My job is a constant grind of meetings and talking to people. Some days it’s actually more of a break to go into the office than it is to work from home, because at home people don’t know that I’ve been on back-to-back meetings for the last three hours. On a bad day, I don’t make it into the kitchen, which is less than ten feet from my office.
I spend a lot of time on remote calls. So I spend a lot of time thinking about how to handle them.
It’s harder to read the room when there is no room. You lose body language, side conversations, and the thing where you catch someone’s eye across the table and know you’re both thinking the same thing. You’ve got to replace that with something, or your meetings turn into a bunch of muted avatars staring at each other.
Mirror, Don’t Mandate
For someone I don’t know, I start with a low-key call and mirror what they do. If their video is off, mine is off. If their video is on, mine is on.
Before someone gets excited about how everyone should have video on all the time, go try eight to nine hours of meetings back to back across four time zones. You’ll quickly understand why they (or you) don’t want to be on video today. Maybe they’re sick. Maybe they’re eating lunch, and for the love of God you do not want to watch someone eat on camera. Mirroring gives people a break without anyone having to make it a thing.
Narration Helps People Read the Virtual Room
Silence is ambiguous. In person, you can see someone processing. On video, silence feels like something’s wrong. You need to narrate it: “I’m thinking about that,” or “Give me a second.” A lot of times people just need to know it’s okay.
The cousin to this is the call where everyone joins with cameras off. I get it at some level, but in a group setting it’s hard for any presenter (me or someone else) to tell if the audience is even paying attention. No camera, no eye contact, no questions. It feels like you’re talking into an empty room. The flip side is true when I’m in the audience. The speaker can’t see that I’ve been looking at them the whole time, processing what they’re saying and taking notes. It’s harder to see remotely, so you have to put more effort in. Ask a question and make it obvious you’re there.
Written tone is always read more negative than you intended. “Fine” in person can be warm, especially if your tone carries. “Fine” in Slack reads as passive-aggressive. Remote requires more explicit signaling. I tend to use a Midwestern understatement in person and in writing. For example, I’ll say “that’s fair,” which in my parlance means “you have a good point” or “yep, you’re right, I was wrong.” Some people read that as placating or dismissive. The answer is, it depends on your tone. I try to keep phrases like that out of verbal conversations where people can hear me. I avoid them in writing, where the tone has to carry on its own.
Informal communication takes effort. You don’t get to use hallway conversations or lunch catch-ups. The information that used to flow naturally now requires intentional effort. It’s harder to grab a virtual coffee. So put some time into your conversations instead of turning every check-in into a transactional status report. Ask how they’re doing. How’s the family? How’s the kid? Is it tennis season for their daughter, or baseball, or softball, or pick another sport? If you treat every interaction as a status report, that’s all people will expect from you.
Context disappears. When you send a message, they don’t know you just got out of a tough meeting or that you’re having a great day. Every message arrives context-free. The fix is to add a little context as the intro: “I’ve been in back-to-backs for the last two hours, so I’m going to take a sec to spin up.” Most people going through the same thing are understanding and actually appreciate it.
Hybrid Meetings Are the Hardest Version
The hybrid meeting (some people in the room, some people remote) is the hardest to manage. If you’re not careful, the in-person folks take over the conversation and the remote folks get treated like observers.
Call on the remote folks first. If you ask an open question to the whole group, the people in the room will answer before the remote folks finish unmuting. Flip it. “Before we hear from the room, let’s start with everyone on video.”
Repeat what was said in the room. Side conversations, whiteboard sketches, and reactions from the in-person crowd don’t carry over the call. If something important happens in the room, narrate it. “For those on the call, Sarah just pointed out that we missed a dependency on the finance team.”
Give remote folks a way to flag that they want to talk. A hand-raise in the tool. A “I want to add something” in chat. Then watch for it. Remote people will give up trying to interject if you don’t leave them a door.
The Underlying Point
Remote communication needs more intentionality, more clarity, and more redundancy. You have to talk and interact more than you would in a room, because people can’t see your body language. The only way to communicate it remotely is to actually communicate it.
The best remote managers aren’t the ones with the fanciest setups. They’re the ones who figure out how to get the best interaction out of the team, which hopefully gives you the best product.
See you next week!
-Frank
