When President Paul Kagame was addressing Local Government officials last week, he tackled the issue of disproportionate time spent on meetings.

He said it was high time meetings took the backstage to create more time for implementing whatever has been discussed.

Unnecessary meetings especially within the public service could be costing us a lot. It is almost impossible to seek service and access an official in most government institutions on Mondays as this day has been designated for meetings.

In most circumstances the agenda is never different. It is a repeat of issues that have either been addressed in the past or discussing documents whose contents were a subject of similar meetings.

If one did an audit on meetings attended in a week, you would find that a good number of them are not directly relevant to the objectives of the institutions they work for.

Quite often, officials attend meetings that are unnecessary or the purpose and agenda aren't clear. It’s easy to succumb to the illusion that by attending all these meetings you’re being productive and moving the business forward. But that is not usually the case.

This issue is not limited to the public sector, there’s ample evidence that the private sector too, spends unnecessary amount of time on meetings.

Though it is important to meet and strategize on issues, it is equally important that officials apportion more time to implement what they discuss.

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