Back to Normal - Part 5. Where is the meeting?

This is part of a series of posts about "normal", day-to-day life in the pandemic.

• Part One- 23rd March 2020, about wiping clean the blackboard with our weekly schedule on the first day the kids' school was closed in Lockdown.
• Part Two- 27th August 2020, about the return to school at the start of the school year meaning the return to some sort of structure to our daily/weekly routines for the first time in 5 months.
• Part Three - 14th May 2021, in which I talked about my first day back in the office in over a year... (mainly through the lens of my coffee drinking rituals.)
• Part Four - 24th September 2021, in which I talked about being back in a routine of being in the office (2 days a week).

The Great Hybrid Working Experiment

If Spring/Summer 2020 was "the great remote working experiment", I think right now we're in the middle of "the great hybrid working experiment". The first part was last Autumn/Winter, when schools and offices opened up and went "back to normal", and I think we pretty much assumed that the transition to "hybrid working" would be as straightforward as the transition to "remote working."

The thing is, remote working is relatively easy to manage when everyone is in the same boat - we were all stuck at home, all working on our computers, all dealing with whatever else we were dealing with (home schooling and being driven up the wall by your family for some, loneliness and isolation for others - filling your days while furloughed from work for others).

Obviously, emails and 'calls' were going to be the way that we dealt with communication. Obviously we needed to be empathetic about other people's different personal situations. Being physically together wasn't an option (for most of us…), so being virtually together was the default. How to actually go about that seemed more like an exercise in codifying the obvious (eg. Skype isn't working well, our organisation uses Microsoft office, so we'll move to Teams instead. Teams is hard work to set families up with, so we'll use Zoom to talk to the grandparents), rather than thinking things through and making well thought through decisions.

(It has to be noted though - virtually nobody making thought-through decisions in the spring/summer of 2020 would have been thinking that by spring/summer of 2022 it would still be an issue. I remember conversations about how it seemed silly to be spending £10 on a mask that won't get any use after a couple of weeks... Our ability to know exactly what is coming around the corner is still very limitied.)

Interestingly though, "calls" seemed to disappear pretty quickly and get replaced by "meetings"- I think I've only had a handful of voice calls since the pandemic began; every call has been through Teams, usually at a pre-arranged and agreed time, and I've settled into the habit of defaulting to the 'video' answer button. (So, if I have had "voice calls" then I suspect that they have involved the other person realising they are talking 'camera-off' on a video call and switching on their camera.²) So, "Calls" became "Meetings" - which meant we weren't just talking to one another, but 'meeting' in a virtual space. It feels like there's something fundamentally different about someone talking in your ear when you answer the phone, versus agreeing to make the time (and space) for a 'meeting'.

So - we've now got;

• Physical meetings- several people in a room, usually with some sort of "host", with a pre-prepared agenda (or the next best thing - someone has some Powerpoint slides they want to talk over)
• Virtual meetings- several people, usually with some sort of "host"/agenda/Powerpoint, on a video call.
• Scheduled calls - generally fewer people, generally more of a conversation than a "talk"
• Impromptu calls - not necessarily in the diary, and with some people's lives still somewhat upside-down (maybe childcare commitments, maybe other things going on) I think today's etiquette is to agree over text/email before calling someone out of the blue.

"Calls" are relatively easy - you don't generally need to prepare (often, you don't have a chance), camera on or off is kind of optional (although camera off etiquette seems to have turned into promting some sort of apology/excuse for not being "camera on").

"Meetings" seem to have a bit more nuance though.

Where is the meeting?

Meetings where everyone is on a call are just "virtual meetings". The place where the meeting is happening online, and everyone is in their little boxes.³ (Incidentally, I think I'd be inclined to say that this is a better example of what early metaverse behaviour is going to look like than the now-standard references to Snow Crash, Ready Player one, Fortnite, Roblox etc. But thats a whole other topic...)

Meetings where most people are in the room are just "physical meetings" - you might have a few people dialling in (most likely camera-on), but its clear to all involved that the place where the meeting is happening is "in the room". Those who are remotely dialling in (there's an anachronism from about three generations of technology ago) are generally seen as "second-class citizens"; there's often a tendancy to forget that they are even 'present'.

Where it gets more interesting is where you have a few people in a room, but most people (or at least, the key people- eg. clients) are online. I haven't -yet- been in one of these meetings where it feels like "the meeting" is happening in the room; its much more like an online meeting where some of the attendees are having their own side-meeting. Perhaps like when a couple of people are having a conversation in the chat talking about something tangential, while the video/audio conversation continues on its own course.

