Rebecca Hinds has spent over 15 years studying how office meetings and collaboration work. Recently, she’s been looking into how AI might improve these gatherings or make existing problems worse. Her research shows that AI, if used correctly, can help involve more women and lower-level employees in meetings. But it can also create issues, especially in hybrid settings where in-room participants tend to dominate conversations.

The Persistent Problems with Meetings

Hinds explains that meetings are a bigger reflection of overall organizational health. Despite rapid advances in technology and changes brought by the pandemic, many meeting habits have stayed the same. Research shows that meetings often reinforce social hierarchies, with leaders or the highest-paid people influencing decisions even before the meeting starts.

She adds that while workplaces have evolved quickly, meetings remain stuck in old patterns. This stagnation can hold back progress and hinder effective teamwork, especially if meetings are used for the wrong reasons or without clear goals.

AI’s Impact on Meeting Culture

Hinds emphasizes that AI tends to amplify existing cultural traits within organizations. If a company views meetings mainly as information-sharing sessions, AI tools will likely make that worse by broadcasting more data to employees. The real challenge isn’t providing information — it’s helping people find the relevant details quickly.

She believes meetings should have a clear purpose, like making a decision or discussing a specific issue. When the goal is well-defined, AI can help surface the right information to support that purpose. However, she warns that using meetings simply for information exchange is inefficient. Instead, information sharing can often happen asynchronously, outside of live meetings.

Which Meetings Are Truly Valuable?

Not all meetings are equally useful. According to Hinds, the most valuable ones involve complex, emotionally charged, or risky work. These situations require face-to-face interactions where trust, empathy, and body language matter. For example, when a company needs to implement a hard change or navigate a delicate issue, live meetings are essential.

She also notes that real-time, spontaneous collaboration is important when quick back-and-forth communication is needed. But if the workflow is predictable and tasks are straightforward, meetings aren’t necessary. Clear documentation and asynchronous updates can be enough, saving time and reducing unnecessary gatherings.

How Leaders Are Using AI in Meetings

Hinds observes that senior leaders are feeling the pressure to flatten organizational hierarchies. This often leads to larger spans of control and a tendency to delegate managerial tasks to AI tools. Many leaders try to replace or supplement meetings with AI-generated summaries or reports.

While this can save time, it also risks reducing direct human interaction, which is vital for building trust and understanding. Hinds warns that over-relying on AI summaries could make meetings even less effective if it replaces meaningful conversations with superficial updates.

Overall, she believes AI has the potential to transform meetings for the better, but only if organizations are mindful of how they incorporate these tools. Properly used, AI can support more inclusive, purposeful, and efficient meetings. But if misused, it could deepen existing problems and weaken team connections.

Inspired by

• https://www.computerworld.com/article/4127434/qa-how-ai-could-transform-corporate-meetings-for-better-or-worse.html

Sources

• rebeccahinds.com
• read.ai