I am with you. After leading online meetings for over 10 years, I still feel butterflies in my stomach before leading an online meeting. There is the classic: "I will seem like I am not organized", then the imposter, "I know they will find me incompetent for this role", then the deep: "I could have done better in preparing" or "what if the technology fails me?". Here are 3 tips to help you push away the inner critic and prepare well for your first meeting.
- Send an agenda to the group about 3-4 days earlier. I know the norm is one week, but I rarely followed suit. There is always something to add and it is not terrible to procrastinate a bit to get the latest update.
- Think about participants' state of mind. While you think they may be out to find how incompetent you are, they are actually very much focused on their own roles and responsibilities regarding the meeting and their own shortcomings. If they are late, they are probably anxious about this, or if they miss the meeting, it will make them self-conscious about missing it. No one cares whether you actually completed the 100th task you assigned yourself. They are rather following your lead and waiting to be guided through the agenda items and helping at maximum your mission and vision for the meeting. Have grace for yourself as you do for others.
- Divide items into two categories: Informational and actionable. With informational items, you are relaying the information, updating on progress of work done on your end, but not necessarily asking your audience to contribute, change, or improve much. For actionable items, make sure you utilize your participants' talents in two ways, first have discussion about pros or cons of situations, proposals, and ideas. Second, ensure there is a next step. Summarize specific action: "So the next step is..." . Check with the group to see if this is the right summary. See, you did not have to be anxious, because you have intellectuals contributing to a solution, and a collaborative outcome that makes all feel welcome and all hands on deck.
What other strategies you use to calm down the inner critic and take the pressure off of yourself during your online meetings?
