Live polls are a fun way to get people thinking, clicking, and checking out the results. You can set up your online meeting polls before or during your meeting, and attendees will find them in the sidebar. Virtual meetings are the ideal place to let your tech take center stage and add interactive and engaging elements to the proceedings.

(Google and Microsoft have settings you can turn on that shorten your meetings by default.) Also, start meetings on time, to avoid cascading scheduling problems and even greater inefficiency. Researchers found that for knowledge workers, it’s optimal to confine all meetings to just two days per week. That reduces stress and actually increases cooperation, as people instead connect one-on-one or use communication tools like Slack. But even just declaring one day per week free of meetings boosts productivity, cooperation, and engagement while reducing stress and micromanagement.

Virtual Meetings With Microsoft Teams

Save meetings for when you really need them, and you’ll find that your team is much more likely to bring all they’ve got to the table. By appointing a moderator, you give that person the authority to control the proceedings. No one can speak without the moderator’s permission, and the moderator keeps everyone focused. This is particularly important in online meetings, since issues with internet connectivity and audio or video quality can lead to miscommunications. Especially for remote employees, those things that tie everyone together like the company culture, vision and mission can start to feel distant. Remind everyone what you’re all working toward to help reinforce a sense of culture for your remote teams.

Avoid open-ended meetings, and schedule a follow-up if necessary instead. So, it’s important that managers not only have the right tech stack in place, but also the right mindset when it comes to how they manage their teams and meetings. A great place to start is by conducting meetings with a remote-first approach. Whether you’re meeting with colleagues who are working from home that day, or with clients located half a world away, running a productive and effective remote meeting can be a challenge.

If your remote meeting involves multiple speakers and topics, it’s a good idea to assign jobs before the call starts. Hash these details out beforehand to ensure a smooth meeting. ‍The platform you choose to run your remote meetings should be chosen with a variety of factors in mind. These factors should be unique to your team and organization. You may even find that having multiple conference platforms is a viable solution to cover your needs for smaller and larger meetings. Basic video conferencing platforms are perfect for smaller team meetings and can either be set up in advance or initiated on the fly.

4 Take Notes And Record The Video

When you work in a physical office, the time to stop is clear – you stop when you leave the building at the end of the day. When meetings are structured, focused on solutions, and move along at a good pace, your co-workers tend to be more engaged during meetings. Workers spend, on average, 2 hours per week in ‘pointless’ meetings that don’t have a clear agenda, or don’t support the work that they are responsible for. If you find that these types of interruptions and distractions are taking up too much time, make explicit time for them. At Parabol, we hold a weekly fika meeting explicitly to socialize. That space is reserved for talking about the dogs, the kids, and everything else that lets us connect as human beings beyond work.

• Before you click the red button, everyone in the conversation should know what they need to do next.
• Here at Executech, we use Microsoft Teams and recommend the product to our clients for its powerful meeting functions and one-stop-shop environment.
• A pet, nearby lawn mower, or children can get picked up in your microphone and be distracting for everyone.
• They may seem like small things, but users need to know where the video on/off icon is, how to mute, how to share screens.
• Make sure all attendees have the chance to view the agenda before the meeting starts so that they can decide what they want to ask, share, or debate.
• How to engage meeting attendees, whether they’re online or in person, introverts or extroverts.

And of course, one of the most convenient excuses is that we have another important video meeting we need to join right away…. A crucial first step toward better meetings is deciding whether a meeting is necessary. Sadly, video technology makes it more tempting to hold meetings simply because it’s easy to just click a link. In fact, one study showed that the number of meetings increased by 13% when people switched to remote work.

If you’re the one setting up the meeting, be sure to set it for a time that works for everyone on the attendee list. There’s nothing worse than realizing you’ve been scheduled for a meeting that’s at 6 AM your time—or in the evening when you’d normally have other plans. Many remote meeting tools are designed to work primarily over internet connections. But what happens if someone’s internet goes down or slows down? It’s important to give the option for folks to listen to the meeting and talk over the phone.

Despite all the benefits of online meetings, one of their biggest drawbacks is technical difficulties. There’s nothing more distracting, and disrupting, than technology failing during an online event. Issues logging on, attendees getting disconnected due to slow internet, and screen share glitches are just a few of the myriad of things that could go wrong during a virtual event.

It happens that Gartner employs over 2,000 experts, the vast majority of whom have been working from home for years. And in case you’re wondering, I https://globalcloudteam.com/ don’t like to work in monastic seclusion. I am a deeply collaborative worker and find it difficult to get work done unless it’s with someone else.

How to identify which tools you need to succeed—and why audio and video are non-negotiable. As an entrepreneur, you handle an onslaught of tasks day in and day out. Competing priorities make being organized and focused on the end goal even more… Virtually everyone owns a smartphone, which we use for an ever-growing array of tasks and entertainment.

How To Hold Productive Online Meetings

So all you need is a video engagement platform that draws all these interactive features together – and some fun-loving spirit and creativity to really get going with it. A simple intro between everyone is great for team collaboration – people are way more inclined to speak up if they’ve already spoken once to the group. The key is to prompt attendees to keep their engagement high in order to earn rewards or further collaborate with others taking part in the meeting. These aren’t designed to be challenging brain-teasers, concept-checking questions aren’t meant to call people out. They’re to make sure everyone’s engaged in the relevant topic and understands the information, what to do, and what or expect.

