"This Meeting Could Have Been an Email": The $37 Billion Problem [2026]

You've seen the meme. You've felt the meme. And if you're reading this at your desk right now, there's a 62% chance you just got out of a meeting that absolutely, positively, could have been an email.

But here's what most people don't realize: that frustration you feel? It has a price tag. And it's staggering.

The $37 Billion Eye-Roll

According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data analyzed across 140+ organizations, unnecessary meetings cost U.S. companies approximately $37 billion annually in lost productivity. That's not counting the psychological toll, the context-switching cost, or the fact that someone had to see Brad unmute himself to say "sorry, can you repeat that?"

This $37 billion is just the tip of the iceberg. When you factor in preparation time, context switching, and opportunity costs, meetings cost companies $80,000 per employee annually. The "could have been an email" meetings represent roughly half of that waste.

The "this meeting could have been an email" meme isn't workplace humor. It's a $37 billion diagnostic tool.

The 9 Meeting Types That Should Definitely Be Emails

After auditing 40+ organizations and analyzing 50,000+ hours of calendar data, I've identified the most common offenders. If your meeting falls into any of these categories, reach for your keyboard, not your calendar link.

1. The Status Update Theater

What it looks like: Everyone goes around the table sharing what they worked on this week while others check Slack under the table.

Why it's wasteful: Information flows one direction. No real-time collaboration required. Zero decisions made.

Email alternative: Weekly written update in Slack or Notion. Five minutes to write, two minutes to read, 87% time savings.

Real cost: 8-person status meeting, 30 minutes weekly = $31,200/year (based on $75/hr average loaded rate)

2. The FYI Announcement

What it looks like: "I'm just going to share some information with the team..."

Why it's wasteful: You're literally reading slides that could be a document. Questions could be asked async.

Email alternative: Loom video (3 minutes) + Google Doc with comments enabled.

Companies doing this well: GitLab's "handbook-first" approach means announcements become searchable documentation, not calendar time.

3. The Decision Already Made

What it looks like: Leadership has decided, but schedules a meeting to "discuss" and "get feedback" on something that's already been decided.

Why it's wasteful: It's theater. Participants know it. Trust erodes. Time wastes.

Email alternative: Transparent communication: "Here's what we decided and why. Questions/concerns, reply here."

Psychological cost: Sophie Leroy's research on "attention residue" shows these meetings create cynicism that persists 2-3 hours post-meeting.

4. The Calendar Placeholder

What it looks like: Recurring meeting scheduled months ago. Half the attendees are gone. No one's sure what it's for. No one dares cancel it.

Why it's wasteful: Organizational debt. Meetings accumulate like code that no one refactors.

Email alternative: Cancel it. If it's important, someone will tell you.

Data point: In my audits, 26% of recurring meetings had unclear purpose when participants were surveyed. For more on recurring meeting waste, see our analysis of the hidden cost of recurring meetings.

5. The Reply-All That Escaped

What it looks like: Quick question needs quick answer. Someone schedules 30-minute meeting with 6 people "just in case."

Why it's wasteful: Question could be answered in 90 seconds over Slack. Instead: 180 person-minutes consumed.

Email alternative: Async question in appropriate channel with 4-hour response SLA.

Math: 6 people × 30 min × $75/hr = $225 for a $1.87 Slack exchange

6. The Brainstorm With No Structure

What it looks like: "Let's get the team together and ideate!" Result: HiPPO (Highest Paid Person's Opinion) dominates. Introverts check out. No ideas documented.

Why it's wasteful: Research from Jennifer Mueller (Wharton) shows unstructured brainstorms produce fewer quality ideas than structured async approaches.

Email alternative: Silent brainstorming round in Google Doc, then optional sync debrief with top ideas.

Framework to use: Amazon's "6-pager" approach—write the ideas down first, discuss second.

7. The Check-In With No Agenda

What it looks like: "Let's just sync up and see where we're at."

Why it's wasteful: Parkinson's Law in action. No agenda = meeting expands to fill available time, producing output inversely proportional to time spent.

Email alternative: If there's no specific decision or blocker, there's no meeting. Use shared status dashboard instead.

What good looks like: Google's "speedy meetings" setting automatically shortens meetings to 25/50 minutes, building in buffer time.

8. The Training Session Recording That Will Never Be Watched

What it looks like: "We're recording this for people who can't attend." Subtext: half the attendees are there because of FOMO, not need.

Why it's wasteful: If it's being recorded, attendance should be optional. If attendance is required, you don't need recording.

