Meetings

Business concepts: When we discuss trivial matters instead of important ones

Black-and-white photo of bike leaning up against small shed

The Law of Triviality describes how people often waste time focusing on small things instead of the important ones. We might be meeting to approve plans for a nuclear power plant, but we spend most of the time arguing about what color to paint the bike shed.

Circle back

If a conversation is going in a new direction and you want to return to a previous point, you can circle back.

In business, it’s very common for discussions to be directed away from the main point as new ideas, issues, or related topics come up. If you would like to refocus everyone’s attention to the main point of a discussion, you can circle back to it.

You can use this expression as a statement or a question. Here are some examples of how to use this phrase: