As we kick off this week, we get to explore Effective Virtual Conversations Tip #115 – Virtual Icebreakers. Whether we are leading a webinar or a group coaching call, it can be important to do a number of things in launching a call –

1. Connect people quickly to the topic
2. Connect people quickly to each other
3. Help people see the common ground amongst themselves

A good icebreaker will do all three of these things.

#1 - First, we want to connect people quickly to the topic. This is usually referred to as the WIIFM or WHAT’s In IT For ME? This helps to create focus and avoids the multi-tasking mindset that can slip in.
Questions could involve:

• What’s your biggest opportunity around __ (insert topic)?
• What’s important about ___ (insert topic)?

#2 – Connecting people to each other
Connecting people quickly to each other helps establish trust and safety across the group. Depending on the context it will also be an important part of the process of learning and discussion after the event.
Questions might include:

• What is an example you have around ____ (insert topic)?
• What is one resource you would like to recommend to each other?

#3 – Common Ground
Helping people see the common ground or connections across their work is also important in a virtual setting. Even if we think we are varied, in fact, we may be more similar than we think.

Ways to find common ground:

• Asking the group – What do you notice about the areas of commonality which exist across the group?
• You could put up a photo on the screen and ask to have people share what they see.
• You could have people map themselves along a continuum - for example, on a scale of 1-10, where do you see yourself?
• You could also poll people for their input.

​For more resources on this please check out Chapter 7 of Effective Virtual Conversations OR pick up a copy of the 20 Focus Areas for Virtual and Remote Team Development – pick up a copy here.

Enjoy your exploration!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized 
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder 
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.
For those looking for tips, tools and ideas about remote work and support for your remote teams, be sure to check out these tags and resources. ​

Mentoring is one of the several learning and growth modalities which is getting more attention. No surprise, virtual mentoring is also getting more attention as well.
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Key things to keep in mind when mentoring virtually:

• Just like an in-person meeting, keep to commitments. Watch for the slippery slope of cancellations. Like in person meetings, keep to time as well.
• Use technology to your advantage – Where possible, use streaming services so you can see each other. This helps to boost connection and avoid misunderstandings. approximately 55% of our message is conveyed by body language which is lost when we are only on the phone. Can you host your zoom calls on skype or zoom so you can see each other?
  
• Have an agenda, or an anchoring theme for the meeting. This can keep you on task and focus. Some common themes mentoring partners may want to explore are:
  • Work-life
  • Important pivot points
  • Networking and building relationships
  • Moving career forward
  • Trends in your industry
• Set some success criterion – What is the end result you are aiming for? What will make the meeting successful? 
• Build in feedback loops - Make sure you check in regularly around this.
• Make changes as you go- Plans for conversations should be fluid, and revisited regularly. Many mentoring conversations find that it's useful to have a focus or anchoring theme with each of their mentoring conversations. Given the pace of change today, it shouldn't be so fixed that conversations are no longer relevant. Discuss how you will be able to create an adjustable plan together.

Mentoring can be a critical part of any professional's development journey for employees and entrepreneurs. How can you incorporate it into your professional development?
 
Best wishes, 
​Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized 
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder 
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.
For those looking for tips, tools and ideas about remote work and support for your remote teams, be sure to check out these tags and resources. ​

It’s Monday at time for our next Effective Virtual Conversations Tip. This is tip 113 in the series. Be sure to check out the weekly Effective Virtual Conversations Tips here. You can find out more about this book and related programming over at EffectiveVirtualConversations.com.

This week’s tip gets you to consider the question “What digital distractions are impacting you?”. From pings to things flashing across the screen, interruptions in the digital space can quickly take us off focus. While Gloria Marks research has shown that it can take upwards of 22 minutes to regain focus, sometimes we don’t have that long.

What are the things we can do to create more focus in the virtual/digital space?

• Go on airplane mode or non-wifi for parts of the day when you need deep concentration
• Work on different devices – i.e. a smaller laptop for writing projects
• Schedule "deeper thinking" work at different parts of the day
• Make a point of spending part of a work day outside of the office. For example, I spend 2-3 hours working out of a public library once a week. In addition to being a great research resource, it also is an place where I know I will be able to work without the usual distractions. I usually target to take action on the one project that has been left hanging for that week. It gives me a keen sense of satisfaction as I do to leave after my time spent.

