The teamovore produces nothing: it digests available time
In Crestignac, La DdC identifies the teamovore, a professional predator that absorbs other people’s available time through a succession of Teams meetings.
La DdC2 min read
La DdC interrupts a session of collective teamovoration under the watchful eye of the official warthog.
It generally appears first thing on Monday morning, at the precise moment everyone thought they could start working. Silently, it opens calendars, spots the remaining gaps and methodically occupies them. Half an hour here, a “quick catch-up” there, then a follow-up meeting to prepare the scoping meeting for the next committee.
The teamovore does not hunt: it invites.
Its message is brief, often without an agenda, but always accompanied by a link. It never asks whether the meeting is necessary. Its necessity lies entirely in the fact that it has been scheduled.
At 9 am, its first victim still has a whole day ahead. By 6 pm, all they have left is a list of tasks they have had no time to complete.
Contrary to popular belief, the teamovore does not devour its colleagues directly. It absorbs their available time, fragments their concentration and gradually turns every impulse to act into meeting minutes.
Its diet consists of four essential elements:
the progress update;
the alignment meeting;
the preparatory meeting;
« I won’t be able to make any progress this afternoon. I’m being teamovored until 5 pm. »
the meeting to determine whether another meeting should be arranged.
Once sated, the teamovore generally utters the words: “I’ll leave you to it. I have another meeting.”
The victim, meanwhile, remains alone in front of their screen with that distinctive feeling of having participated a great deal without being able to identify in what.
They have been teamovored.
Faced with the scale of the phenomenon, linguists in Crestignac have officially entered the teamovore and the verb to teamovore in the Grand Dictionnaire de la Duchesse.
To teamovore: to absorb other people’s working time through a succession of Teams meetings whose precise purpose nobody knows.
The verb is also used reflexively.
To teamovore oneself: to arrange meetings among yourselves until all productive activity has disappeared.
A few expressions have already entered common usage:
The imperfect subjunctive remains rarer, although perfectly suited to executive committees:
The verb’s full conjugation can be consulted in the Grand Dictionnaire de la Duchesse.
Asked about this proliferation, Her Highness the Duchess of Crestignac announced the creation of a High Commission for the Protection of Available Time.
“The time spent talking about action must never prevent us from talking about the time we could have spent taking action,” she declared at the end of a three-hour meeting devoted to reducing the number of meetings.
Several measures are currently under consideration, including a requirement to provide a comprehensible subject line, the pre-emptive release of unnecessary participants and the introduction of a meeting licence renewable every fortnight.
The CIS, coefficient of situational immobility, will also be used to measure precisely the amount of movement prevented by each invitation.
The first results are expected as soon as the committee responsible for examining them has found a date.
In the meantime, the authorities recommend never leaving a time slot unattended. The teamovore immediately considers it available.
The Crestignacien observes without judging. But sometimes declines the invitation.
How to make it
- 1.Nous nous sommes teamovorés pendant deux heures afin de convenir que le sujet nécessitait davantage de réflexion.
- 2.Ils vous teamovoreront dès qu’un créneau commun aura été identifié.
- 3.Il aurait fallu que nous teamovorassions avant de pouvoir statuer sur l’opportunité de décider.