“bring ideas, passion, and enthusiasm”

Received in my e-mail:

The heart and soul of any organization is its brainstorming meetings. Yet not everyone attends our meetings, comes with ideas, or is engaged. Here’s what I expect…

Everyone who is in our [content production departments] at the time attends these meetings and everyone comes with ideas that can be done [with the resources we have]. These meetings reflect the problems with our products…. they are boring and uninspired. I expect these to change immediately. Please ask yourself how you are participating in these meetings and how you are contributing to them. Bring ideas, passion and enthusiasm and most importantly … come to them!

Okay, first of all, these meetings happen twice a day — one in the morning and one in the afternoon. For the early-morning staff, they have a postmortem meeting at 8:30 as well. These brainstorming meetings are 45-60 minutes a day each time. When our new VP — the person who sent the e-mail — got here, everyone attended the meetings, but over time, there’s been attrition. See, we all have things to do. We can’t waste 45-120 minutes a day at the meetings (because the VP expects us to attend meetings if we’re here, which really screws the 8-to-5ers.

I’ve been exempted from these meetings by my supervisor, and I’m the only person who works in this room that has, because technically my supervisor is of a rank with the new VP. (In truth, she outranks him by a mile.) Plus, since I work for all departments in this building, I really don’t have the time to spend at those brainstorming meetings.

I’m sure that I’ll be ordered to attend the next one (tomorrow, since I’m leaving early today). I’m sure I’ll go, sit on my smartphone, and answer e-mail, because then I’d actually be accomplishing something. Unlike these meetings, which are attended with a sense of drudgery.