Best Practices for Virtual Meetings


Planning

  • Establish your purpose or goal.
  • Identify your target audience.
  • Determine how many attendees there should be for optimal efficiency.
  • Create an agenda and plan on sticking to it.
  • Consider if you’d like to record the meeting. Click here to learn more about recording your event. 
  • Decide on the length and plan on ending on time!

Inviting Attendees

  • If your meeting involves important visual materials, encourage attendees to participate via computer versus phone.

  • If the majority of attendees plan on participating by phone, make materials available in advance of the meeting via email, Microsoft Teams or other document-sharing sites.

Conducting

  • Designate a leader/moderator who will communicate procedures, introduce each topic of discussion and stick to the agenda.
     
  • Post a slide with an agenda a few minutes before the meeting starts. 
     
  • Communicate Procedures:

          • Remind everyone to mute themselves until they want to speak.
          • Determine how attendees will participate. Will they have to raise a virtual hand, submit questions via chat or be called upon by the moderator?  This can be pre-determined prior to the meeting or decided by consensus as a group. The moderator or host of the meeting can also send an email the day of the event/meeting reminding the participants of how the meeting will be run.

  • Keep attendees engaged:

          • Encourage attendees to use their video so they are less likely to multi-task and remain engaged. 
          • Designate tasks, such as note-taking, on a rotating basis.  
          • Call on attendees throughout the meeting to ensure broader participation. 
          • Answer questions throughout the course of the meeting to keep people involved. 

Following Up

In a virtual environment, where you can’t always read facial expressions or be assured that all participants are paying attention, follow-up is very important. Send a meeting recap, and when appropriate, slides, handouts and links to resources that may have been shared in chats. If there are specific calls-to-action or assignments, list those to avoid confusion.