Blueprint | 03 Hosting Remote Meetings

B L U E P R I N T HOSTING REMOTE MEETINGS In this session, you will learn: 1. How to be as professional in an online setting as you are in person. This starts with how you prepare for the meeting, but just as important some things you do in the beginning, middle, and end during the meeting. 2. Engagement - There are techniques that work especially well for online meetings with groups of people. 3. How to keep the call on track by sticking to the agenda. HOW TO STRUCTURE A PERFECT REMOTE MEETING Running a great online meeting is all about controlling the meeting. In the last session, we talked about the prep that goes into a video call, now we’ll talk about what happens from when the first person joins all the way until the end. The first couple of minutes can be awkward when waiting for everyone to join and making small talk. No matter what you’re talking about, do it with positive energy that makes people comfortable and sets the tone for the call. Do not suggest sitting in silence until everyone joins giving people the opportunity to disengage. Timeline of the conversation Introduction The first couple of minutes can be awkward when waiting for everyone to join and making small talk. No matter what you’re talking about, do it with positive energy that makes people comfortable and sets the tone for the call. Do not suggest sitting in silence until everyone joins giving people the opportunity to disengage. ACE Once everyone joins, the next A ppreciate - “I appreciate you taking the step is to ACE the meeting. This time to join this call” is the transition from small talk C onfirm end time - “We’re scheduled for 30 to the meeting. minutes. Does that time still work for you?” E nd goal - “At the end of today's call, if we can address your needs, we typically move forward with a proposal. Does that sound fair?” Agenda Review the agenda of the call to Our agenda today is: 1. First, I’d like to hear about some of make sure everyone is getting the things you’re working on and your the impact they expect from the executive priorities call. The agenda should be 2. Then, I’ll share how we work with about 3 bullet points. similar clients like you 3. Then, we’ll set up next steps What else would you like to cover today? (If they answer this question, you now know what their number one priority is)

B L U E P R I N T HOSTING REMOTE MEETINGS Summarize Discuss what was talked about during the last meeting so everyone is on the same page for the rest of the call. Connect the At the end of the call, Ask “We agreed that the end goal of this Wagons make sure the end goal you meeting was to accomplish understanding went over at the beginning of what your requirements are and seeing if it’s the call was achieved. If they a good fit to move forward. Did we achieve say no, then you have about 5 that today? minutes to handle it. If they say yes, you can move on with the next steps. HOW TO ENGAGE AN ONLINE AUDIENCE Let’s talk about how to engage everyone on a call of more than 5 people, and assume everyone has their own camera and you can clearly see each person’s face. The first thing to do is to make sure you know everyone’s name by turning on the setting that puts the name next to each person’s face. A best practice of how to ask questions to an entire group vs individuals is The risk of asking questions to the entire group is something called the tragedy of the commons. Everyone expects someone else to answer and now you’ve lost momentum. You can avoid the tragedy of the commons by calling someone out, “Sari, this next question is for you…” and then add context so even if she wasn’t paying attention you are setting her up for success, “We were talking about xyz” … then, ask the question. This technique is powerful for audience management, so make sure everyone is engaged by rotating throughout the entire group. Also important when you’re on video is to smile. People will naturally mirror each other’s behavior so spread the positivity! HOW TO INTERRUPT DURING ONLINE MEETINGS Keeping your agenda on track is tough. Time management when you’re running online meetings is challenging. There are techniques to keep an online meeting on track. First, roughly timestamp how long each section should last, and give yourself wiggle room. The opening of the call, including context and stating the prepared agenda should take about 5 minutes. If you sound like you’re doing it your way you may come off as a pushy salesperson or someone that just cares about themselves.

B L U E P R I N T HOSTING REMOTE MEETINGS Polite interruption - How do you politely interrupt someone if they’re going on and on and on? The value that you bring to the table doesn’t have to be from you talking. Simply facilitating the conversation and making sure it stays on track is enough. Sometimes the conversation can start off on track but then tangent or get into the weeds. Mirror a word the person that you’re trying to interrupt said. Find something they said and use that to guide the conversation back to center. For example, if you’re asking questions in a meeting, 2 close-ended situational questions followed by open-ended pain questions, the person might tangent or go long on the open-ended questions. “We have a lot to cover today, and I know this topic will start a conversation. I might interrupt to make sure we stay on track with time. Does that sound fair?” TOP MISTAKES OF AN ONLINE MEETING X Be careful of making the meeting too rigid by just reading from a PowerPoint slide or being the only person to talk the whole time. X Avoid letting your audience become distracted. This can happen when not being prepared and your tech fails during the meeting. The time it takes to fix will derail and lose momentum. X Make sure to involve everyone, keeping feedback or redirection as positive as possible.