According to a tweet by CNBC, which I found while checking in on the latest Elon Musk dust-up, he has six productivity rules including “walking out of meetings that waste your time”.
When I read the article, ultimately sourced to a leaked company email, I had to read it several times over to make sure I, and they, had it right.
Walk out of a meeting or drop off a call as soon as it is obvious you aren’t adding value. It is not rude to leave, it is rude to make someone stay and waste their time.
Originally, I’d thought the premise was that staying in a meeting where you’ve nothing to contribute was wasting everyone else’s time. But, no, the premise is that if you’ve nothing to add, making you stay is wasting your time. Left unaddressed is any consideration about whether or not remaining in a meeting where you’ve nothing of value to contribute might nonetheless be of value to you.
Musk argues that walking out of a meeting in this way isn’t rude, but in truth it tells everyone else in the room that they aren’t worth your time, and can’t possibly have anything to say that you need to hear.
Given the speaker, this certainly tracks.
Musk likely sees meetings as circumstances in which people need to listen to him, but he doesn’t need to listen to anyone else. It makes sense, then, that once he’s said his piece, he simply walks out of them.
What’s weird is giving that out as internal productivity advice to anyone else. No organization of solipsists likely would last very long.