Meetings with remote teams serve a purpose, but their zone of usefulness is much smaller than we think.
As an operator, I try to minimize the need for meetings in general. Or, more accurately, keep them where they’re most useful.
Here are my best tips to not bog yourself or team down with meetings while improving team-wide communication.
1. Determine if a meeting is even needed.
In my experience, we default to meetings too often.
We use them for questions, brainstorms, announcements, and when we don’t know the best way to solve a problem.
Synchronous meetings are one effective problem-solving tool, but certainly not the only one nor the best under every circumstance. Here are the filters I run through before I call a meeting:
1) What is it that I’m actually asking this person/group for? A surprisingly helpful step that has me thinking about exactly what I’m asking folks to contribute. Often, I’ll realize I can take on some organizational work to make the ask more clear.
2) Are there any non negotiables that we need to be live on a call for? If yes, great, center the call around it and deliver other information beforehand to help them prepare. If no…
3) What’s the best way to deliver this information? If it’s a lot of information, I may do a quick video, organizing the points I want to make beforehand. If I have quick questions that I fear may be missed in a video, I’ll include those in bold in the email or Slack message. I’ll often use a combination, but the decision is often rooted in the answers to these 3 Qs.
2. Make the agenda and prep work super clear.
I used to think these pieces were overkill, but now I realize they’re useful tools when used correctly.
Everybody involved in the meeting should know what’s going to be discussed, what we’re trying to accomplish, and what they can do beforehand to prepare.
It’s less important how this is communicated and more important that it is. Include the agenda itself or a link to the agenda in the invite. Ensure the priorities for the call, agenda items, and prep work are clear.
If the prep work or meeting is outside the norm of the organization or individuals, I also may send a quick written message emphasizing the importance of the prep and call to up the likelihood we’re all coming in on the same page.
3. Recap the purpose and priorities at the start of the meeting.
Everybody likely skimmed the agenda, but it’s helpful to center around our key focuses and outcomes for the meeting before we dive into it.
This can be as simple as recapping each agenda items, and our highest priorities for the call.
4. Make decisions and action items super clear.
Now do the same at the end of the meeting as the final word.
Recap the decisions that were made and next steps that were decided.
Make it clear for your team how they can recap the decisions made if they forget something after the meeting.
I hope you found this useful!
I aim to make these genuinely useful for you and I hope you took away at least one useful nugget. If you’re looking for additional support in building your business thoughtfully, please don’t hesitate to reach out via my contact form, or at alex@alexcartmill.com. If I’m not the best fit for you, I’ll do my best to point you in a better direction.