7 Steps to Global Virtual Conference Calls

When you set up your meetings, there is a standard structure that your virtual team should follow.  If you establish it and follow it each time, then everyone will come to expect it and will benefit from it. 

1.    If you use a Net meeting or other technical tools, ensure everyone has the access and everyone’s kind of done a test drive prior to the meeting. 

2.    Always send out your materials and your agenda at least 24 hours in advance. 

3.    Always ask for and incorporate feedback.  When you have the agenda, ask the team, “Did I get everything?”  Don’t have one person do all the talking.  You want this to be a team exercise.  You might need to make the decision, but you want to get input from the team.

4.    Often, ask for input.  Leave time for questions and for air time, that quiet time when people are thinking and processing what you said. 

5.    Review the action items and the owners prior to the end of each meeting.  You want to ensure that there are clear milestone and deliverable dates, and that everyone understands what these dates are and who is responsible for them. 

6.    Send out the minutes and action items, preferably within two hours of the meeting.  That way, it’s clear, it’s fresh in everyone’s mind, and you can make sure that you didn’t miss anything, and you’ll get a much better response rate on any feedback that you need from the team.

7.    Follow-up on action items until the next meeting or until the deadline.  So, if something is due in a week, don’t wait a week to see if they’ve finished it.  Do a follow-up.  Make sure that they are working on it and understand the priority. 

Pictures are worth more than words

When forming a global team, it is important to have “picture” of team members in your mind. Generally, we like to visualize people and have a closer connection to them when we can “see” them. Set up a share point or web site or just share pictures so everyone can have a visual. The most popular part of a conference we had with part of our global team was the team picture – this was the best feature the rest of the team liked. They liked to see everyone and compare it to their mental image of each person. That one picture started an entire picture sharing component of the team that strengthened the bond of the team.

This may seem like unnecessary work, but it shows everyone that we all have personalities outside our “jobs” and gives people a sense of community.  This step will help with the harder work that comes – setting and living up to expectations within the team. Build the foundation and everything that comes after will remain solid.

Is Your Virtual Team Getting Summer Fever?

About this time of year, I have trouble getting things done. Work that I usually complete in an hour or two can take all morning – it then makes me want to get even less done. Do you have this problem? Ever? Honest?

Ok, Seriously, it is hard to not have periods where focus is hard to keep. How do you regain your focus and get things done? Everyone has their tricks that include everything from giving yourself a break to breaking your tasks into much smaller deliverables to keep your ability to deliver. What about when you are managing a global team with summer fever?

It gets harder when you don’t see your people face-to-face. Teams that work well can overcome short term slowdowns or interruptions – but some teams have trouble regaining the momentum. What works for you?

With my teams, it all depends on the team dynamic. The stronger the base, the easier to overcome short term delays. With new teams, or teams that are less trusting, you may not know there is a problem until a major milestone is missed. That can cause major ripples in the project plan.

It is best to have the informal network catch these short term glitches – everyone has them, but a team can support individuals through the short term issue. Teams without this informal network are less likely to “catch” a team-mate in trouble. Another reason to build the foundation before it rains…

 

Making it Work Virtually with Japan

Ever spend an hour on the telephone and not understand one word of the conversation? This happens to me – frequently actually. The sad part, these are my meetings. I’m talking about the hard part of virtual teams.

I like to use this space to talk about how virtual teams work together. One group that is a particular challenge for me is working with virtual Japanese teams.  The usual comes into play of course – language barriers, late night calls. But there are other challenges. Last night, I was on the call for literally four hours, but about 30 minutes total was in English. Short of me learning Japanese ( a nobel cause, but hard for me to manage since I had trouble with French, I figure I need another option) – I needed a solution.

The best solution, I have found, is to have a trusted team member on the ground in Japan. This gives you not only the language solution, but also the respect and “face” to the customer. It is important to have a solid team to the customer, so it still takes work.

Trust is critical for the virtual team. For my project team, I have people in Texas, California, Japan, Malaysia and Singapore.  Internal communication is always key – and always a challenge.

Don’t Avoid “dead” air Time with Virtual Teams

Draw out participants who are quiet.  If you have a team of 10 or 12 people and you have three or four who do most of the talking, ask the other participants specific questions. 

If they’re from a culture where that’s going to make them more uncomfortable, and be aware of that, then tell them ahead of time.  “Sally, I really want your opinion on how we’re going to accomplish this within the timeframe.  Please give it some thought, because I’m going to ask you to share your ideas with the group.” That way she knows, going into the meeting that you’re going to ask for her input. 

Allow that air time, and ask participants directly if they have questions or if they have anything to add.  But don’t spring it on them.  As I mentioned, especially depending on the individual or on the culture, you want to give them some notice that you’re going to do that.

Now, real work locations really equates to technology.  In today’s world, there’s no reason why we can’t have team members from anywhere in the world.  But you need to make sure the technology is working.  You need to have working phones, you need to have an international calling plan and, of course, you need to have high-speed connections.

You can also use several time zone meeting tools on the Internet, to help put this together.  You can go online and put in the different countries, and it will give you a matrix that shows you, when you pick a meeting, what time it will be in the different countries, so that you can make sure that it’s not 3:00 a.m. anywhere.

You can also coordinate meetings so they don’t always impact that same location.  As I mentioned, share the timing so that it moves around, but everybody has some convenient and some inconvenient times.