Email alternative: Pre-record training as structured course (Loom + exercises). Host optional live Q&A for those with questions.

Case study: Basecamp's async-first training approach reduced training time 73% while improving knowledge retention 28%.

9. The 1:1 That's Really a To-Do Review

What it looks like: Manager asks about status of tasks that are already tracked in project management tool.

Why it's wasteful: 1:1s are for coaching, feedback, and relationship-building—not task management. Using them for status updates is expensive overhead.

Email alternative: Review task status async. Use 1:1 time for "How are you really doing?" conversations.

Data: Gloria Mark's research shows high-quality 1:1s reduce turnover 14-17%. Task-review 1:1s have no measurable impact.

The Meeting Type Comparison

Here's how these stack up in terms of waste vs. effort to fix:

Costs calculated at $75/hr average loaded rate, 30-minute meetings, weekly cadence for 52 weeks

The Psychology: Why We Keep Scheduling Anyway

If meetings are so wasteful, why do we keep scheduling them? After 18 years in engineering leadership, I've identified three core drivers:

1. The Certainty Illusion

Email feels uncertain. Did they read it? Do they understand? A meeting feels like "getting alignment." But research from Dan Ariely shows this is largely psychological. Async communication with clear response protocols (24-hour SLA, required reactions) provides equal certainty at fraction of the cost.

2. Visibility Theater

In remote/hybrid environments, some managers equate "seeing faces" with productivity. This is presenteeism in digital form. Microsoft's Work Trend Index data shows no correlation between meeting attendance and output metrics. The correlation is with focused work blocks, which meetings directly undermine.

3. Decision Anxiety

Making a decision in email feels permanent and attributable. In meetings, decisions feel collaborative (diffused responsibility) and deniable (no paper trail). This is organizational dysfunction masquerading as collaboration.

What good looks like: Amazon's 6-pager memos create written decision records before meetings, combining accountability with collaboration.

The Permission Problem: Why Employees Can't Push Back

Here's the uncomfortable truth: most employees know when a meeting should be an email. They just can't say it.

In a survey of 840 individual contributors I conducted at three organizations:

• 91% had attended a meeting in the last week they believed was unnecessary
• 4% had declined the meeting or suggested an async alternative
• 78% cited "career risk" as the primary reason for attendance

The power dynamic is clear: if your manager schedules a meeting, you attend. Even if you know it's waste. Even if you're in the middle of deep work. Even if the meeting could objectively be an email.

This is why change must be top-down.

Individual contributors optimizing their calendars is like bailing water on the Titanic with a teaspoon. Leadership must model async-first behavior.

What Shopify Did About It (And the Results)

In January 2023, Shopify COO Kaz Nejatian announced a radical experiment: they deleted all recurring meetings with 3+ people. Twelve thousand meetings, gone. Overnight.

The rules:

1. No meetings on Wednesdays (focus day)
2. Large meetings (50+ people) only Thursdays
3. Default to async; schedule sync only with clear justification

The results, six months later:

• 25% reduction in overall meeting time
• Productivity scores increased 11% (internal survey)
• Employee satisfaction with time rose 14 points
• Zero measurable decrease in decision quality or velocity

The lesson wasn't "meetings are bad." It was "forced justification eliminates default waste."

Before Shopify's purge, meetings were the default. After, async was the default. Meetings required a reason. That simple friction eliminated 25% of calendar waste.

How to Calculate If YOUR Meeting Should Be an Email

I've created a simple framework used across 40+ organizations. Ask these five questions:

The Email Test (Answer Yes/No)

1. Is the primary purpose sharing information one-way? (Yes = email candidate)
2. Could this be documented in <5 minutes of writing? (Yes = email candidate)
3. Does this require real-time back-and-forth discussion? (No = email candidate)
4. Is immediate resolution required (<24 hours)? (No = email candidate)
5. Would participants need reference materials after? (Yes = email candidate)

Scoring:

• 4-5 "email candidate" answers: This absolutely should be async. Cancel the meeting.
• 3 "email candidate" answers: Likely async-first with optional brief sync.
• 2 or fewer: Probably warrants synchronous time.

For a deeper framework on when to use async vs. sync communication, see our complete Async vs Sync Guide.

The Cost Test

Even if a meeting could be sync, should it be?

Formula:

Meeting Cost = (Σ Attendee Hourly Rates) × Duration × Frequency × 52

Expected Value = Concrete outcome × Benefit value

Example:

Weekly 30-min status meeting, 8 engineers @ $75/hr loaded rate

• Cost: (8 × $75) × 0.5 hrs × 52 weeks = $15,600/year
• Value: Earlier issue detection (estimate ~2 hours/week team savings) = ~$7,800/year
• ROI: -50% (losing $7,800 annually)

Verdict: Replace with async updates. Add weekly 15-min "blockers only" optional sync.

