Meeting best practices (including remote staff)

This is a page where we can collect meeting best practices for including remote staff. Please feel free to rename this page, and/or move it to a more logical location. Sue Gardner (talk) 17:41, 14 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Start the meeting on time, so people like Siebrand don't get antsy waiting
 * Figure out a consistently good time for all members of the team (ie, PT mornings to include Europeans)
 * Or if there is no consistently good time, try rotating times so everyone gets to share the pain of being on super-late or super-early.
 * Have an IRC backchannel open during the meeting to make it easier for remote people to contribute without needing to interrupt
 * Start with an agenda and take notes in an Etherpad -- this gives another backchannel and you've got notes ready to post when you're done
 * Make a point of calling on remote people during the meeting, acknowledging that they're disadvantaged in ability to participate
 * If you're using video, make the image as near lifesize as possible
 * Have all the meeting rooms consistently equipped with the audio-visual equipment that works best for us (people who will know what works best include Alolita, Tomasz, Arthur)
 * Remember that remote people are in the meeting. Pointing at something, if there's no visual link, and going "what I think about *point* that is..." does not communicate what you're discussing"
 * Try to keep the meeting in good order. If more than one person is speaking at once, most audio channels get fuzzed and the end result is the remote person can't hear a thing.
 * more

Other best practices for including remote people

 * Remote people like the staff list. It helps them keep connected to the life of the office, and it's easier for them to contribute using channels that are asynchronous.
 * Having said that, remote people do not necessarily want to hear about Thai food in the fridge on 3rd, or this REALLY FUN PARTY everyone is going to. That makes them SFsick.
 * Remote people like it when San Francisco people hang out on IRC. It helps them feel connected socially and casually.
 * Be deliberately, explicitly nicer in text (e.g. smileys), because people will default to a non-nice reading of your text.
 * Please stop calling us remoties. (Wait, who's been calling us remoties?)
 * more