This year has seen a huge increase in remote working and has challenged many companies to find new ways of doing things. We have all spent an hour of our time in a meeting (that could have been an email) at some stage in our career, but how can you avoid that happening again in the future? We share our experiences of running successful and productive meetings while working remotely and the importance of speaking up if things aren’t working.
Are you using the right tools for your updates? You can slip into the pattern of waiting to update someone on how things are going when you know a meeting is coming up. An online tool like Trello or Basecamp might allow you and your team to create a seamless system for posting updates. Using an asynchronous format for updates instead of taking up a lot of time giving updates means meetings can be used for strategy.
If you are running the meeting, make sure it has an agenda. Give all the attendees time to look over the agenda in advance. This helps to ensure everyone has a chance to think about the meeting topic and can bring their collective thoughts to the table.
Meetings should always have a next step, whether that be writing up notes, allocating tasks or communicating the findings of the meeting with the wider company.
Speak up if your time could be better used elsewhere. Was your attendance at the meeting really necessary? Was the project relevant and your input useful? Maybe an email would be just as efficient next time.
01.30 – Check in
06.50 – How to run a successful meeting, remotely
17.20 – What constitutes a productive meeting?
20.05 – The importance of speaking up
21.56 – Tips on collaborating
