Tag: working from home

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Tips for the virtual meeting

Now that more of us are working from home, we are getting used to virtual meetings with Zoom, Microsoft Teams and other software. Zoom seems to be the most popular platform and here are a few things to remember when making conference calls to colleagues and clients. Some of them are free with the basic package, but some require a monthly subscription.

Choose your own background

People don’t need to see you in your room, so you can set a default background, a blank wall, tidy office or photograph that you’ve taken. Open Settings, Virtual Background or when you join a meeting tap the three dots at the bottom of the page and make a choice.

Improve your image

There is a setting in Meetings called Touch Up My Appearance. It works in a similar way to a filter on an iPhone camera.

Control the microphone and video settings

The default position is that Zoom broadcasts audio and video immediately you enter a meeting. If you’d prefer to control them yourself look in Settings Audio and Settings Video to turn them off. You can open them up at any time you wish.

Remove people who have video turned off

You can hide the people who have disabled their video by checking the Hide nonvideo participants in the Settings, Video, Meetings section.

Record your meeting

Not everything gets written down, but the meeting host can record the meeting though the Settings, Recording section. The recording can be paused and restarted at any time.

Share a screen

A quick and easy way for everyone to look at the same document, or whatever is on your desktop.

Mute everyone

Background noise can interfere with the meeting, but the meeting host can mute everyone and talk uninterrupted. Everyone can then be unmuted to start a discussion.

Name display

Firstly, make sure your display name is correct and don’t use something frivolous if you’re using Zoom in a work environment. In the Video settings select ‘Always display participant’s name on their video’, it’s a useful reminder if you’re talking to customers or making sales calls to people you don’t know well.

Set an Alert

When you’re organising the meeting, send a calendar invitation that participants can accept and posts the meeting to their schedule. You can choose how far in advance of the meeting you want a reminder to flash up.

And don’t forget the ‘Zoom Groom’ to look your best, or you top half anyway. For more information and to download Zoom, click here

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Maintaining good mental health when working at home

maintaining-good-mental-health-whilst-working-at-home

The Coronavirus COVID-19 has brought great changes to our lives and in the event industry we are under immense pressure to keep our businesses going. Our first priority is to postpone or change our events into virtual meetings wherever possible, rather than cancel them. We can’t risk anyone’s health by proceeding with conferences, but at the same time a lot of hard work has gone into the planning of events and we’d all like them to take place in one form or another if possible.

Our industry is particularly sociable and we are used to travelling and meeting people, so working from home or being furloughed is quite a change of lifestyle. However, we are also used to working on the move, from hotels, venues, airports and lots of us are set up to work whenever we need to and wherever we are. We usually have contact and encouragement from colleagues and now that this has been removed, we need to maintain good social connections, through the increased use of technology.

The current situation is likely to increase stress in an industry where it is thought 70-80% of employees already feel that they are constantly worried. So, what should we look out for? Stress is not an illness, it is a mental, emotional and physical state where we feel overwhelmed and unable to cope as the result of unmanageable pressures. This can cause an increased risk of depression, substance abuse, alcohol consumption, lack of sleep and other effects.

Working from home

The first thing to do is change your mindset and plan a routine:

  • Set a start and finish time and when the working day is over, put your devices and work away to make the most of your downtime
  • Schedule tasks that are manageable and don’t get overwhelmed
  • Take a lunch break and coffee breaks, not only will you work better afterwards but it will stop your mind thinking about work all day
  • Look after yourself. Find an exercise to make yourself feel good, because keeping physically find will help your mental health. There are lots of different classes online, YouTube videos, zoom, Instagram and Facebook sessions that you can do on your own or join a virtual group. Or would a mindfulness session help?
  • Remember you are not alone – keep in touch with your colleagues in virtual meetings or speak to friends and relatives
  • Do what is in your control and keep the things outside your control in perspective
  • Achieve some of the things that you normally don’t find the time to tackle
  • Solve the little problems first, so that you get jobs ticked off the list
  • Take time to review your social media platforms and websites, which need peace and quiet and are difficult to do in the normal working day. What works and what doesn’t, can you streamline your messaging and make it work better?
  • Find ways of planning and developing for when the events industry does bounce back

If you do need help, talk to a professional immediately and get the guidance you need. But in the meantime, the way we can get through this is to accept the situation, talk about our problems to people who will support us and only worry about the things we can control.

The HBAA is running two mental health webinars in April 2020, for more information take a look at their website.

Keep up-to-date with all the latest industry insights and news by reading our EDGE news section.

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Keep your staff occupied, whilst they’re working from home

Working from home venue sourcing by EDGE Venues

None of us want staff who don’t have enough work to do, whether they’re in the office or at home and we feel the best way is to set a routine and make the most of your time while Coronavirus COVID-19 has changed the normal working day. No-one wants to be bored even if we’re not working, so these are also ideas for events staff who’ve been furloughed and can take the opportunity to further their careers.

Training

There are plenty of resources online and people are being very imaginative and generous with their knowledge. Pick a topic and research it. Does anyone know enough about virtual conferencing, augmented reality or just the best event app to use. When you’ve made yourself an expert in the subject, write a report for your colleagues or a blog for your company’s website and share the information, it will come in useful later.You could also focus on a destination in the UK or overseas and research it for future events and plan a site visit for a later date. All the conference bureau have websites with lots of information or how about learning a language the Open University and Open Culture have free courses.

Or it’s easy to learn from each other, plan a weekly meeting with Microsoft Teams or Zoom to share best practice and pass on tips or advice.

TED Talks

There are more than 3,300 online on a wide range of topics to make you think or behave differently, improve your career or just learn about something new. Or there’s a TED Talks daily podcast.

Podcasts

Podcasts are growing massively. Listen to business leaders talking about how they developed their companies or how about ‘Everything You Need to Know About Working from Home (But Were Too Afraid to Ask!)’. Or there are the conference and events industry podcasts such as EventIcons, Event Brew, The Event Tech Podcast or Event Industry News Podcast.

Blogs

A Backward Glance at 5 Trends that Changed Events in the ’10s
The C2 conference in Montreal is a business event that combines combine progressive and inspiring content in a highly creative, festival-like setting. In this article they look at the 5 key trends that changed events in the 2010s.

Online magazines

When do we really have time to read these thoroughly, maybe there’s time to catchup on the latest industry news on a regular basis. Check out Conference News, Conference & Incentive Travel and M&IT magazine.