Virtual meeting is a kind of meeting that is held virtually among the people around the world without the restriction of location, they can easily communicate through different media channels like video, audio, and text.
People can easily communicate, share information and data virtually with each other without existing in the physical location. They can use different video teleconference software’s like Microsoft Skype, Adobe connects and Google Hangouts to conduct virtual meetings.
Now organizations focusing on the hiring of remote workers, remote workers make the organization more flexible, make possible to hire the right talent around the world with low cost. When you hire employees remotely then you also need to train them so you need to conduct virtual meetings to make them able to do the complex tasks easily.
Teams also play an important role in achieving the organization’s goals in an effective way. Nobody can ignore the importance of virtual teams. Virtual team members also need training that make them able to work effectively.
>> Recommended reading: Time Management – A Guide to Boost Productivity
How to Organize a Virtual Meeting?
Successfully organizing virtual meetings are also important to make sure that virtual meetings are organized in a proper and professional way. As a manager, you can follow these tips for the effective organization of virtual training.
Structured Meetings
Structure of the meetings plays an important role in organizing an effective meeting and in the case of the virtual meeting we need more structured meetings. In virtual meetings, communication can be a challenging task because sometimes there is a chance of miscommunication among the members because of the lack of face to face interaction.
So it will be a better idea for the managers to structure and develop a plan and make sure that your team members are following the plan during the virtual meeting.
1. Define Agenda of your Virtual Meetings
Defining an agenda before the conduct of virtual meetings is also an important task for the managers. Managers should formulate an agenda with the consultation with their team member’s and the same should be communicate with your team members before the start of virtual meetings.
2. Follow- Up Note
It is necessary for the managers to make sure that their team members are on the same page regarding the agenda and structure of the virtual meetings. It is considered difficult to communicate all the things with your virtual team member’s as compare to ordinary meetings.
As a team manager, you should make a follow-up note and it should be clear as possible to communicate all the things clearly and actionable without wasting the time in reading the long email threads.
3. Suitable Environment
Before conducting the virtual meetings, you should ensure a suitable environment for your team members. There should not be anything in the background that create a disturbance like the barking of the dogs and making noise by children’s.
So as a team manager, you should ensure a suitable environment where there is a minimum disturbance in the background as possible and no objects in the background.
4. Avoid Distractions
In virtual meetings distractions can easily happen like eating something or checking email during virtual meetings can create distractions. Sometimes team members are alone in the room during the virtual meeting and they don’t aware that something is creating disturbance in the room.
5. Assign Responsibilities to the Team Members
As a manager, you should assign responsibilities to your team members during the virtual meeting like meeting leader, team keeper, and note taker. In this way, you can easily keep check and balance and track the performance of each team member.
Team members also become responsible because they know that they need to perform the tasks assigned by the manager and this thing creates more engagement among the team members.
6. Use PowerPoint Slides or Share Screens with your Team Members
You can use PowerPoint Slides and share the screen with your team members to make sure everything is on the same page instead of telling something by reading from your notes. You can also use document sharing tools for this purpose.
7. Different Tech Problems
There are more chances of different tech problems during the virtual meeting like bad internet connection and microphones that may not work during the virtual meeting. This situation is very annoying and creates disturbance during the virtual meeting. You are wasting both time and money at the same time when these problems occur.
So make sure to tell you each team members to check all the tech equipment’s before starting the virtual meetings and make sure that these equipment are working properly.
>> Recommended reading: Guide for Effective Meetings – How to use time well and deal with anxiety
Tools for holding a Virtual Meeting
You can use different types of software tools to make your virtual meeting more professional and productive. Here, we are discussing some tools with you.
These software tools are easily accessible and you can conveniently use them for your virtual meetings to make your meetings more productive.
Tips to make your Meeting Productive
Here we are sharing some guidelines and important points to make your virtual meetings more productive.
1. Be Focused
You need always be focused on your virtual meetings. Always specify the topics which need to be discussed during the meeting and remain stick to them. Always set your priority topics to be discussed at the start and remain at the end.
2. Always Start on Time
Always communicate your virtual meeting time schedule with your team members to participate in the meeting on the time. If somebody late, ask the reason and suggest to arrive in meetings on time.
3. Always Invite your Core Team Members
It is always suggested to keep minimum members in your virtual meeting so that you can discuss all the things before the members. So choose only those team members which you think can contribute to the success of virtual meetings.
4. Summarize the Virtual Meeting
Always summarize each point and action which have been discussed in the virtual meeting before adjuring the meeting. You can also discuss the schedule of the next meeting with your team members if you think it is necessary.
Effective virtual meeting starts here: with Runrun.it helping companies organize routines using management tools that focus priorities by scheduling tasks and meetings in a transparent, productivity-focused way. Runrun.it is a work management software that measures the time your team spend working on tasks, projects and clients. You can try out a free trial of this software by clicking here: http://runrun.it
Nowadays, with the help of our modern technology, we can become close and communicate effectively. Video calling or conferencing is really helpful for people that are worlds apart. Thank you for sharing these helpful tips!
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