I don't think this is really "hybrid working" - the idea of hybrid is (surely) taking the best from both worlds, and this is just either/or, virtual or physical.

Who should be in the room?

The thing is, we haven’t really worked out what “roles” in a meeting work best online, and what works best in the room. Like video-calling camera etiquette (and arguably, email etiquette before it), we don't have an established set of rules and training programmes - we just have the experience of being in meetings, watching how others behave (particularly those in more senior positions) and figuring out from that what our own roles should look like. If we get to choose between virtual and physical attendance, then I think we need to have a clear understanding of what our role in the meeting is going to be so we can figure out which works best.

First of all - I think it goes without saying that there is a natural benefit/advantage to being in the room. The chat before and after the meeting, the non-verbal communication, building relationships - not overlooking the basic needs for human contact - are all important. But, depending on your role in the meeting, I don't think being "in the room" is always the best place to be for everyone involved.

If you’re “the audience” (eg. the client, the person being presented to, the person actually making the decisions that the meeting is informing), then I think being in the room works best- “good listening” isn’t something a microphone can do on your behalf.

If you’re the host/chair, then being in the room with “the audience” works best. You need to be in control of where people's attention is directed - mainly the audience.

But what if your role in the meeting is to present, say, 3-5 slides and talk over them (maybe with time allocated for Q&A later on) out of a 40-50 slide deck? Your slides are probably going to be up on the same screen in front of 'the audience' - do you need to be in the room for the whole meeting? Is it going to help the rest of the meeting having you sitting at the table, nibbling at the biscuits, drinking the coffee and trying to be surruptitious about checking emails on your phone under the desk while pretending to pay attention to a speaker who you've already heard in a pre-meeting rehearsal?

Maybe more to the point - is it reasonable to expect someone to plan their whole day (and bear the cost - in terms of both money and time) around being in the building so that they can be in the room for those 10 minutes? Especially if it might actually be better for the meeting to keep the numbers "in the room" down to help facilitate discussion.

Or worse - if the main two people in a meeting are speaking through a video call, does it really help to be in the same room as one of them?

“Hybrid” should mean the best of both worlds- and I don’t think the best of both means being in the room for a meeting that isn’t really happening in that room, just because you happen to be in the building that day. I think its OK to be on a call like that, but not necessarily paying attention- but I don't think our current etiquette has adapted to the fact that virtual and phyical meetings are fundamentally different to one another. "Camera off" while you listen to the call but deal with your email seems to me to be a perfectly reasonable way of managing your time when you have a busy workload.

Types of "Meeting"

All of that is assuming its a standard "meeting" - but there are different types of meetings, and I think different sets of rules apply. In a rough order of least complexity to most;

