Working from home: anyone else burdened by tons of useless meetings and by useless bosses becoming even worse?

[SoCloseToLosingIt]

My manager has always been a bit of a control freak micromanager, but the lockdown has really brought out the worst in him.

He keeps scheduling countless video meetings with gazillions of people, most of which are totally useless.
(There are other infuriating behaviours but they are so specific I wouldn't want to be identified).

Basically I spend from 1/3 to 1/2 of my time in useless meetings.

Then, asking around, I learnt that pretty much the same is happening to almost all of my friends. Is this your experience, too?

My interpretation is that insecure middle managers do this because:

• they don't trust their team
• they are afraid their underlings would otherwise spend too much time on Netflix
• they must give themselves, us and their bosses the false impression that they are so busy and important
• this gives them the delusion they are more in control than they really are, of the underlings and of the situation in general; this is particularly true if they realise they have little to no decision-making power, so capricious decisions on stupid stuff like that is the only way they can exert some authority

What is your experience? If you work from home, have you noticed certain aspects of the job and the boss worsening big time with the lockdown?

OneMomentInHistory Teams is your friend.

When the lockdown first started she wanted us all to sit on a team video call, with cameras on, all day, every day

Jesus 🤯

What about people with kids?

The Covid crisis is like the happy hunting ground for shit management.

Usual weekly department meeting which takes longer, and we even had school CPD for 2 hours live about behaviour. Because right now behaviour is my biggest worry!

I don't really have off times though now; I reply to kids emails and messages on Google classroom if I'm awake; saves the onslaught of over a hundred every morning before I start work.

I’ve been doing a daily meeting with my team but that’s less to check up and micromanage their work and more to do with being conscious that some live alone. A chat each morning should not be a great hardship but it can help to keep people connected.

Sure, a short daily meeting, if only to ensure everyone is OK, is fine.

But having 1/3 to 1/2 of your calendar blocked by meetings which are not only useless but actually a hindrance because they take away time you could use to do actual work, that's something different.

At some level, I get it that, if the team is genuinely busy with work that is producing tangible results, there is no need to come up with nonsensical work, while, if the team isn't that busy, then managers will have an incentive to come up with bull projects and tasks to justify their existence: see how busy we are with such important stuff? You cannot fire us. This I get.

What is driving me insane, and it doesn't take Freud to understand it, is that useless insecure middle managers are using the lockdown to increase their micromanagement.
Seeing people at their desks gave them a false illusion that they knew people were working; it was always nonsense, because facetime has nothing to do with productivity, and someone who leaves at 5 could get more work done that someone who stays till 9pm but spends all his time browsing the news. But now that they can't see people in person, they use meetings upon meetings as a surrogate, also because they are unable to judge real productivity.
Many useless managers must also fear for their role because they realise they are neither those calling the shots, nor those doing the actual work, and these middle levels are often very much at risk in times of cost-cutting.

Is there a realistic alternative? In most, if not all, cases, sadly, no. Now is not the time to resign and look for a new job :(

I ve had a very positive experience, my manager asks how we are by message once a day and calls once a week or so, otherwise we just get emails as and when things come up like they do in the office.
They ve always cared about our welfare if they know something is going on personally and have never bothered with meeting unless needed, best management I ve had.

No, I have been really grateful for how our work has been managed. We all have deadlines to work towards and that's how the managers know we are getting done what we say we are. Other than that we are having some development chats as a team and we already had a good culture of regular supervisions. Other than that I can work when and how I want. I just keep my calendar up to date so people know when I'm at my desk if they need to speak on the phone or whatever.

My DP was so sick of spending the whole day stuck on the sofa in meetings that achieved nothing he went back into the office. Now he can at least physically move about and get some stuff done inbetween.