Stevea Robbins here, and welcome to the Get It Done Guys quick and dirty tips to work less and do more.

Today's topic is being smart about your communication.

The quick and dirty tip is to provide context with your messages.

You know how much I love meetings?

I don't.

I hate meetings. That's't. I hate meetings.

That's because it seems like meetings are chock-full of irrelevant, useless, boring information.

I used to marvel at my friends who were addicted to online virtual games.

I'd naively think, why would someone spend hours in an online virtual world

when they could have 3D, millions of colors, and a multisensory

first-person interface in the real world? Simple. The real world has meetings. Online doesn't.

So, you can imagine how my ego shattered this week when I discovered I, I was part of the

irrelevant, useless, boring information

problem.

Eager to make a good impression on my new co-workers, I sent out several articles that were relevant

to our project, useful, and fascinating.

I was expecting accolades and praises for my intellectual brilliance.

Instead, my boss said,

Okay, Steaver, I spent my Saturday night reading the 75 pages you sent. Was there anything

relevant in it? It seemed totally irrelevant, useless, boring information. Ouch. Really,

ouch! Double-ouch. No one knows what we're thinking.

What I'd forgotten to do was provide context.

...