Are you an over-communicator? Although you may think you’re not communicating enough to your employees, often the opposite is true: bosses make the mistake of being too transparent in their operations, and the result is lost time and money. Joel Spolsky, CEO of Fog Creek Software in New York City, shares these telltale warning signs and suggestions.

Do you invite eight people to a meeting instead of the three essential employees, just so no one feels left out? “Everybody who doesn’t need to be in that meeting is killing productivity,” says Spolsky. Invite as few people as possible; if any important decisions are made, you can fill everyone else in later with an e-mail.

But don’t get too comfortable with that CC button. Do you send out a companywide e-mail about punctuality, even if only one employee is constantly late? Spolsky says, “Everybody who doesn’t need to read that e-mail is distracted by it.” Time is money—don’t waste your employees’ time on things that don’t apply to them.

And we’re all for democracy, but you don’t need to get everyone’s two cents on every decision. Choose one or two key players to take charge of a new program. Spolsky says that adding more people to a late project actually makes it run later still, because so much time is wasted getting everyone up to speed.