meetings.

Reading time for this blog: 3 minutes Return: at least 3 hours per week...

We know it, but we do it anyway: meetings are the national sport. A full diary feels like status, and "let's schedule something" is the corporate version of hitting snooze. Meanwhile, hours evaporate, decisions are outsourced to "next time", and everyone leaves with action points without owners. Why do we inflict this upon ourselves? Because no one is held accountable for the cost of twelve people reading each other news that could have fitted in a memo.

And then I read Pilita Clark's column in the Financial Times "The CEO trying to end the curse of the pointless meeting". About Mike Henry, the CEO of mining company BHP, who holds a five-minute feedback round after every management meeting. Not anonymous moaning, but structured, via an app, as part of the BHP Operating System. Checklists. Clear questions. Agenda no later than 24 hours in advance. The right people at the table. And stopping if it proves not useful. Yes: midway through. That's not a blunt instrument; that's mature governance.

Sounds strict? In reality, it's liberating. You enforce three things that every organisation claims to want but rarely organises:

1. Sharpness: why are we here, what's the objective, what's the outcome?

2. Ownership: who takes which decision, with what deadline?

3. Discipline: start on time, finish on time, or earlier, if it's done.

The standard reflex follows predictably: "Who has time to give feedback?" As if five minutes of attention to effectiveness is more expensive than sixty minutes of inefficiency. The BHP approach also tames the familiar office-political objection ("people flatter the boss, undermine the rival") with standardised questions: did it start on time, did the chair stay on course, did it contribute to business objectives? Clark describes how even the feedback about the feedback is used, not to breed bureaucracy, but to consistently steer towards outcomes rather than busy-work therapy.

For family businesses and long-term owners, this isn't detail but strategy. Time is capital; culture is a competitive advantage. You don't have to be BHP to exhibit BHP behaviour. A medium-sized company with courage and a few tools can start tomorrow. No monster programme, but a new ritual.

My proposal for a BHP-style mini-routine (copy-pasteable):

1. Why live? If it fits in a one-page memo, that's the format.

2. Who must be there? Fewer than you think. Maximum seven.

3. What's the outcome? One decision/owner/deadline. How simple is that...

4. Agenda 24 hours in advance. Incomplete or late? Then the meeting doesn't go ahead.

5. Timer on. Start on time, end on time, stop earlier if it's finished.

6. Five minutes feedback, immediately. One app, same questions, open with all participants.

7. Measure against business objectives. No "good atmosphere" score, but progress on KPIs.

   
   

What does this deliver concretely? Speed (decisions no longer slide through), focused time (people who contribute nothing get their time back) and transparency (if the chair drifts off course, everyone sees it). And yes, it asks something of leaders: the willingness to be part of the system themselves. The courage to end a meeting if it adds no value. The discipline to no longer confuse "busy" with "useful".

Clark points out that millions of meetings take place globally every day, of which more than seventy per cent are ineffective. That's not an occupational hazard; that's economic self-destruction disguised as collaboration. In three minutes of reading you can break that pattern, by cancelling one meeting tomorrow and making one meeting visibly better.

Start small. Choose the most irritating weekly call. Rewrite it according to the seven points. Count the freed-up hours. Invest them in what truly matters: customers, product, people.

Organisational culture is not a museum. You're the curator. Remove the dusty pieces—and let the masterpieces have more light. BHP showed how. The rest of us no longer have an excuse.

You're welcome to exchange thoughts about behaviour, communication skills and effectiveness. Or, for example, about finding and selecting people who lead to positive, measurable and effective contributions to success.

Warm regards,

Aegeus