Picture this: Half your team is sipping coffee in the office, while the other half is in pajamas at home and choosing the perfect filter. Is that a distant lawnmower in the distance or have you not activated your noise cancellation app yet? Welcome to the wild world of hybrid meetings! As a group of tech disruptors building our flexible feature-packed workplace experience platform and app with a globally distributed team you know we make hybrid meetings, stand-ups and syncs work.
What is a Hybrid Meeting?
Hybrid meetings blend in-person and online participation. Some team members gather physically in an office, while others join remotely via video conferencing tools. A meeting should have a clear agenda, the right people on the invite and clear actions to take away.
Challenges of Hybrid Meetings:
Thanks to Owllabs 2022 report ‘The State of Remote Work’ we know there is some division in the challenges faced but we can all find some common ground.
Remote Struggles = Disconnection
In-person and remote team members may feel disconnected. Perhaps an unnatural hierarchy might emerge if introverts and shy people end up joining remotely. Remote attendees are ‘hesitant to interrupt someone who’s speaking (34%) and not being able to see everyone’s faces, and therefore missing visual cues (32%)’
In-person Hurdles = Tech Glitches
Integrating technology between video conferencing and physical spaces can be tricky. ‘30% of in-room participants experience difficulty starting a meeting on time due to…unreliable tech.’ But you’ve read this guide and are looking into your meeting tech set up and will test your audio and conference cameras before the big meeting.
Hurdles we all face = Lost Information
Project documents might not be accessible to everyone. This is your notice to make any relevant files are available whether you’re a SharePoint sharer or Dropbox aficionado. Drop those file links in the meeting invite, chatbox and in the (spoilers) meeting summary email.
What makes an awesome hybrid meeting?
Before
Decide: Do you need a meeting to solve the issue or complete the project? Can it be a collaborative online board or document that people add ideas into? Would a full blown workshop be the best course of action? You might have bumped into the terms synchronous and asynchronous communications. Synchronous comms are your more traditional scheduled meetings that have information shared and responses are expected immediately. Asynchronous gives people a bit more time and space to respond, think Slack, Miro or any collaboration tool where you can drop your contribution in as and when it comes to you.
Goals & Agenda: Clearly outline the meeting’s purpose, topics, and expected outcomes. Craft an agenda that’s juicier than a mystery novel. No room for cliffhangers here though you want everyone to leave that meeting knowing what will happen next and whose job it is to action it.
Communication Plan: Where will it virtually take place? Leverage digital tools for real-time collaboration, note-taking, and brainstorming. Unleash the power of collaboration tools! Whiteboards, sticky notes, and mind maps—oh my!
During
Glitch Tech: Your meeting tech can turn into a comedy of errors but you had everyone check their equipment before the meeting so if something does go wrong, remain calm and be prepared to go asynchronous if every comms channel breaks down.
Warm Up Your Team: Start with icebreakers or casual conversation to build rapport. Break the ice like a pro. Try “Two Truths and a Lie” or “Emoji Catchphrase” you can ask your British friends for the reference.
Assign a Facilitator: If you prefer you can call them the facilitator, chair or circus ringmaster but these wonderful people ensure balanced participation by having someone lead the meeting. Their job? Keeping everyone on track and preventing virtual tumbleweeds. Your ringmaster should give everyone equal time to contribute.
Collab tool tutorial: Remember not everyone will be the meeting pro that you are, so if you are taking advantage of an whiteboard or other collab tool, remember to walk through the essential features for your meeting buddies.
Wrap it up with a bow: Recap decisions, assign action items, and send virtual high-fives. Most importantly give everyone a realistic timeline to get it all done.
After
Follow Up: Last but most definitely not least send your expertly crafter summary email or channel message where you recap decisions, action items, next steps and timeline.
Get those actions actioned!
While you’re in the mood to delve into collaboration tools for your teams take a look at GemEx workplace experience app where your hybrid meetings are scheduled in a few taps, your meeting services added in the blink of an eye, synced to your calendar and configurable so your whole team can get booked in one go.
