In this blog post, we give you some quick tips on how to run more inclusive business meetings to not miss out on ideas or opinions from your most valuable asset: Your people!

1. Leveling the playing field

We all have extroverts in our organizations that if a question is asked they are the first ones to share their thoughts. The risk of not facilitating those meetings is that your introverted employees might hold onto their thoughts and therefore are not being heard.

Enabling their voice is to ask people beforehand to prepare for the meeting and share their thoughts via an Open text activity.
Alternatively, when the question is asked to the group, let them send in their opinions in Stagecast’s open text activity and table the answers you as a facilitator think are worth discussing. This way all of your attendees have the equal opportunity to raise their voices and be heard.

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2. Bigger is not necessarily better

We have all been in meetings when there are 50,100, or even more participants. Unless you are breaking up into smaller groups you will not give everyone a chance to share their feedback.

By using Stagecast in smaller groups you can facilitate discussions with our Q&A or Poll activities which not only give people the chance to participate fully but you can export and collect everyone's thoughts in one place. Making it super easy to follow up on ideas or feedback that have been shared during the meeting.

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3. Get to know your team

An ongoing challenge for teams in a virtual work environment is to build relationships. It’s not as easy anymore to have organic conversations in shared spaces in an office. Finding out that you and your colleague are equally obsessed with the new Netflix show is harder.

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Using our Poll activity you can easily make interactive ice breakers that hopefully will make your teams find connections. A new relationship that maybe will be the reason for finding a solution to a future business problem..

4. Share the insights 

Due to the “new” setup, teams mention on numerous occasions that they are spending more and more time in unproductive meetings and it is now creating a challenge. To avoid these time-consuming meetings it is important to have proper action points and using our voting activity is a quick way to collectively decide on what are the next steps.

The agreed-upon insights are accessible to download and can easily be shared amongst the relevant teams. Making everyone part of the journey forward and informed on what needs to be done.

5. Empower and celebrate victories

Celebrating the small wins are equally as important as the big achievements. A quick and easy word cloud text activity can make everyone aware of the small achievements your team has accomplished. Make sure the unsung heroes of your team gets the recognition they deserve and highlight the belongingness of your company.

People who win together should celebrate together and why not finish off that meeting with a giveaway prize, also a function within Stagecast. 

To learn more about running more interactive meetings, see our team meetings templates and get set up in a heartbeat! 

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