are high ; Consider breaking the meeting into a series of sprints - breaking agenda elements into steering and supervisory .
Make collaboration and distribution easy - the digital portal
If you are planning to embrace the full potential of virtual meetings , and protect the most confidential materials you produce , then you are going to need to invest in a digital portal . A good portal will : save you admin time - on average organisations that switch to digital portals from a paper process expect to achieve 90 % time savings ; enable leadership teams to securely access their meeting materials at any time and from any location in the world ; allow you to easily make changes to agendas and papers and notify readers in real-time ; and help you collaborate on reviewing papers through tools such as annotations and notes .
Make each word count - the digital paper
Digital packs are essential to an effective virtual meeting , but they can make it too easy for writers to include pages and pages of data and detail . Combine that with the challenge of a virtual forum
Meetings , present some significant challenges , whether around adopting the new technology needed to host virtual meetings , chairing and facilitating virtual meetings , ensuring meeting papers are safely distributed , and keeping meeting attendees engaged and the conversation focused .
When adopting new technology for your meetings - whether conferencing technology or a digital portal - it ’ s always better to choose something simple and intuitive than something rich in unusable features . Make sure you consider the needs and preferences of the crowd around your virtual table .
itself , where focus and attention can be in shorter supply , and that means you ’ ll need to pay greater attention to the quality of your papers .
Make sure that your papers provide value by incorporating the following steps : encourage the report writers to keep their information short and to the point - set strong guidelines and provide clear briefs ; ensure the information that matters most is at the front of each paper - and that papers are explicit about their ‘ ask ’; provide digital frameworks or templates to help them focus on what matters most .
Make the meeting as realtime as possible
In a fast-moving world , and particularly on some agenda topics , days and hours matter and the meeting always need to see and hear the latest facts , figures , and informed speculation . The ability to ensure only the latest information and agenda are in front of the member is key .
Ensure that you tread a fine balance between getting papers in early - but not so early that they are out of date ( we suggest 5 days ); ensure ‘ late ’ papers get into the hands of the directors instantly ; when agendas change , ensure everyone is notified immediately ( a good portal will help you automate this process ); equally , ensure any corrections that emerge as a result of questions , clarifications , and challenges are automatically notified to the members ( and crucially , that annotations are not lost when papers are updated ).
During The Meeting
Make it real . Ensure that your virtual meetings are face to face - It ’ s still true that body language represents more than
50 % of effective communication . That ’ s even more important in a virtual setting where visual cues will tell you whether the meeting is going to plan and who may have a contribution to make . A virtual face to face also ensures that the meeting is something that must be actively attended too .
Always provide an audio dial-in option as a backup - Video conferencing can work very well , but it relies on a strong internet connection that may not always be available . Make sure that the videofirst meeting is the new norm but account for people who might need the option to participate via audio .
Know when to quit - Ask them to be there 15 minutes before discussions start and limit attempts to connect via video to no more than 5 minutes after the time the meeting should have started . At that point ask the struggling individuals to audio-dial in . It ’ ll keep frustrations to a minimum and keep precious time focused on agenda matters .
Ensure all get heard
Whilst you may not chair the meeting , you may well be the person to educate the Chair in the new etiquette of leading a virtual meetings . Here are some tips and hints : Even with video , visual cues of dissent or disagreement may still be missed , so contribution must be solicited rather than assumed . A more collegiate style of chairing is best for virtual meetings . One suggestion on each issue is to go ‘ round ’ the table ensuring all have said what they need to .
Use the shared annotations in the pack that were made in the lead-up to the meeting to ensure the chair knows to invite someone to share their question ,
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