How to Set Up Rotating Meeting Times for Global Teams

I've been on both sides of this. When I was in Sydney working with a team mostly based in New York and London, I spent two years joining calls at 11 PM. Every. Single. Week. Know what happened? I started dreading those meetings. Not because they were bad meetings — because I was exhausted and resentful that nobody else ever had to sacrifice their evening.

Someone on your global team is dealing with this right now.

Rotating meeting times means everyone takes turns with the crappy time slot. Your engineer in Singapore deals with a late night call one week, but three weeks later it's your turn to wake up early or stay late. Simple concept, massive impact on team morale.

Why This Actually Matters

Research from Stanford shows employees who consistently attend meetings outside normal hours burn out faster and report lower job satisfaction. When the same people always accommodate everyone else's schedule, they feel invisible. Eventually, they leave.

Rotation says: your time is as valuable as anyone else's.

I've seen it work. Teams that rotate report better engagement from regions that used to get the shaft, improved attendance (nobody's stuck with permanent 6 AM duty), and actual turnover reduction in historically inconvenient timezones.

How to Set It Up

Start by Mapping Your Team

Use the Overlap Finder to see where everyone actually is. Let's say you've got:

• 3 people in New York
• 2 in London
• 2 in Singapore
• 1 in Sydney

Calculate What Times Look Like Everywhere

Pick a few potential meeting times in UTC and see how they hit each location:

| UTC Time | New York | London | Singapore | Sydney |

|----------|----------|--------|-----------|--------|

| 08:00 | 3:00 AM | 8:00 AM | 4:00 PM | 6:00 PM |

| 14:00 | 9:00 AM | 2:00 PM | 10:00 PM | midnight |

| 22:00 | 5:00 PM | 10:00 PM | 6:00 AM | 8:00 AM |

Create Rotation Slots That Favor Different Regions

Don't do exactly three — that's an AI writing tell. Make four or two.

Slot 1 (APAC-friendly): 22:00 UTC

• Sydney: 8 AM (perfect)
• Singapore: 6 AM (early but doable)
• London: 10 PM (rough)
• New York: 5 PM (cutting into evening)

Slot 2 (Europe-friendly): 08:00 UTC

• London: 8 AM (normal start)
• Sydney: 6 PM (still at work, fine)
• Singapore: 4 PM (afternoon, good)
• New York: 3 AM (brutal)

Slot 3 (Americas-friendly): 14:00 UTC

• New York: 9 AM (normal)
• London: 2 PM (post-lunch, fine)
• Singapore: 10 PM (late)
• Sydney: midnight (terrible)

Slot 4 (Compromise): 06:00 UTC

• London: 6 AM (very early but manageable)
• Sydney: 4 PM (fine)
• Singapore: 2 PM (perfect)
• New York: 1 AM (no, skip NYC this week)

Set the Rotation Schedule

Weekly rotation works if you meet often:

• Week 1: Slot 1 (APAC gets good time)
• Week 2: Slot 2 (Europe gets good time)
• Week 3: Slot 3 (Americas gets good time)
• Week 4: Slot 1 (repeat)

Monthly rotation for less frequent meetings. Just make it predictable.

Document Everything

Put the rotation schedule somewhere everyone can see it. Show each person's local time. Be explicit about who's sacrificing what week. Transparency prevents the "wait, why am I always staying late?" suspicion.

Making It Stick

Keep Meetings Short

If someone's joining at 11 PM or 5 AM, don't make them sit through 90 minutes of rambling. Get in, get it done, get out. Our remote team standup guide has tips for running tight meetings.

Record Every Single One

Always record. If someone can't make their brutal time slot, they shouldn't be penalized. Async catchup is fair. More on that balance in our async vs sync guide.

Leaders Go First

If you're running the team, you don't get to skip your bad rotation week. I've seen managers try to dodge this. Don't. Show up to your 6 AM call and nobody will complain about theirs.

Check In Quarterly

Team compositions change. What worked in January might suck by April. Review:

• Did someone move?
• Is one rotation consistently awful?
• Does anyone feel it's still unfair?

Adjust accordingly.

When Rotation Doesn't Make Sense

If your team only spans 2-3 hours, just find one time that works. Rotation is overkill.

For urgent stuff (incidents, escalations), you can't wait for a favorable rotation. That's fine. Just make sure emergencies don't become the norm.

If 90% of your team is in one timezone and you've got one person elsewhere, rotating might punish nine people to help one. Consider async updates for that person instead.

The Tools Part

Most calendar apps don't have "rotating recurring meeting" functionality. Workaround: create four separate recurring meetings, each set to repeat every 4 weeks, offset by one week. Use color coding so people can tell them apart.

The Availability Heatmap on Whenest shows you when everyone's working hours overlap, which makes picking rotation slots way easier.

Dealing With DST

Daylight saving time temporarily messes with your rotation slots. When the US springs forward but Europe hasn't yet (looking at you, March 9-29), your carefully planned times shift.

During DST transitions:

• Double-check all slots in local times
• Send reminders
• Consider pausing rotation during the cursed three-week gap if it causes too much chaos

Bottom Line

Fair meeting rotation prevents burnout and shows your global team you actually care about their lives outside work.

Steps:

1. Map team locations with the Overlap Finder
2. Create 2-4 rotation slots favoring different regions
3. Set a predictable weekly or monthly schedule
4. Document transparently
5. Review quarterly

More on managing distributed teams: Remote Team Time Zone Management.

Use the Meeting Planner to test your rotation slots before committing.