Meetings, meetings, meetings

Today consisted of back-to-back teleconferences and meetings. All useful, but 5 hours of meetings gets to feeling weird. Teleconferencing has become a norm, at least in my life. When you work with colleagues and scholars from around the nation, with three time zones, teleconferencing makes it possible. In the scheme of things, it wasn't that long ago when teleconferences were a big deal, special, unusual. Now we casually move the tripod mic from room to room, like carrying a jelly fish with all those wires dangling in a perpetual tangle.

What were the meetings about?
The first started 20 minutes late after a flurry of emails to find a working call-in phone number....gotta love technology. It was to bring two groups together with an eye toward stronger collaboration. But, well, it wasn't working for me. All I could think was "Does this mean that funding will be somehow cut for one or the other of us?" Without a doubt, efficiencies can be gained, but insecurity prevails.

The second was for my AHRQ grant. I brought together the speakers as a first step toward having a coherent set of presentations.  It was hard for me to interpret the silence; where there questions, was there teeth grinding, was the challenge a bit overwhelming? Time will tell. But, at least I now have speakers lined up.

The third meeting only had two people on the phone, with the rest of us in the room. It's the end of this grant intervention and the tasks are winding down. The mood was a mix of sadness to be ending, anxiety about the work involved to wrap up the evaluation, and casual familiarity. We ended the meeting with a discussion of how/where to celebrate the end. We all sat there, as though waiting for someone to say the end is not coming. We'll have to write some grants to have more projects together.

I ended the day by drafting a letter of nomination for myself. Those can be hard to do because it requires absolutely no modesty or humility, followed by prayers and finger crossing.