West Of Boston Legislators Want Continued Remote Access To Government

Especially now, you might need to increase your individual meeting cadence to ensure everyone is okay and feels included. It’s your job as a leader to ensure everyone gets heard and dominant voices don’t overshadow the introverts on your team. This is just like in-person meetings, but this situation can be exacerbated on remote working channels.

Those informal conversations and connections help build a rapport that carries over into meetings, making people feel more engaged and perhaps more comfortable voicing their opinions or offering critical feedback. One study found that workers who shared a funny or embarrassing story about themselves with their team produced 26% more ideas in brainstorming sessions than workers who didn’t. And the benefits of having a best friend at work have also been well documented. Even in a virtual setting, you want to present a professional image to your other team members. While you generally have the freedom to wear what you want when working remotely, a meeting is a slightly more formal situation. You should ensure that you are properly dressed for all virtual meetings.

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They cannot rely on casual encounters or lunch in the cafeteria to cement new relationships. Pay special attention to anyone who is new to the team and is suddenly working remotely. You might need to have more meetings with new workers or set up meetings between them and teammates proactively. If you’re thinking, “Yes, but this has always been true,” you’re right. But as noted above, working remotely tends to expose in-person practices that are already problematic. If there is one thing you should do right now, it’s to examine your meeting culture, and your assumptions about what good looks like.

Ensure that your meetings are inclusive, effective, and well-run to reduce frustration and build team camaraderie during challenging times. When possible, avoid interrupting others as they are speaking. Many online meeting systems have a voice-activated switching feature to automatically move the camera to the active speaker. Interrupting another speaker may confuse the voice activation. Setting a clear meeting agenda and guidelines will help ensure that everyone is on the same page before the digital meeting takes place.

The agenda acts as a guide to ensure you discuss all points in order and in a reasonable amount of time. It also makes sure you don’t accidentally leave out important points. You should share the agenda with all attendees before the meeting so that they can adequately prepare; this ensures better participation. remote meeting Remote meetings have the potential for public officials to “stifle public conversation, to limit public comment, and to really restrict the ways in which the public can engage with them online,” he said. Remote work can be difficult, and remote work during a pandemic has its own set of needs.

Include Introverts During Remote Meetings

Advocates and legislators seem to agree that virtual access has improved equity and access, especially for those who had barriers in the way. “Where we were initially worried about how government would continue to function and how we could maintain the same level of transparency and access, the virtual and remote participation was a huge win,” Foster said. Remote access to all levels of public government bodies was “a huge success” that “removed long-standing barriers” and resulted in an “increase in public participation,” said Geoff Foster, executive director of Common Cause Massachusetts. If you’re geographically distributed around the globe, the chances are that different teammates are experiencing different circumstances, some in total lockdown, others emerging from it and still others yet to experience COVID-19 directly. Given the current state of the world, many meetings will begin with everyone touching base about what’s going on. But be aware of the fatigue that can create in certain geographies.

If you notice that someone on the team is trying to contribute but getting overshadowed by more extroverted team members, carve out time for them to speak . Some team members may still be reticent to pipe up during a digital meeting. Take the time to schedule a one-on-one to get that person’s insights on how you can make remote meetings a more inclusive space for them. Even better, create a communal space or document online where people can add their thoughts, insights, and suggestions following the meeting.

Establish an understanding among participants of when and how to interrupt. For example, have people raise hands or otherwise signal that they want to speak. When videoconferencing with many sites, start your comment or question by stating your name. If remotely joining via low-bandwidth or slower internet connection, it may be necessary to disable video in order to improve audio reliability. Once all attendees are present, take a minute to conduct an audio check.

• Any light-hearted way to start the meeting can help set the tone of exchange and feedback that you want.
• Even though “remote access has been a game changer and attendance has increased,” in-person access allows another level of accountability that can’t always be achieved remotely,” said Silverman.
• Since it can be hard to participate and take notes at the same time, make it a team effort and have people that are not talking in the meeting, at any given time, help take notes.
• Setting a clear meeting agenda and guidelines will help ensure that everyone is on the same page before the digital meeting takes place.
• However, trying to multitask distracts you from the meeting, and you might miss crucial points.

Take it for a spin by yourself, or add a few other https://globalcloudteam.com/ people to see if it works for your team.

Keeping Remote Team Members Engaged During Online Meetings

Research says that 55% of communication is body language, while another 38% is tone of voice—all of which is necessary to creating a communal atmosphere during a digital meeting. It’s irritating to hear noises from non-speaking participants while the current speaker is making valuable points. Some participants may find it challenging to maintain a completely quiet environment during virtual meetings, so muting your microphone when not speaking is good etiquette. This ensures that background noises such as kids playing in the yard or passing cars won’t distract other participants. So use team meetings to cement relationships, get people talking and provide a space for all-way communication, especially during a time of crisis. But in addition, decide as a team that you are going to disagree, talk about the elephant in the room, make tough decisions and keep moving forward through this crisis.

However, virtual access to state government may not be going away as soon as the Open Meeting Law addendum ends. Senate President Karen Spilka, D-Ashland, Rep. Jack Lewis, D-Framingham, and Hogan each expressed support for continuing virtual access to the Legislature to some extent. Large groups of Massachusetts residents, such as those with disabilities, those who are family caregivers or those without access to a working vehicle, have difficulties physically getting to government meetings, especially those at the State House. In terms of government access during the pandemic, “the only thing that has improved was that things went virtual.