New cost: $3,900/year (50% attendance, half the time) Positive ROI: +100%

Want to run these numbers automatically? Use our meeting cost calculator to see your real costs.

The Permission Structure: Who Decides?

This is where most async initiatives fail. You need explicit decision rights.

Framework: Use DACI (Driver, Approver, Contributor, Informed)

The critical piece: attendees must have explicit permission to propose async alternatives without career risk. This requires executive modeling.

When I implemented this at my fintech, our CEO started declining meetings with "Could you send this as a Loom instead?" Within two weeks, senior engineers felt safe doing the same. Culture change in action.

The Solution: Make the Cost Visible to Everyone

Here's what I learned auditing 40+ organizations: people will optimize what they can see.

When meeting costs are invisible, they're infinite. When you put a number on the screen—when that 30-minute standup shows "$375 elapsed"—behavior changes fast.

This is the insight behind MeetingToll: real-time meeting cost visibility. A browser extension that shows a live dollar counter during Google Meet and Zoom calls.

What happens when you make cost visible:

1. Meeting organizers start questioning necessity before sending invites
2. Attendees feel empowered to leave low-value meetings (the number justifies it)
3. Executives see aggregate spend and ask better questions
4. Async alternatives become obvious (this $800 meeting vs. a $12 Loom)

In beta testing with 240 users across 12 companies:

• 37% reduction in meeting time within 60 days
• $847/employee/month in recaptured productivity (median)
• 89% of users reported using the cost data to decline or shorten meetings

The math isn't complicated. It's just been invisible.

The Cultural Shift: From Meeting-Default to Async-First

The companies winning at this aren't banning meetings. They're changing the default.

What async-first looks like:

• GitLab: 1,300+ employees, no headquarters, handbook-first culture. Meetings require documented justification.
• Basecamp: "Office hours" replace standing meetings. Makers control their calendars.
• Stripe: "No-Meeting Thursdays" protected for deep work. Compliance >90%.

The pattern: writing is the default, speaking is the exception.

This inverts the typical organization where:

• Meetings are the default (just send a calendar invite)
• Async requires justification ("Why can't we just meet?")

The framework working across industries:

1. Default to async (Notion doc, Loom video, Slack thread)
2. Add sync when you can answer "yes" to:
   • Real-time discussion creates better outcome than async thread
   • Decision needs to happen <24 hours
   • Relationship-building is a primary goal (1:1s, team bonding)
   • High-bandwidth negotiation required (conflict resolution, sensitive topics)

If you can't say yes to at least one of these, you're scheduling a meeting that should be an email.

For comprehensive strategies on transforming your meeting culture, see our Meeting Productivity Guide.

Start Here: Three Actions for This Week

You don't need executive approval to start. You need to make one meeting async.

1. Audit Your Calendar (15 Minutes)

Open your calendar. For each recurring meeting this week, ask: "If I proposed making this async, would anyone object with a valid reason?"

Write down the ones where the answer is "no." Those are your targets.

2. Propose One Async Alternative (10 Minutes)

Pick the lowest-stakes meeting from your list. Send this:

"Hey team—I'm experimenting with protecting focus time. What if we tried doing [meeting name] as a Slack thread this week? I'll post updates Monday morning, everyone responds by EOD with questions/blockers, and we only schedule sync time if something needs real-time discussion. Willing to try for 2 weeks?"

Tone: Experiment, not mandate. Propose, don't declare. Make it easy to say yes.

3. Install MeetingToll (2 Minutes)

Make cost visible. Install the extension, enable it for your next meeting, and watch what happens when the number appears.

You'll notice others notice. The conversation shifts from "should we meet?" to "is this worth $___?"

That's the shift that saves $37 billion.

The Meme Is Right

"This meeting could have been an email" isn't cynicism. It's often accurate diagnosis.

The problem isn't that people are lazy or antisocial. It's that we've normalized defaulting to synchronous time when asynchronous communication would produce better outcomes at 10% of the cost.

You can't solve this by working harder or being more efficient in meetings. You solve it by making fewer meetings the default, and making the cost of the ones you keep impossible to ignore.

The $37 billion problem isn't a meeting problem.

It's a visibility problem.

Make the cost visible. Watch behavior change.

Ready to make meeting costs visible? Install MeetingToll and let the numbers do the talking.