Synchronous tools like meetings shine when a topic is ambiguous, contentious, or requires debate. You can have a dialog.

Asynchronous tools like email or even Slack are better for topics with less ambiguity, aren't controversial, or doesn't require a ton of back and forth.

Lastly, meetings are better for building relationships, trust, etc.

I think it takes experience.

You send out an email and people misinterpret it, and there’s some nuance, and there’s a bunch of back and forth communication, but nothing ever gets resolved—maybe that should have been a meeting.

You set up a meeting to explain something to 50 people in your department—maybe that could have been an email.

I think the simple rule is when you need to persuade when choosing among multiple ambiguous options, you must also rebut counterarguments (even "devil's advocate"), so a meeting is more concise at reaching a decision than an email chain.

So basically any ambiguity about the outcome. When you're not sure what hill to take, when there's competing priorities, when there's conflicting information and you need alignment, when there's risk and you need to spread it appropriately.

The reason you need a meeting is an email by itself will be insufficiently conclusive, and everyone writing emails will be talking past each other.

yes, start by writing an email, if you feel it's impossible to solve the issue with the email, set up a meeting

I like that! It also prepares the meeting in case you need one. Thanks for sharing

It's a trust thing - the more trust the less it needs to be a meeting. Unfortunately most companies and client relationships are low trust and need facetime to build towards that high trust environment.