How to run an online meeting for your team

Our business is a professional services firm that’s had the right technology in place to work remote from day one but the main lesson we've learned is setting up the cloud-based, remote working infrastructure is the easy part.

As we’ve slowly increased our part and full-time remote options for team members it’s been the process around connecting and collaborating that requires constant work.

Running an efficient and productive online meeting is the critical skill to bring team work into remote work.

The risk of getting this wrong certainly has an impact on the company, but we’ve seen the biggest impact falling on individuals.

Disconnected team members become less motived and received fewer opportunities to do interesting and innovative work.

At best, disconnected team members can repeatedly execute well on work they already know but the innovation and collaboration suffer.

Here is how we’ve learnt to structure our catchup and tactical meetings using a mix of the Scrum and Holacracy methodologies with our own tweaks, it’s not the panacea to challenges of remote working but it’s a necessary foundation.

Working Remote

When working remote you need to put more effort and structure into coordinating teamwork, and ensuring team members can ask for help and get the support they need.

By not being in the same physical space you won’t be able to just walk over and ask for help, or see that someone is struggling and needs a hand.

Bear in mind you will have a spread of personalities in any business, some who are quick to put up their hand for help and some who won’t but losing the direct human connection does not mean it’s not possible to stay connected.

it does mean that you need to build in some formal communication time and process to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to voice how they are doing.

Regular Catchups

Regular catchups, with a good meeting structure, go a long way to ensuring that all team members have the opportunity to:

• check-in on how they are doing
• share their work updates
• raise any key roadblocks they need help on
• work out the issues with the relevant team member’s support

The format and process is as important as the time you set aside, particularly when it’s 4 or more people and the basic senses of knowing who needs to talk and when are not as accessible over online channels.

The Tech & Process

For operational catchups, we broadly use the Holacracy tactical meeting format. We initially followed the Scrum stand-up format but found this went further with better guidelines on raising and solving agenda items.

We use this in conjunction with our task management software, Asana. This is the essential collaborative to-do list.

You can insert [your project management solution] wherever we mention Asana below, but make sure you are using something to track every team task that requires collaboration, who’s responsible and by when. Message me and I’ll share our meeting format template.

Meeting schedule

Schedule: Twice a week, Monday and Friday, for 30 minutes is what we use.

This is directly applicable to a 4–8 person team. You may need slightly longer as you’re getting used to the format, or with a bigger team. You may also remove a meeting (only have 1 a week) or hold more depending on the volume of items raised. Don’t have meetings for the sake of it, but weekly catchups are a minimum for operational teams.

The first meeting of the week is usually more about tasks and team member support co-ordination.

The second meeting is often more orientated around task progress but both should stick to the same meeting format below.

Meeting roles: A facilitator is needed to run the meeting, and make any notes or create tasks that arise from agenda items. They should study the Holacracy tactical meeting format if they want a guide to facilitation.

Everyone else just represents their role/s by raising updates and agenda items to discuss, and providing support for other team members where their role can help.

Meeting format

Follow this closely, or develop your own version, but always follow the same flow to ensure all team members know how to, and can, contribute.

Our Asana template — have this up on a screen for the meeting

Welcome
After the initial hello’s, quick greetings, and once everyone is on the call the facilitator welcomes everyone to the meeting, notes apologies of those who couldn’t make it, and confirms the time allocated for the meeting.

They can also check if anyone needs to leave early, and note that so everyone is aware and can priorities agenda items accordingly.

Opening round (1-way)
The opening check-in round is a 1-way flow where the facilitator goes around the room and asks each individual for a check-in.

Only that individual speaks, without any discussion. It’s a screen down, phones away time.

Nothing is formally required beyond a ‘hello’, but it’s an opportunity for each team member to share how they are doing, what’s on the mind and to get present for the meeting.

It’s not discussion time, no sympathy or praise required, just a few moments to let your team know hour your day or weekend went prior to you arriving at the meeting. This initial human connection gives the team context for your overall mood and helps you get ready to make the most out of your collaborative meeting time.

Some teams do 30 seconds of silence as well prior to this round, to help get present.

Checklist review (no discussion)
The facilitator asks everyone to review their tasks in Asana, and make sure there is ‘no task left behind.’ The team has about 60–120 seconds to do this.

The aim here is to:

- Tick off any tasks you have already completed
- Delete any tasks that were created but not actually relevant anymore
- Adjust the due date of any overdue tasks, bringing them into the present (yesterday’s gone…yesterdays gone)

If you don’t run a process like this then it’s easy for tasks to build up and slip behind. We all hold each other accountable to make sure we use our Asana tasks as a guide to planning our day and week.

