There are right ways and wrong ways to run a meeting that has virtual participants and yesterday I had the privilege of seeing it done right!

Yesterday I went to an all-day face-to-face meeting with a team in my organization. There were about 15 people attending in person and 3 attending by phone. Usually when I attend these kinds of meetings, the people on the phone are on their own. Sure, there’s a polycom speaker and the presenter is sharing his/her screen so the virtual attendees can see the slides. But that’s it. No attention is paid to whether the attendees can here the whole conversation - especially when people in the back of the room, furthest from the mic, are speaking. There is no concern over whether the virtual attendees can hear, can keep up, or can even tell who is speaking.

But this was quite different. Tony, the person leading the meeting and doing most of the presentation, really cared about the folks on the phone. He constantly asked them if they could hear. When someone who wasn’t near the mic was talking he’d either hand them the polycom or, if they were too far, he’d quickly summarize what they said when they finished – speaking quietly into the phone. He also took copious notes on his computer, while sharing his screen – summarizing what each person said.

But it wasn’t all just what Tony did. Apparently the whole team had a culture of taking care of their virtual team members. Someone had brought a small webcam and either she or someone near her always made sure the web cam was pointing at the current speaker, turning the webcam, balancing it on a Kleenex box or water bottle to get it up high enough if need be. They made sure if someone got up and wrote on the whiteboard, that the webcam took that in too.

The whole effort of the team was quite amazing. This is a team I haven’t interacted with very much before, so I don’t know if this was just a fluke – perhaps driven by Tony who seemed to make the most effort. Or perhaps this is how the team always behaves. But regardless, I was very impressed.

So if you’re a telecommuter or remote worker who can’t make it into the office for face-to-face meetings because you live too far away, consider yourself very lucky if you work in a team like this one. If your team is not quite so conscientious, perhaps you can recruit a few friends to take this approach for you and see if they can spread the attitude to the rest of the team.

Most importantly, when you are attending a meeting in person and there are other virtual attendees, make it your business (as much as you can) to be the Tony in the room and take care of those virtual attendees!

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