Most leaders you meet are losing almost a full workday every week to meetings that go nowhere. Same people. Same topics. Same problems. No real movement.

You’ve seen it in boardrooms and job trailers: different settings, but the same pattern. The problem isn’t meetings; it’s that your meetings are built for silos, not for the whole business. Everyone shows up to speak for their part, but no one is asked to hold the entire picture.

That’s where a generalist mindset helps—not a new title, but rather a new way of running the room. You treat every meeting as the place where the whole system comes together, not just a series of updates.

Here are five simple rules you can put in place this week. If you stick to them, you’ll get back hours you’re now wasting in repeat conversations. You can clean up handoffs and walk out of the room with one plan instead of six.

Rule 1: Every meeting gets one job

Most meetings try to do three or four things at once. You “update,” “brainstorm,” “decide,” and then “vent” for a while. No wonder nothing sticks.

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