Our Staff meeting

Every other week, we have our staff meeting, but being a highly distributed team, this happens over the phone. Occasionally we complement the call with the use of a "virtual meeting room" in which we can share documents and presentation material. As we know each other quite well, we actually achieve a lot of work during those calls. We update each other on what we have done and are doing, we agree on the way forward and come up to consensus. But this is only achieved because we have an operations manager who is very good at moderating the meeting.

Indeed, the issue of teleconferences is that people do not see each other. In the photo above, the drummers need to see the leader to follow the pace. This is actually a very good analogy. The moderator gives every person on the call a prompt when the person can talk. We go around the room several times during the call. If you do not do that, the most vocal ones (and we have a number) are the ones who take control, and the others do not get their say. Putting discipline in the meeting is mandatory to make it smooth and productive.

Now, let's be honest, we still have some control taking going on, occasionally. One of the people in the team has the tendency to use a hands-free phone, one of those with a mike and a speaker. Now, one thing to know, is that, in most of those phones, the speaker is disabled when the mike picks up sound. So, when he starts speaking, he cannot hear what the others are saying. So, he speaks, and the only thing the others can do is wait till he has finished. This is frustrating, and often results in the fact people are not listening. So, one of my key learning: never use a hands-free phone, our chances are you do not get your point across.