Zoom! We’d never even heard of it 2 months ago and now it’s a daily part of our lockdown lives. Sometimes I have four or five Zoom meetings per day with colleagues, students, friends, family and church friends. For some it is probably even more. So how do we get the most out of these meetings without suffering from “Zoom fatigue” (yes, that’s a real thing)?
1) Take breaks between meetings. Let’s face it, video calls aren’t natural. When you have a face to face talk with someone, you are not usually sat staring at your own face! You also don’t have to contend with connection problems, background interference and delays caused by internet speeds! It’s exhausting! So it is important to take a break. Schedule your meetings at different times of the days, or even different days. Be honest with people if you need to miss the odd meeting.
2) Experiment with views. Zoom allows you to switch between “speaker view” and “gallery view”. On speaker view, you see only the person who is speaking at that time. Some prefer this, especially if there are lot of people present in the call. This allows you to give one person your attention at a time. The problem comes if one person is speaking and another person coughs and suddenly it is their face you are looking at! This is easily solved if everyone mutes themselves and unmutes only when it is their turn to speak. Personally, I prefer gallery view, as I like to see everyone’s faces. Find out what works best for you.
3) Sit still! Honestly, this is for me the most frustrating part about video calls. People walk around holding the phone or position it so I’m looking at their forehead or ceiling! It can actually make me feel a bit dizzy watching someone’s screen moving around. Decide where you will have your meeting in advance. Choose a quiet location, near to a power socket in case you need to charge your device (video calls are such a drain on the battery). Don’t sit with the window behind you otherwise you will just be a silhouette! Prop up your phone, tablet or laptop so that your head and shoulders fill most of the screen. If you do need to get up and do something, consider turning your mic and video off so your movements do not distract others.
4) Turn off. If you are finding the video call a bit stressful or you need a few moments to yourself, it is perfectly acceptable to turn your video off and simply watch and listen. You can even explain this to those you are talking to, and they will surely understand.
5) Leading the meeting. By now you have probably been the host of at least one Zoom meeting. When hosting the meeting, it is a good idea to make a list of all the participants and put a tick next to their name when they have contributed something. This will bring to your attention those who are quiet or who have got lost in the crowd, enabling you to call on them to share their views. The best thing about hosting a meeting is the power to mute people (oh how I’ll miss this when we return to real meetings)! If someone is making a lot of noise such as rustling, noisy pets, coughing etc, you can quickly mute them so as not to distract others. Even better, ask everyone to mute themselves and unmute only when they are speaking. If you’re using a laptop, you can temporarily unmute yourself by holding down the space bar.
6) Security. There have been some concerns about how secure Zoom is. To ensure your meetings are secure, always use a password and enable the waiting room. Do not share the Zoom link online, only with specific people via email or WhatsApp. In the unlikely event that you do get a gate-crasher, remember that you can boot people out of the meeting!
7) Don’t multitask! It can be tempting to carry on with other tasks while on your Zoom meeting, but in reality our brains are not capable of multitasking, despite the myth that they are. Remove all distractions while on your video call so that you can focus on what is being said.
8) Share information in advance. If the meeting is a discussion (as opposed to a prayer meeting or a chat with friends), share as much information with the participants beforehand so that the meeting can be as brief as possible. You may even find that meeting is unnecessary and can be replaced with an email instead! Bonus! If you do have to meet, be sure to set an agenda to make your time productive.
9) Break out rooms. Some people find talking in front of large groups difficult, so break out rooms can be the solution to this. We use this for our prayer meetings. The host needs to have this enabled in their options and then they will be able to open the rooms when needed. The host can choose the groupings or allow Zoom to do it automatically.
10) Screen sharing. Thank you to James for this one. One of the best features of Zoom is the ability to share your screen and show people what you are talking about. This could be a video, PowerPoint, document or website. Plan in advance what you want to share and make sure there is nothing open that you would be embarrassed for others to see! You can even mute everyone (including yourself) and play a YouTube video, allowing you all to sing along.
By Lindsay Jacobs