If you can get the message across via a quick chat or email, avoid the meeting. Depending on the culture at your place of work, you might need to set some rules about video and what people should wear. Don’t forget about the appreciation and motivation that should keep coming from managers/peers, even for small acts of success.

Meeting facilitation is a skill that requires practice and, when possible, some training to get right. If you keep meeting numbers low and time periods short, people are far more likely to stay engaged. Smaller meetings also reduce the chance of miscommunication as fewer stakeholders are speaking, and it’s easier to follow the flow of conversation. It’s the job of the team leader/meeting convener to make sure that everyone feels comfortable in the virtual space. And that connections can still be made without letting anyone feel unappreciated and left out. Remote meetings eliminate many of the traditional logistical issues of face-to-face meetings.

Use Interactive Tools For Virtual Team Building

Write an agenda that covers the purpose of the meeting, the questions you want to answer by the end, and the goals you hope to achieve. Ask yourself, what is this meeting for, and how will you measure whether it was successful? You can even share your agenda with your team to ensure everyone’s on the same page. Meetings under 15 minutes now make up a majority of meetings tracked by Microsoft. And, if nothing else, schedule meetings for 25 or 50 minutes , so participants have time to move around before the next meeting starts.

Even so, for many, there’s still an element of awkwardness that comes with not being in the same room with peers or clients. And with online meetings, you might just find there are more ways for your team to engage, participate, and interact. While some would prefer meeting face to face, it’s not always possible. Plus, there are many times when it’s actually more beneficial and cost-effective to host an online meeting.

And if you opt for a predominantly remote workforce, you don’t even have to lease as much office space. In a perfect world, our most important meetings and events would be held in person. But if the Covid-19 pandemic taught us anything, it’s that there are times when “business as usual” isn’t practical. Blog Discover tips and advice about building engaging events. Content Library Browse a library of webinars, ebooks, templates, and more.

She believes that the real challenges with remote working are not technology but human. To overcome them, she suggests business leaders do a few things things to ensure the wellbeing of remote workers. Consider adding a ritual or ceremony to your team meetings, like a fun way to start or end a remote meeting. For example, everyone might begin the meeting by saying what they can see out their window every day. This works best for geographically distributed teams, where one person is looking at snow and another at a palm tree.

#5 Don’t Fill The Allotted Time Just For The Sake Of It

Emoji_events 360+ Goal & OKR Examples Access our library of 360+ role-specific and personal development goal examples to inspire your team. Slack Set up meetings, add agenda items, and get meeting reminders directly from your Slack community. Meeting notes Take minutes right within your agenda and automatically How to run a successful remote meeting email them to all participants. In the same vein, turn off your computer sounds and notifications, especially if you’re sharing your screen with the group. It’s super distracting for everyone else in the meeting to see pop-ups on your screen while trying to take in the information you’re presenting.

This can be done in real time during the meeting, or immediately afterward to separate deliberation from decision-making. Use available chat room technology, not for side conversations but for attendees to communicate that they want to speak or that they missed something. For some meetings, the chat room can be used as a second channel of communication that the leader or another attendee moderates.

Ideas From The Experts On Getting Meetings Back On Track

#3 Deliberately position yourself to include body language and tone just as you would in a face-to-face conversation. Robin recently surveyed 300+ professionals to better understand what great leadership looks like in a hybrid world. The basic idea is to borrow from the behavior change literature and use behavior enablers, artifacts, and nudges to make desired behaviors habitual. Behavior enablers directly help people follow desired behaviors . Artifacts and nudges act as powerful indirect reinforcements .

We like to think jumping from one unfinished task to another is called “multitasking” and we really love thinking it’s efficient. Timeboxing your calls and aiming for shorter meetings will leave everyone more room for actual work, actual thinking, and action alike. These items allow the website to remember choices you make and provide enhanced, more personal features. For example, a website may provide you with local weather reports or traffic news by storing data about your current location. These items are used to deliver advertising that is more relevant to you and your interests.

A reliance on screen sharing as a way to illustrate talking points. When you’re attending meetings remotely, that means it can be challenging to perceive 93% of communication. It’s the ability to manage conflicting tensions—rather than always seeking cohesiveness—that is the most predictive factor of team performance. Feeling comfortable enough to regularly debate and spar over ideas can actually be productive.

Tips To Run Better Remote Meetings With Examples

Consider scheduling the occasional sync just to catch up as a team or to plan a virtual team building activity. During regular team meetings, such as a daily standup or sprint planning, use the first few minutes to catch up on any exciting news or weekend plans. In addition to bringing the team closer together and increasing employee satisfaction, this virtual water cooler chat can get team members prepared to participate more during the meeting. Some managers feel the need to schedule additional check-ins to make sure their remote team members stay productive and have the resources they need.

Create urgency in solution generation – break into groups and set short solution times. Don’t look around the room you are in, out a window, or talk with others that may be physically in the room with you. #6 Keep it professional by following basic virtual call etiquette. Never fill the allotted time if the outcome of the meeting has been achieved in less time. Utilize a whiteboard behind you to draw, take notes and capture the conversation. Stepping back, putting some distance between you and the camera to create a 3D space.