Individual Meetings

If you follow these and other common sense rules, your meetings will be well-run and effective. To host an effective virtual meeting, it is important to have a set of ground rules for all participants. When everyone knows what to expect from a meeting, they can be more productive and courteous, communicate more effectively, and avoid distractions. If the team isn’t used to speaking up, try changing your approach. For example, encourage people to use the chat function to ask questions or rotate who leads the meeting. Use humor and informality to get people talking, but just like in-person meetings, don’t force anyone to speak or put anyone on the spot.

If the room is too dark or there’s too much ambient noise, you might miss important parts of the discussion and you won’t be able to participate effectively. Choose your location wisely and test the lighting, noise levels, and background visuals before you sign in. During the meeting, one of the discussions may lead to an off-topic discussion.

A great approach is to use a shared document, like a Google doc, and use it for both the agenda and for taking meeting notes. Since it can be hard to participate and take notes at the same time, make it a team effort and have people that are not talking in the meeting, at any given time, help take notes. Additionally, once you know the agenda, you can prepare your speaking materials to match that agenda , jotting down questions you need clarified. If you join the meeting without seeming to know what it’s about or why you’re there, you can give other attendees a bad impression and make them feel that you’re wasting their time. Without an agenda listing essential points to be discussed, your team might veer away from the meeting’s objective.

Stop the “invite everyone just in case” mentality and invite only those willing to work on a specific task and use the meeting time to get something done. So take the tips below and expect to personalize and change them according to what you and your team need. One size definitely does not fit all in remote work environments.

Prior to that, there were always these roadblocks that were put up so the public couldn’t weigh in,” said Paul Craney, spokesperson of Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance. Depending on the culture at your place of work, you might need to set some rules about video and what people should wear. Eliminate “admire the problem” meetings where everyone gets together to talk about the problem but not do anything productive. This looks something like a meeting where you state the problem, comment about why it’s a problem, lament the fact that it is a problem and move on to the next problem. A good rule of thumb is that if the in-person meeting is terrible, the remote version of the same will be exponentially more so.

Work Effectively With Online Meeting Technology

However, trying to multitask distracts you from the meeting, and you might miss crucial points. That distraction also prevents you from contributing meaningfully to the meeting. If you are participating in a meeting, request an agenda if the meeting host invites you without one. It confirms that you should be part of this meeting in addition to helping you prepare for it.

Empathy And Emoji: How Mandy Ansari Became Everyones Virtual Bff

Arrive early to allow time to troubleshoot and resolve any potential issues with equipment. If your presentation is visually dense or contains video, consider distributing it to participants in advance. By submitting this newsletter request, I consent to Slack US sending me marketing communication via email. Use Status Hero for 21 days with no obligation, payment, or credit card required.

It’s important to keep everyone engaged during remote meetings, including the team members who might not be the most vocal or outspoken. You may disagree with someone but you shouldn’t interrupt while they’re speaking or try to talk over them. The proper meeting etiquette is to allow the participant to finish making their points before you speak.

Successfully running a digital meeting can feel overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. When you follow this step-by-step guide, it doesn’t matter if you’re working with a team of two or a team of 10, whether team members are five miles away or 5,000— you’ll have everything you need to confidently run a productive remote meeting. A digital watercooler can be a specific place or a set of shared traditions (like daily video check-ins or a weekly digital happy hour). As long as it connects your team and familiarizes them with one another before meetings happen, it will help lay the foundation for successful online meetings. All the points we’ve covered—from scheduling to setting an agenda to practicing proper etiquette—are important in getting a digital meeting up and running.

Otherwise, the other attendees may not be able to fully focus on what either of you is saying. Also, if you’re quick to interrupt, you might not be fully listening to the other speaker and may miss part of what they say. Use these 7 ground rules to keep your virtual meetings efficient and productive. Make sure you have meetings with each of your team members often. Some people find more than once every two weeks is invasive and unnecessary, and others need multiple calls per week.

Making a quick round of introductions is an effective way to do this. Introductions break the ice and ensure that everyone can hear each other properly. Normally, the settings used in a traditional work environment are adequate. Ensure all meeting participants have the meeting invitation link and materials in advance of the meeting.

But those are all moot if the team isn’t engaged when it comes time for the actual meeting. The tools that are most effective for a one-on-one digital chat aren’t necessarily the same tools as those that are most effective for running a meeting with 20 remote workers spread across different time zones. Make sure the meeting software you choose can accommodate a large number of attendees without going haywire. And although every team is different, they all benefit from an online meeting tool that has both video and audio functionality at the very least.

“As a facilitator, your job is to not only bring everyone up and empower them but also to create a space of safety for those individuals who maybe aren’t as comfortable vocalizing themselves,” says Galindo. Giving everyone a job allows them to take an active role in the meeting and makes them feel like part of the action, instead of forcing people to be passive listeners—which, we can all attest, is boring and tedious. If the job is too complex, your team may spend more time trying to figure out what to do than actually participating in the meeting. If there are a lot of people attending a meeting, it can be hard to keep tabs on who’s who.

A good rule of thumb is to make the team meeting 50/50, whereby the leader of the meeting talks for no more than 50% of the time , and the other 50% is reserved for collaboration, conversation and discussion by your people. Run more effective, more efficient team and individual remote meetings and keep your team better connected. A comprehensive hybrid and virtual meeting guide provides even more tips for a productive and enjoyable online meeting experience.