• Calls- two or more people, generally unscheduled, chatting.
  • Camera off shouldn't be a problem - voice calls worked fine before March 2020.
  • Little organisation needed- if people have 'open' calendars, or a common platform like Teams where you can see a busy/available status, then they are incredibly useful (if people use them properly...)
  • Perhaps worth asking whether email/chat/messenger is a better platform, accounting for different working patterns/time commitments etc. Calls can usually get things done much quicker- although the 'paper trail' of what people have agreed/committed to can be useful.
• Round-table meetings- Someone is the 'chair', but everyone gets an opportunity to speak, ask questions etc.
  • Probably the easiest kind of meeting to deal with, whether virtual, physical or hybrid.
  • Not much organisation needed, other than coordinating an agreed time.
  • "Camera on" doesn't matter as much, if you can speak up and people will listen. But its really up to the 'chair' to make sure that people get that opportunity - easy to manage in a room with non-verbal communication where you might notice someone opening their mouth to speak, but requires a bit more conscious effort for a virtual meeting.
  • As a forty-something, white, bearded male with a space at home with a background I'm relatively comfortable with people I'd be unlikely to invite into my home seeing, I have the privilige of being able to wash my face, throw on a shirt and be 'camera ready'. (Even if I'm wearing scratty old pyjama bottoms and slippers and haven't shaved for days.) If you've got small children or pets running round the house, or don't feel comfortable on camera without make-up, then I acknowledge that 'camera-on' can be a bit more complicated. (But the topic of inclusivity and accessibility is a much bigger one than I think I can properly address here...)
• Presentations- someone is talking, everyone else is listening.
  • I think these work pretty well virtually- accepting that "listening" is more work when you've got all the distractions of the real world and without the social pressure of being seen to be paying attention to the speaker, and 'presenting' is much harder when you can't gauge the engagement of your audience. (I've run a few of these, and they are hard.)
  • Tech considerations: Its worth having two screens - at least. When you're presenting, you want to see the slide you're presenting, any speaker notes, the audience on camera, a chat window - maybe more, depending on what you're presenting. And you want all of them to be visible at a glance. If all you have is one laptop screen, then you're going to have to make compromises.
  • A decent camera (and decent lighting), a good microphone and a good, stable internet connection are table stakes.
  • "Camera on" for the benefit of the presenter is polite. The feeling that you're alone in a room and talking to yourself when you know you've actually got dozens of people watching and listening to you is horrible. (Being on mute is also very important- even if you're quiet, a small cough or the sound of moving in your seat can be very distracting.)
  • Losing the benefits of interactions and feedback from the audience, this raises the question of whether it would be better to have a pre-recorded video (so you can re-record bits that you mess up, edit out fumbles etc. and make it 'better')- which then raises the question - what is the benefit of having it at a fixed time, rather than letting people watch at a time that suits them best?
  • I think there's a kind of stigma attached to recording meetings - although they might make it less comfortable for people to ask questions or raise concerns about looking stupid, they can be a useful thing to be able to refer back to. Perhaps recording the presenter/presentation separately from recording the whole meeting - giving the opportunity for questions or comments 'off the record' that the presenter can pick up on, acknowledge and address at their own discretion - is truly the best of both worlds?
  • Powerpoint slide design for people who might be seeing them on a phone screen, or in a small window on a small laptop/tablet is worth considering. (ie. Less text, larger font size - I think more slides with less content works better than presenting on a big screen in a room.)
• Training sessions- Lots of people in the audience, but maybe unlikely that everyone can be in the room. (How do you deal with training that might be necessary but only available a handful of times a year - that someone might have paid for - with the potential need to self-isolate?)
  • I think practically, that means that these really need to be done virtually - which means the kind of session that you could run 'physically' with a couple of trainers and dozens of trainees now involves more work for the trainers - and ideally, more of them to handle things like breakout rooms, virtual whiteboards etc.
  • Ideally, you want someone running the training and someone else dealing with comms - looking out for virtual 'raised hands', keeping an eye on the chat etc.
  • Strong moderation skills have always been valuable (and probably overlooked) - but they become even more important in this environment.
  • I think ideally, you would still want at least a few "audience" people in the room - but at the very least, you would need to establish that the "meeting" is happening in the room; acknowledging virtual attendees are welcome, but effectively 'second class citizens'. (Akin to the idea of "auditing" a class.)
• Workshops - again, "in the room" is ideal but challenging; what one person in a room can do with a whiteboard and a stack of post-it notes becomes very challenging when they need to be speaking, listening and writing at the same time.
  • The most reliant on having a decent space, and decent technology. Giving a presentation or even running a training session (essentially, a lecture) from your home office with nothing more than a laptop with a webcam is fine. Doing the same for a workshop is just asking for trouble...
  • You need to allow for more time to handle things like 'energiser' exercises, scheduled breaks (so people don't go off to the toilet or make a coffee, only to discover that they missed 5 minutes of the talk but got back just in time for a 10 minute comfort break.)
  • Also, allow for more work in the preparation, management, setting up technology (virtual whiteboards, separate cameras/screens for slides/whiteboards/on-camera audience members etc.)
  • 'Virtual breakout rooms' are incredibly useful- people who will be reluctant to get involved in a conversation with dozens of people tend to be much happier to speak openly in a conversation with 4-6 people.
  • There was a trend a few years ago for conferences having a screen that showed a Twitter feed of the conference hashtag. I think something similar for the 'meeting chat' would be a smart idea- giving people the opportunity to contribute to the session without interrupting the speaker.
  • Again - skilled moderators are essential.

Even if my pessimistic outlook is totally wrong and the pandemic is, for all intents and purposes, over in the UK (and I'd love to think that the next of these posts will be about things being 'back to normal' without an ironic slant), then I think how we deal with the new and increasingly embedded routines of flexible/remote working is going to be an ongoing discussion for months to come. Or at least, it probably should be.

1. Technically "in the Microsoft Teams meeting", but it doesn't really have the same… ring. ↩

2. Which seems to have become standard etiquette for most people - one of those unwritten rules that seems to establish itself. At least, I don't think anyone got training on the rules and etiquette of video calls. ↩

3. That link is to a video by my wonderful wife, which is soon going to be in the British Library as an example of creativity during lockdown. (I am very proud.) ↩