BCF guidance for teleconferencing

Following Government guidelines, all BCF council and committee meetings due to take place in the coming months will be going ahead as “virtual meetings” and will not take place at Spectra House. This includes the Board of Directors and Annual General Meeting due to take place in May. We will write to the councils and committees with the details for these meetings shortly.

Most people have some experience of virtual meetings, from facetime with the family to regular international team working with many participants.  Whichever group you’re working with, follow the below tips for a positive virtual meeting experience. 

1. Connect ahead of the meeting start time.

As with a face to face meeting, get there 5 minutes early and have a chat.  This not only helps get the meeting off to a positive start but also allows time for any potential technical issues to be resolved.

2. Do a roll call. 

Ensure you know who is on the call by doing a quick roll call. We suggest that the meeting host starts by going through the list of attendees and asking who is present.  It is also useful to have a presentation ready to use with a list of expected participants.

It is also important for transparency seeing as you may not be able to physically see them, and also good for everyone else to know who they are talking to. 

3. Speak up if you have an issue.

Can’t see the slides?  Excessive background noise?  Need a comfort break?  Let the chair / host know, chances are others are experiencing the same and would benefit from a break, etc.  If you can’t connect, get in touch with the meeting secretary or Belle*mailto:belle.robertson@bcf.co.uk* as soon as possible to avoid disruption to the meeting.

4. Send the meeting materials ahead of time 

We suggest that any presentation be emailed before the meeting, just in case you have technical problems - can always revert to an audio call if they have the PPT. remember it is always good to have a backup plan. 

5. Remember the rest of the team can hear / see you!

Background noise can be very distracting for other participants.  Please mute your microphone unless you are speaking, unmute when you need to contribute.

6. Beware of lag.

From time to time sound lag can develop between users, if this becomes unworkable (more than 3 seconds) it may be best to disconnect and re-connect to the call.

7. Allow others time to speak.

During virtual meetings, we can’t always use body language to gauge when someone else has an important input to discussion.  Allow time for others to input, more frequent asking around the “virtual table” may feel unusual to start with, but will help to avoid speaking at the same time as each other.

8. Use the best equipment available

Modern computer microphones and speakers are perfectly good enough for virtual meetings.  If you’re joining alone, we recommend the use of a headset, if joining as a team it’s best to use specialist virtual meeting equipment.

9. Give feedback

If you’ve had a particularly good or bad experience of teleconferencing / videoconferencing, let your host know.  This will enable improvements to be made for future meetings.

Any advice I’ve missed, please let us know by emailing info@bcf.co.uk