Everyone says ‘no task left behind’ once they are up to date and the facilitator ticks off this round

Agenda building (1–2 word agenda items)
The facilitator will ask the team to raise any agenda items they have, with 1–2 words only for each item. At this stage, we are only noting down the 1–2 word items, no discussions around them.

The team member also needs to specify whether the item is an ‘Update’ or a ‘To Discuss’, and how much time they need (2, 5 or 10 mins).

The difference between these two types of items is important:

- ‘Update’: This is a 1-way communication flow from the team member on something that has changed since the last meeting that they feel the team should be updated on.

- ‘To Discuss’: This is a 2-way communication flow where the team member specifically asks for input they need from the team, either information or a decision.

Once all team members have supplied their agenda items to the facilitator, the facilitator checks the agenda items and expected time required against the remaining meeting time. If there is a substantial misalignment between the time remaining and expected time, team members can offer to de-prioritise their items (move them to the bottom) or reduce time.

Agenda — Updates and Discussion points

Here the facilitator moves down the list of agenda items.

Updates come first. These are one-way flows of something that has changed on a project or task since the last meeting that is relevant to the team.

A one way Update flow gives the space for a team member to talk, without any side questions or distractions.

It’s a very powerful way of sharing a relevant change, knowing you have the space to talk but will receive no feedback.

Any questions people want to raise on an Update need to be added by the facilitator as a Discussion agenda item (1–2 words, person raising it and expected time needed)

It’s important not to allow conversational diversions in the Updates round, and to allow the person who has a question to clearly define it per the Discussion agenda items framework below.

Discussion items follow the Updates.

For each Discussion agenda item the facilitator will call out the 1–2 word item name, the name of the person who raised it, the time they allocated and the the question “what do you need?”

The team member then explains explicitly what they need from the team.

This ‘need’ is important to articulate before diving off into context and background. Let your team know specifically what you want from them so they can process the contextual information accordingly.

Examples are:

“I need to know if we have chosen the supplier for our new materials, so I can place the order for my project”

“I need to know if we can move Wednesdays working session as I have a family member visiting from outside town that day”

By being precise about what you need the relevant team member/s can offer the information you need or help with a decision for your issue.

The aim is not to do specific work in the meeting but rather to co-ordinate information and support. Share the needed info, make the decision, book a working session to resolve something deeper.

Common outputs from an agenda item are:

• Creating or moving a meeting with team members to get the support work
• Need: “I need some technical help on the website project, can we put in a 30-minute session to work on that project together? Team member/s response: Yes, let’s do Wednesday @14:30”
• A specific task for another team member to complete
• Need: “I need more materials for project X, can you order them and let me know when they arrive? Team member/s response: I’ve added a task to order them and will let you know once received”
• Noted information that allows the team member to continue their work
• Need: “I need to know if we have that new software installed yet before I change the network? Team member/s response: It’s installed, you can continue”

The facilitator has a responsibility to make sure only one agenda item at a time is processed, and if a decision is required it should be clear whom should decide it so the agenda item does not become a consensus discussion but moves swiftly to resolution.

Therefore the person responsible to make the decision must do so or create a task to follow up once done. Similarly, if it’s some form of a vote that can be taken immediately or moved to a separate session if required.

Probably most important is that the agenda item is done when the person who raised it gets what they need.

If someone else has something they need, they can raise their own agenda item.

The facilitator should always have the individual who raised the item in mind and keep checking in with them to see if they got what they needed. Once they have, the item is closed and move on to the next one.

Hopefully, you get through the agenda in the time you have. It takes time to learn how to predict the time needed for an item, and discipline to stick to it.

Usually, you will raise an agenda list with the overall time in mind, self prioritising your issues, and graciously rolling over the less essential to next time or to private communication with the people involved.

Closing round (1-way)

With the agenda done, it’s time for another screen down round, for each person’s reflection on the meeting.

Nothing is formally required beyond ‘goodbye’, but it’s an opportunity to share your overall thoughts on the meeting.

These can be the general feeling (“thanks for the meeting, excited for the projects and week ahead”) as well as constructive insights on how the process served the team today (“we do need to pay attention to the agenda and make sure we stick to time”). Remember, it’s one way only so no discussion

Reflect on your meet

Overall, running a meeting this way creates clarity of expectations of each team member in the catchup, and also helps you see what you’ve accomplished each time.

Well done, and have a good week!