research citations

Sources

While the crowdsourced dataset is still being gathered, recurring.fyi shows external research figures as a baseline reference. Below is every external figure cited anywhere on the site — with the publisher, year, and a link to the primary source.

Each baseline reflects one specific population (e.g. senior executives, knowledge workers in Microsoft 365, US professionals). They are not directly comparable to the crowdsourced per-company averages we publish — they are a frame of reference, nothing more.

1. [1]

   Senior executives, large companies

   23 hrs/wk

   Of 182 senior managers surveyed. Up from <10 hrs/wk in the 1960s.

   Harvard Business Review (Perlow, Hadley, Eun) (2017) · https://hbr.org/2017/07/stop-the-meeting-madness

2. [2]

   US professionals (Otter.ai survey)

   21.5 hrs/wk

   Average reported by US professionals. ~1/3 of meetings flagged as unnecessary.

   Otter.ai / The State of Business Meetings (2022) · https://otter.ai/blog/one-third-of-meetings-are-unnecessary-costing-companies-millions-and-no-one-is-happy-about-it

3. [3]

   Microsoft 365 heavy meeting users (top quartile)

   7.5 hrs/wk

   Time in Teams meetings for the heaviest 25% of users. Overall meeting time up 252% since Feb 2020.

   Microsoft Work Trend Index (2023) · https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index

4. [4]

   Knowledge workers (distributed/hybrid teams)

   8 hrs/wk

   Distributed/hybrid teams ~8 hrs/wk; office-only ~5 hrs/wk. From a survey of 5,000 knowledge workers.

   Atlassian State of Teams (2022) · https://www.atlassian.com/blog/state-of-teams-2022

5. [5]

   Workers globally (Doodle)

   3 hrs/wk

   Pre-pandemic baseline: ~3 meetings/wk × 1 hr. 67% felt unnecessary; ~2 hrs/wk of those rated pointless.

   Doodle State of Meetings (2019) · https://doodle.com/en/resources/research-and-reports-/the-state-of-meetings-2019/