ILR School Research on Meetings

Harvard Business Review's "You Should Take That 'Boring' Meeting" includes research from experts including ILR School PhD student Nicole Thio. Studies showed that senior leaders are trained to allocate attention strategically. When they anticipate low value, they tend to invest less cognitive presence, saving concentration for something that they feel truly deserves their limited resources. Yet engagement, which emerges from asking one more question, lingering a moment longer, and reacting in real time, is the essential element that injects even mundane topics with dynamic potential. When leaders enter a conversation already partially disengaged, they reduce the likelihood that a fruitful dynamic will take hold.

There is a second-order consequence as well. Employees monitor executive reactions closely. If a leader appears disengaged during routine updates, subordinates may begin to self-censor. They may withhold minor frictions, early warning signs, or local morale shifts because they assume such issues are not interesting enough to merit executive attention.