How To Perform Well In An Office Meeting: Top Tips For Introverts

As a first-time officegoer or a generally shy person, you might find yourself less impressive during team meetings at work, and that’s not always a good sign since your superiors are looking closely at you.

Be it an online or offline meeting, being an active participant matter since your work image is created this way. The more you participate and the better you listen in these meetings, creates a good impression of you among other staff as well as your higher-ups.?

So if you\'re an introvert, you’re shy or this is your first job and you don’t know how your part in a meeting works, we’re sharing some of the top tips for you to do better in work meetings.

Be Confident And Speak Up

Banish your jitters, calm your nerves, and stay confident from the very beginning of the meeting. Stop thinking internally and add value to the meeting by speaking up instead of feeling that people might judge you all the while. Try asking powerful questions, supporting others’ statements, applauding a good idea, or adding inputs of your own to a question or plan.?

Speak Early

When you’re early in a meeting, you have pointers in your head from before. This is the best time to shoot them instead of waiting to a point wherein all of your ideas are either lost or have no scope to be spoken in the advanced conversations. To avoid this, share your insights at the very beginning of the meeting since the thoughts are still fresh in your mind and are also more relevant to others.?

Don’t Let Your Inner Critic Win

Oftentimes, we have great thoughts in our minds, but we feel they might be criticized or made fun of if we say them out loud. This is where your inner critic is stopping you from sharing good ideas in the meetings you attend. No matter what your thoughts are, speak them out. What’s the worse that could happen? In fact, you’ll always be appreciated for your participation and also lauded for a good idea or input!

Be Aware of Your Body Language

When you attend a meeting, open, and engaged body language will help you to appear (and feel!) more engaged, and will facilitate others reacting to your words positively. Keep your arms positioned at your side instead of crossing your arms. This is a sign of being more composed and calm, and less threatening.?Also, take the time to make sure you have made eye contact with each member of the group, so everyone feels more engaged with what you are saying.

Make sure your voice is not too loud that you sound overbearing, and not too quiet that you sound like you are lacking confidence. It’s a careful balance, but you will see an improvement in your meetings if you can come across as both confident and approachable.

Be Focused Throughout

Being a good listener from start to finish helps you stay more present and active, and not miss out on any points or questions. As an attendee, you can stay focused by asking questions when you want to understand something further, writing notes, or drawing diagrams. Experiment with different things, and find out what works for you.?

Use these sure-shot tips to ace each meeting and stand out as an excellent employee, here at F5 Web Solutions!