Rob Castaneda, founder and CEO of ServiceRocket, told Lacey Carlyle that he started scheduling time on the executive team's calendar before and after the core meeting. He almost breezed by it. Lacey didn't let him. Thank goodness. Because the idea is quit smart and practical. Exec meetings are usually long, and execs don't exactly have a lot of time, so blocking off more time on people's calendar seems counterintuitive. Until you see the the behavior. During the 30 minutes of blocked calendar time before the meeting, people come into the meeting room and start preparing for the meeting. Updating reports and responding to action items from the prior meeting. This makes for a much more productive meeting. Participants prep before the meeting and not during the first 30 minutes of the meeting, while they are not talking, and not paying attention to the meeting. In other words, not being present in the meeting. This pre-meeting blocked time allows people to be present during the meeting because they are prepped.