Meetings Are Broken: Rebecca Hinds on Fixing How We Work, Lead, and Collaborate

Do you hate work meetings? Meetings consume more time than any other business process, and yet they’re often the most frustrating part of the workday. According to Rebecca Hinds (see her bio below), that’s not a coincidence. It’s a design problem.

Rebecca is a leading expert on organizational behavior and the future of work, with deep experience at the intersection of research, technology, and real-world execution. In this conversation, she shares insights from her new book, Your Best Meeting Ever: 7 Principles for Designing Meetings That Get Things Done. You will learn to rethink your meetings radically.

We talk about how her background as a Division I swimmer at Stanford shaped her views on team dynamics, why meetings should be treated like a product, and how organizations unintentionally sabotage themselves with outdated collaboration habits. Rebecca also unpacks the human side of AI adoption, the challenges of hybrid work, and why most AI initiatives fail not because of technology, but because of people.

You’ll hear about:

• Why inefficient meetings resemble a World War II sabotage tactic

• The “4D + CEO” test to decide whether a meeting should exist at all

• Why Return on Time Invested (ROTI) is a better metric than meeting satisfaction

• How hybrid and remote teams build culture intentionally

• Why empathy and systems thinking mattered during COVID

• Where AI is actually helping people work better and where it’s falling short

• How first-time managers can instantly raise their leadership impact

This is a thoughtful, practical, and surprisingly fun conversation about how work really happens—and how leaders can redesign it to be more human, effective, and intentional.

 

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About ​Rebecca: Rebecca Hinds is a leading expert on organizational behavior and the future of work. She holds a BS, MS, and PhD from Stanford University. Rebecca founded the Work Innovation Lab at Asana and the Work AI Institute at​ Glean, first-of-their-kind corporate think tanks dedicated to conducting cutting-edge research on the future of work. Her research is consistently featured in top-tier publications and has appeared in places like Harvard​ Business Review, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Fast​ Company, Wired, TIME, CNBC, Bloomberg, Axios, the Washington Post, and more. Rebecca has been invited to speak on major stages all across the world, including Dreamforce,​ SXSW, INBOUND, Ai4, Cloudfest, and the Gartner Digital Workplace Summit. She regularly appears on​ podcasts, webinars, and online education programs, including appearances on Adam Grant’s Worklife​ podcast, Deloitte’s Capital H podcast, and as an instructor for CNBC’s Make It Masterclass, “How to Use​ AI to be More Productive and Successful at Work.” She is a trusted advisor to companies navigating the challenges of modern work—from meeting overload and hybrid dysfunction to the messy realities of AI​ adoption and organizational change.