Ben Gowland considers what happens when the meetings stop and you suddenly have time to think.

I was having a drink with an old colleague recently and he asked me what life was like, now that I am working for myself. Frankly, I replied, there are a lot less meetings.

There is something about working in the NHS that draws you into this culture of meeting after endless meeting. I remember a new Finance Director joining an organisation I was at who proudly placed a framed quote on his desk that read, ‘People who enjoy meetings should not be in charge of anything’. Within a few months he was complaining about the meetings just like the rest of us, and the quote mysteriously disappeared.

At a different hospital, when a new HR Director started she announced she would not be having any meetings before 9.30am. That is going to be tough, I thought to myself, given the consultants would only meet you at 7.30 in the morning (or earlier – there seemed to be some sort of competition amongst the general surgeons as to who would arrive the earliest). I remember meeting her six months later, at about 7.45am on a dark winter’s morning in the half mile queue for the coffee shop in the main hospital concourse, and I asked her about her initial pledge. She looked like she had aged 10 years in that time. She had dark circles around her eyes, and that constantly distant look that comes with one too many employment tribunals. She just stared at me and denied all knowledge of anything so idiotic. ‘Double espresso to go’ she barked at the hapless barista…

I have to admit there was a transition, moving from a diary packed from dusk to dawn with meetings to one with virtually none. What do you do? How do you stop yourself checking whether Supermarket Sweep is still on in the mornings? I searched the web for advice. It turns out it requires discipline: only look at emails for half an hour twice a day; focus on the ‘one big thing’ you want to do each day before you do anything else; and don’t, whatever you do, turn on the TV.

Now I like it. Admittedly it took me a while to get used to it, but now I really enjoy being able to spend my time working on the things I want to do. It has meant I was able to ensure that Ockham produced its first White Paper, ‘5 Years to the End of General Practice?’ in February, that we could generate a suite of tools for the ‘Practical Steps’ programme for GP practices, as well as have the capacity to write two regular blogs – this one and one on general practice.

Life without meetings has its own challenges, but in the quest to make a difference it feels like a step in the right direction. And (I know you are wondering) there is currently no sign of Supermarket Sweep anywhere…