Dear CIRES colleagues,
Inspired by CU Boulder’s interim dean of engineering, I hereby (and entirely unofficially) declare May 24-28 a “minimize meetings” week. I would like to suggest a “NO-meeting” week, yet I know that’s impractical for many of you and might delay critical teamwork for others.
So, to the degree you can do so, please cancel and don’t schedule meetings that week. Put Zoom calls off. If an exchange can be handled by a quick email or phone call, please do it that way. If the topic can be deferred for a few days without significant impact, please push it back. For many of us, a week of minimal meetings means the opportunity to dive deeply into a project that demands a significant amount of focus. It might give you time to concentrate on—and complete—a paper or a critical assessment, or to make progress on a project that has been too easy to put off. And imagine this: It may also give you a chance to take some of your well-earned vacation time—or furlough time.
This has been an incredibly difficult year. This small act might help ease some of the sense of fatigue we have all felt: take a week off meetings if you can. If you can’t, minimize them. I’m going to do this, I’m encouraging the administrative team to do this, and I encourage all of you to do the same. Cancel a meeting. Or five or ten.
Sincerely,
Waleed Abdalati
CIRES Director
