Meetings should be where ideas come alive. But for most people, they’re where focus goes to die.

It’s not because meetings don’t matter—they do. It’s because the way we run meetings doesn’t match how people actually think, listen, or decide. An Atlassian survey of 5,000 workers found that meetings are actually ineffective 72% of the time!

We talk too much, listen too little, and rarely take time to stop and think.

The result? Scattered conversations. Shallow understanding. Endless talk that leads nowhere.

What’s missing isn’t more structure or smarter tools. It’s something simpler—and far more powerful.

It’s quiet.

The Problem Isn’t the Meeting—It’s the Noise

If you lead or attend meetings regularly, you know the pattern.

People show up distracted. Laptops open. Notifications pinging. Everyone eager to “get through” the agenda rather than engage with it.

Someone starts talking, slides start flipping, and before long, the conversation is a blur.

The problem isn’t that people are lazy or unfocused—it’s that meetings are noisy by design. They leave no room to think. And thinking takes time.

We’ve built work environments that celebrate speed and spontaneity, but those qualities can easily become the enemies of depth. Real understanding requires a pause.

Without it, meetings become performances—fast-moving, overtalked, underthought.

The Power of the Pause

Several years ago, I read about how Jeff Bezos banned PowerPoint at Amazon and replaced it with something that, at first glance, seemed crazy: 20 minutes of silence.

No slides. No talking. No introductions. Just quiet reading time.

Photo of a female professional reading during a meeting.

During those 20 minutes, everyone in the meeting would read a narrative document describing the proposal or decision being discussed.

When the quiet time ended, the discussion began—and the quality of the conversation skyrocketed.

What happened was simple but profound: People were thinking before they were talking.

The silence changed the tone, the pace, and the outcomes.

And that’s the point—quiet isn’t the absence of communication; quiet is what makes communication possible.

Why We Resist Silence

Most professionals resist silence because it feels unproductive.

Sitting in a quiet meeting for 10 minutes feels strange. Awkward, even. We’re wired to fill every pause, to prove we’re engaged, to keep things “moving.” But that’s the lie of modern work—the idea that constant talking equals progress.

The truth is, the best ideas don’t come from talking faster; they come from thinking slower. And quiet creates the conditions for clarity.

When people read, reflect, and digest before they discuss, their input gets sharper. Their questions get better. Their tone gets calmer.

The whole meeting improves because people are focused on the idea in front of them.

How to Bring Quiet to Your Meetings

If you want to bring quiet into your workplace, you don’t need a sweeping policy change. You just need a different rhythm.

Here’s a simple way to start:

1️⃣ Begin with silence.
Reserve the first five to ten minutes of a meeting for reading or reflection. No talking. No screens.

2️⃣ Replace slides with stories.
Create a written summary—a narrative that walks through the idea clearly and logically.

3️⃣ Ask better questions.
When it’s time to talk, ask what stood out, what’s unclear, or what needs more thought.

4️⃣ End with alignment.
Don’t rush the wrap-up. Take a minute to confirm what was decided and what happens next.

You’ll be surprised by what happens when you slow things down. The quality of the thinking—and the calm that comes with it—will transform your meetings.

Quiet Works for Selling, Too

At The Quiet Workplace, we teach that quiet isn’t a luxury—it’s a skill. It’s how you lead better, decide better, and connect better.

And nowhere is that more evident than in how people sell. Research from Gong.io analyzing over 100,000 sales calls found that the lowest-performing salespeople speak 62% of the time or more—meaning they spend most of the conversation talking, not listening.

Think about it: The same habits that ruin meetings—talking too much, rushing to fill silence, failing to listen—also ruin sales conversations.

That’s why we created Quiet Selling.

It’s a course that teaches professionals how to bring calm, focus, and restraint into their sales approach—how to slow the pace, ask the right questions, and let silence do the work.

Quiet Selling helps you transform the conversation. You stop pitching. You start listening. You trade pressure for presence.

Because selling, like meetings, isn’t about saying more—it’s about saying what matters.

Final Thought

Most meetings don’t need more talk. They need more time to think.

When you build quiet into the process, you’ll notice something extraordinary: people leave not drained, but energized. The discussion feels meaningful. Decisions stick. That’s the hidden power of silence.

Quiet doesn’t kill momentum—it creates it. And in a noisy world, that’s what makes it your greatest advantage.

Just saying.

Joseph McCormack first shared these ideas in his Just Saying podcast, Episode 380, The B.E.S.T. Meeting Method

Joe McCormack is the founder of the Quiet Workplace and author of BRIEF: Make a Bigger Impact by Saying Less, NOISE: Living and Leading When Nobody Can Focus, and Quiet Works: Making Silence the Secret Ingredient of the Workday. He teaches leaders to communicate with clarity, brevity, and intention.