Work Meetings Are Now Being Considered Therapy Sessions

If you've dozed off once or twice or unloaded your personal problems during a work meeting, you're not alone. 

If you're rolling your eyes at the thought of yet another pointless, endless work meeting, science has your back.

Researchers in Sweden say meetings are more like "therapy sessions" than actual productive work events. Professor Patrik Hall actually wrote a book on the subject and said that meetings aren't useless if used effectively, but most of the time, they are not. You can read his full article here.

"Few decisions are actually made" in such gatherings, Hall notes. And because managers' jobs usually remove themselves from the day-to-day workflow of a given industry, their day defaults to having more meetings. Some jobs, like strategists and consultants, are constantly having meetings. However, the same gatherings can frustrate those whose jobs do not.

There are some tips on actually staying awake during one of these long and boring meetings. Maybe this will help you from dozing off.

Some consider work meeting a place to air out personal and work issues, you know, like therapy. Professor Hall says that when meetings included "equality" which would be "colleagues at the same level," these meetings can be more effective.

"They can be and have an opportunity to complain and be acknowledged by your co-workers, which is a kind of therapy," he wrote.