TMA World: A Guide to Leading Virtual Meetings

Leading Virtual Meetings
Increase productivity with successful meetings

© Transnational Management Associates Ltd. All Rights Reserved.
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Virtual meetings can become difficult due to feelings of isolation,
fragmentation and confusion caused by physical and sometimes
cultural distance.

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To counter this, a sense of engagement, cohesion and clarity must be
created between the individuals attending the meeting.

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1
Planning
2 Leading
3 Following up
4 Improving
An effective virtual meeting is a process, not an event, with
four key stages:

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An agenda is crucial, as it sets
expectations, creates structure and
ensures clarity.
The agenda should be up and available
throughout the meeting.
1 Planning
Understanding the objectives
of a meeting is crucial to its
success e.g. sharing
information, decision making,
evaluating options and
generating ideas.
Objectives

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Any documents that will be referred to
during the meeting should be circulated in
advance, to allow time for necessary
reading and printing, each participant
should have these to hand during the
meeting.
1 Planning
generating ideas.
Objectives

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Different tools can be used within a virtual
meeting to help achieve different
objectives, for instance an online chat
function can be used to share insights,
give opinions and provide feedback,
polling can be used to facilitate decision
making and test knowledge, whereas
screen sharing can provide a common
reference point.
1 Planning
generating ideas.
Objectives

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Tool choices should be kept as simple as
possible and new technology should only
be introduced when absolutely necessary.
1 Planning
generating ideas.
Objectives

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Planning (continued)
Roles and Responsibilities
Pre-assign roles and rotate them regularly. Suggested roles include:
Leader Facilitator
Knowledge
Manager
Gatekeeper Technologist
Sets direction
and
consolidates
content,
draws
conclusions
Ensures
everyone has
an equal
opportunity to
speak
Keeps notes
and
distributes
them
afterwards
Opens the
way to those
that haven’t
participated
much
Ensures
everything is
working
correctly and
that all have
access

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Such behaviors include:
 Acknowledging people’s contributions
 Asking open questions
 Asking for different points of view
 Asking for more and probing
comments and questions
 Paraphrasing to check everyone’s
understanding
 Chunking information for the virtual
world
 Using supportive language
2 Leading
Facilitating effective
communication requires a
complex set of behaviours,
skills and techniques that
accommodate different styles
Facilitation

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Virtual meetings should be much more of
a conversation, with questions asked
throughout – you must be flexible in how
you respond.
In a typical face to face meeting, an
agenda item generates discussion, in a
virtual meeting an agenda item should
generate a discussion, questions and
comments.
2 Leading
Facilitation

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Participation can be created by engaging
in discussion, rather than giving a
monologue or presentation.
Giving others keyboard and mouse control
within the meeting, posing questions,
encouraging people to raise their hands
and speak out and using video can all also
impact the level of interaction within a
meeting.
2 Leading
Facilitation

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Leading (Continued)
Other suggestions for encouraging individuals to effectively
participate in a meeting include:
 Directly communicating with participants before the meeting, to
confirm their attendance, explain the objectives and offer to answer
any questions
 Ensuring attendees care about the meeting by having an investment
in the outcomes/goals

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Leading (Continued)
Other suggestions for encouraging individuals to effectively
participate in a meeting include:
 Ensuring agenda items are essential: asking if there is an easier way
for each one. Ensure everyone is on board with each agenda point
 Create a ‘backchannel’ – whether telecom or virtual tech – for team
members to engage in communication to the facilitator and respond
in a timely fashion.

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Follow up actions should include:
 Meeting minutes that depend on the
nature of the meeting/meeting item.
These could be a set of summary
bullets, a series of actions or a link to
materials
 Ensuring meeting declines can
understand all important outcomes from
meeting minutes
 Ensuring actions, who is responsible
and deadlines are explicit
3 Following up
Efficiently following up the
meeting will help to ensure
that the objectives of the
communication are met
Actions

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Follow up actions should include:
 Ensuring your ground rules cover follow
up process: communicating, updating,
document sharing
 Making all things accessible for others
to see
 Creating a flow outside of the meeting:
follow up, ‘nudge’ interest from other
participants
3 Following up
Efficiently following up the
meeting will help to ensure
that the objectives of the
communication are met
Actions

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 Assessing what you feel went well and
what you would do differently
 Asking participants what went well and
what they would like in/from future
meetings
 Creating a list of ‘new ideas’ and remove
ideas that don’t work
4 Improving
Ensure the process for your virtual
meetings continuously improve by:

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 Adding ‘occasional’ items to add interest
and variety
 Speaking to others about what they do
in their virtual meetings
 Looking to improve and continue the
conversations outside of the meeting
itself
4 Improving
Ensure the process for your virtual
meetings continuously improve by:

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Webinar Twitter Blog Viewpoints
and articles
Publications Written by Terence Brake, Director of Learning
& Innovation at TMA World.
Our new Borderless Working e-book series
About Us
Visit
www.tmaworld.com/insights
to discover the latest thinking
from our experts on global,
collaborative, cross-cultural
and virtual working. There
you’ll find links to our:

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Above all we’d like to hear from you
directly, so please don’t hesitate to send
any comments, questions or feedback
to us at: enquiries@tmaworld.com
Or visit our website:
www.tmaworld.com
About Us
Visit
www.tmaworld.com/insights
to discover the latest
thinking from our experts
on global, collaborative,
cross-cultural and virtual
working.

TMA World: A Guide to Leading Virtual Meetings

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