Early in Doug's career, best practices for physical meetings were worked out. What have we learned in the past 5 years?
Dani/Michelle(?): Best practice: turn your video on if at all possible, nice to see a face. Announce who you are as you speak.
Seeing people's reactions helps you understand how you're coming across.
Sridar (zooom): Sometimes accents may be difficult to understand, but seeing faces can help understand. (Note taker's addendum: Also helps for the hard of hearing!) Wants to see everybody's face, not just a screen. How to encourage?
Dani: facilitates a lot of meetings, a best practice is intentionality. Intentional about making a request. Say "if you are able, please turn on your video" out loud, so people know what you want. From Professor Sutton(?): should only do one or the other, not have hybrid. Only live or only remote. Extreme, but something to think about. How do you make that work?
Pauline: When we show up in zoom, with video, you're helping everyone else. Personally, seeing faces, friends and colleagues, is more engaging.
Emily: Lot of hybrid meetings. When you're remote, and the room you're in has background noise, etc. Choose the best room. Does this room support sound well enough? If not, it's very hard for remote people. Good sound helps people be more engaged.
Tori (zoom): Full time remote now. A hybrid meeting, be mindful of people on the call, as they're often forgotten. Check screen often to see how people are engaged. Be mindful of in person noise. Don't open bags of chips on mic!!! If things are shared, make sure that everyone can see.
Sridar (zoom): Getting attention can be difficult for the remote. Share something on the screen even if it's not being discussed so that people who enter late can catch up. Have something valuable on screen. Cross-time-zone teams: Prioritize people who are later time zones (has some offshore in India folks who are finishing their day when everyone else is starting). Outside of work, meetup.com virtual meetings, make sure every expected time zone has an opportunity.
Pauline: Re: having something to share, curious about what tools people have leveraged? Google docs?
Doug: Google Docs, zoom tools less successful? (Smartsheet)?
Sridar: Confluence is used extensively. Doesn't have to be one-on-one chats. Notes. Survives beyond the lifetime of the meeting. (You're welcome -note taker)
Aladrianne (remote): CTL. This summer, implemented a new schedule system for academic coaches. Virtual trainings with mentors. Helpful: quick checklist of all the things needed to do. Reminders. Back to basics. Make sure screen share is available. Correct zoom information? Another thing: Zoom meetings, are virtual participants using engagement tools (poll everywhere, mentimeter etc.), resources that allow remote participants to participate and share ideas.
Pauline reading from chat: Use SMS for projects. Have a screen to share.
Dani: Request Aladrianne share her checklist. Emphasize: Pauline just shared. Roles specified. Note taker, facilitator. We're not missing zoom chats etc. Leader in the room: keep track, call time, etc. Amplify other voices helps collaborate effectively. Lots of odd things happen.
Stanford has access to Zoom's AI feature. Turn it on by default (unless confidential meeting). Invaluable. AI-generated meeting notes, don't expect it to be perfect, but it'll be pretty good. If you have to take notes, you could be distracted. Companion notes can be invaluable for whomever is speaking to go over what they said. Zoom has improved noise cancellation, specifically chip packets, dogs, etc. In the zoom settings under audio, on by default.
Aladrianne's checklist: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oowvFZm3w2u11PAy5E1UbFaGkxDnfbbTlFOkgKkYix0/edit?usp=sharing
Rodney: Use Zoom whiteboards. Also, please enlarge your shared items for older eyes. Can't answer your own polls!
Doug: Normalizing behavior that we're working in a new environment.
Comments about etiquette, zoom backgrounds. A few people have started poor habits, (eating, etc.)
Physical whiteboards are missed
Emily: goes hand in hand with accessibility efforts: Audio, etc.
Dani: Point of normalizing, "norms" are created intentionally about how we want our meetings to be, our meetings will be better. Be the change you want in the world, applies to meetings. If you have good intentions, give yourself permission to try them. Use people's names! Engages them, brings them into the conversation. How much meetings cost? All your salaries times the amount of time. Meetings are expensive! Make them useful, valuable, good places to be, otherwise, why have them?
Outlook calendar app has an add-on to calculate meeting cost (median salary, etc.) 35 people is an expensive meeting. Invite just the right amount of people.
Doug: Have a good agenda, know what people are going to talk about, OK to now show up!
Tori: Noted that many people talking at once in the room was confusing. OK to give ourselves time to adjust. Great to get feedback. If your day is ~90% meetings, how do we keep ourselves fulfilled? Before, had breaks as you moved physically from meeting to meeting, now on zoom, no time to take breaks. Meetings start 10 minutes after, give people time between meetings. Make sure everyone's OK too. 10 after vs. 10 before, gives a bit of buffer before, just in case they have a different meeting that doesn't start 10 after.
Pauline: In addition to breaks, when the opportunity to connect as people, not as "business," can be like a "hallway talk" in "in person" times.
Rodney: Cost of meetings: If 2 out of 5 need to only be in there for a part meeting, don't invite them to the entire meeting.
Sridar: Meetings have a high cost. Remember how easy it was to just "go and talk" to that person in person? Really difficult in a distributed environment. Having a touch point where everyone is together saves frustration.
Dani: Intentionality: Have to be intentional. Huddles as a norm, so you have an opportunity for conversations. When planning meetings: "1 to 1 to 1." 1 hour meeting needs 1 hour prep/planning, 1 hour followup. Did AI (or the note taker) get it all right?
