“They” say it takes an average of 7 emails going back and forth to schedule a meeting.

Wow. Would be nice to be able to do it in one (request and response). “They” also say employees spend 100 hours per year setting meetings.

Here are some tips to schedule meetings faster:

-Offer the place, time and date when you schedule a meeting. Avoid this: “Do you want to meet?” “Yes.” “Ok, when?” “At Starbucks.” “What day and time?”…yada yada. Instead, “Can you meet at Starbucks on Tuesday at 10 am?”

-Clarify the location. Odds are there are more than one Starbucks. Make sure you designate the exact Starbucks you’re talking about.

-Provide alternative dates. “If you can’t do the date above, I am also available Thursday at 10 am or Friday at 9am.” If you want to really streamline the process, provide your public free/busy Google Calendar (requires that you use Google Calendar of course). This allows your meeting mate to see your entire free/busy calendar, and they can tell you when they can meet. If you don’t use Google calendar and you don’t have anything overly sensitive on your Outlook calendar, I’ve even taken a screen shot of my calendar and pasted it in the email.

Happy meeting making! I hope this helps you cut down on the time it takes you to schedule a meeting!