I liked this post’s rules of thumbs for when to avoid scheduling meetings at work:
Before calling a meeting, ask yourself: What’s the goal? If it’s just to convey information—like a status update—then yes, this meeting can (and should) be an email.
Meetings should be dialogues, not monologues. If all you’re doing is delivering information that doesn’t require back-and-forth discussion, spare your team the calendar block and just send an email.
Many of the worst offenders aren’t one-off meetings—they’re recurring meetings that have outlived their usefulness. A weekly status update that’s just a series of individual reports? That’s not a meeting—it’s a series of monologues that could be handled asynchronously.
On the flip side, some conversations shouldn’t happen over email—especially when they involve complexity, emotion, or collaboration. These are the types of interactions where being able to read tone, ask clarifying questions, and get immediate feedback is essential.