Remote team communication is on the rise as a lot of companies are going remote. It’s no wonder that you would be looking for how to lead a remote team most productively. This article will share with you the five secrets to lead your most productive remote team meetings yet.
1) Get all team members active
When you have different team members from different locations sitting in on a virtual meeting, it is easy for some members not to participate. And this will reduce the productivity of your meeting.
So, while working with remote teams, ensure that all team members have an opportunity to share their ideas and thoughts with the group.
You can do this by calling various team members by name and asking them their opinion.
Doing this helps make all team members feel like they are a part of the meeting and their views count (which it should). After all, the most productive remote team meetings are the ones with inclusivity for all attendees to contribute.
2) Teach team members how to contextualize communication
Next, remember that digital communication and face-to-face communication are so different. In face-to-face team meetings, you know what all your team members are doing, and you can read their body language.
This is not the case for digital communication. So, teach team members how to add context to their responses and elaborate on their replies.
For example, if a team member says ‘Yes’ during a meeting, ask them to elaborate on their feelings.
Please don’t make assumptions as to what they truly mean. Their ‘Yes’ may say they just want to be done with the meeting, and not that they genuinely agree with the subject. If you assume you know what they mean without asking them to expound, you could potentially cause a misunderstanding, which could hinder the productivity of your meeting.
3) Invest in messaging technologies that drive collaboration (& security!)
Do you know that up to 41% of remote teams still coordinate through communication tools like Skype, Facebook messenger, and even text messaging? Using these tools can slow down your team’s productivity. Instead, invest in tools like Zangi, specially designed for professional remote communications & productive remote team meetings.
This will ensure that:
- Team communication is happening on a secure and trusted platform, hosted on your own servers.
- Remote team meetings are happening on an HD communications system, which will work even with slow/poor connections
- Sensitive files are transferred 3X faster than anyone else, safely, and securely between team members, etc.
Are Zoom, Slack, WhatsApp secure? What secure tools to use when working from home?
4) Set up communication guidelines
Another vital secret for leading productive employees during a remote team meeting is to have set rules on communication tools. Many communication tools work with remote teams these days that it is so easy for companies to add them to their list of tools without giving it much thought. However, if you want to have the most productive and effective remote team meeting, not having proper communications guidelines can hinder your goal.
For example, you shouldn’t hold urgent virtual meetings via chat, instead use secure video platforms. Use emails to send professional communication, but not for virtual team collaborations. Meetings with sensitive topics or that require a lot of back and forth should be discussed via video or voice calls, or on professional remote work software, and not through chat messaging.
Informal virtual meetings can use chat platforms, etc. Your company guidelines should detail each communication tool’s usefulness in your portfolio and what meetings you will use them for. Make sure the guidelines you set are clear and to the point, you can employ writing companies from writing services reviews websites like Online Writers Rating to help you craft clear communications guidelines.
Also, aside from setting these guidelines, get feedback from the remote team to see if said platforms helped or hindered their productivity.
5) Understand your team members
Understanding your team members play a vital role in the productivity of a meeting. Because it will help you know when and if you should have a remote team meeting at all. As a team lead, you must realize that most meetings could be counter-productive. Wasting your team members’ time can reduce their productivity. So, in planning a remote team meeting, ask yourself these questions:
- Is this meeting essential to the team’s output?
- Does the set meeting time fit into the schedule of all the team members involved?
- Can an email be a sufficient replacement for this meeting?
If your meeting doesn’t fit into your team members’ time, they wouldn’t be 100% involved; thus, they wouldn’t be productive employees. If the meeting isn’t essential, you are wasting valuable time on it.
Conclusion: Productive Remote Team Meetings
In summary, use the above tips to ensure productive remote team meetings are achieving their set goals. Encourage team members to speak up, pick effective remote communication channels, set clear communication guidelines, and ensure you understand your team members. So, no matter the location of your remote team members, you can collaborate effectively with them.
Author: Frank Hamilton 