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As another resource you may want to check out, I continue to enjoy the writing of Cam Newport in his books – Deep Work and Digital Minimalism. If today’s topic is of interest to you, you may find these books interesting.

Questions to consider:

• What are the digital distractions you are most aware of?
• When do they happen?
• What are 3-5 things you can do RIGHT NOW to create more focus and minimize distractions. DO IT NOW! (Before you get up or click on or reply to the next email). Thank you!

Best, 
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized 
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder 
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.
For those looking for tips, tools and ideas about remote work and support for your remote teams, be sure to check out these tags and resources. ​

Its Monday which means that it is time for another Effective Virtual Conversations tip. One of the challenges in today’s remote and virtual workspace is that people only see a small window of our world – literally what we show them on our screen.

This is a challenge given that CONTEXT is so important for business today. Helping others understand our world can happen through the stories and information we share, and it can also be influenced by what we choose to share.

Today’s prompt gets you thinking about “What do you want to share with others?”.

It could include

• A different view behind you
• A snapshot of a project you are working on
• An illustration of the different people you liaise with
• A map of your key priorities for the next quarter
• Something related to your most important priority right now
• If you are a remote team, it might be interesting to have everyone mix it up at your next team meeting. Ask people to dial in from somewhere different, or intentionally build in time to share a priority.

What do you want to share about your work right now with others?

Best,
​Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized 
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder 
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.
For those looking for tips, tools and ideas about remote work and support for your remote teams, be sure to check out these tags and resources. ​

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations Tip gets you to think about “What systems will help you be more effective?”. Whether you are running remote team meetings, or hosting webinars, systems operate in the background. It’s the systems that we have in place that help us replicate and scale our work, as well as duplicate it and ensure that people are having a similar experience across locations.

There are a number of systems which you will want to keep in mind as it relates to virtual conversations:

• Recording – where do you keep your recordings, how do you itemize them?
• Platform – log in, passwords, etc.
• Participant or team systems – who is who, how to contact, other details
• Program systems and materials

Of course, there may be other items such as:

• Administrative items
• Financial systems – budgets, expenses
• Communication systems

Think about the systems which are going to help you scale your work. What’s important to note? What is important to take action on?

​Enjoy the start to your week.

Best,
​Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized 
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder 
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.
For those looking for tips, tools and ideas about remote work and support for your remote teams, be sure to check out these tags and resources. ​

This week’s Monday Effective Virtual Conversations tip gets you to consider the virtual facilitation skill area of questions. A foundational area, the use of a powerful question can shift a virtual meeting from a one-way black hole of silence, to an engaged conversation.
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A couple of things to keep in mind when integrating questions into your next virtual meeting:

1. Keep your questions short. When questions are too long, we don’t understand them. Aim for 5-7 words in a question.
2. Ask one question at a time. If you ask more than one question, the listener will first need to figure out what question they have to answer first. In a group context, this will likely lead to people getting off on different tangents, as people will hear different questions first.
3. Be clear on when you want to ask open-ended questions, which solicit an invite to expand, or when you want simply a yes/no answer.
4. Use different ways to get people’s response. Depending on the technology you are using, you may be able to share comments verbally, as well as by chat, and sometimes by annotation.
5. Avoid starting questions with WHY unless trust levels are very high! “Why” questions tend to put people on the defensive. “What” questions tend to be the most open-ended. “How” questions will invite people into thinking about process.For more on the art of questioning in the virtual space, along with a series of questions you might use, check out the Skills in Focus Chapter in my book, Effective Virtual Conversations.

What are some of your favorites? Share with us using the comments below.
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And to leave you off with one of my favorite closing questions – What are you going to do to put this in practice in the next 24 hours?

Enjoy!
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton – Potentials Realized 
Leadership | Teamwork | Business Success
Author of multiple books including Effective Virtual Conversations (2017), PlanDoTrack (2019) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013)
Follow along with the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series over at Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder 
Join the conversation at the Conversation Sparker Zone - our online community where you can explore virtual and team issues, coaching, productivity and business development.
Pick up a copy of Volume 1 of the Weekly Journaling Prompts in a digital format. Print it out and take it with you for some inspiration and writing on the go! Available at the Potentials Realized Store.
For those looking for tips, tools and ideas about remote work and support for your remote teams, be sure to check out these tags and resources. ​

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations tip gets you to think about the question “How much has your work changed in the last year?”. The pace of technological change continues to create interesting waves and push backs.

Think about these questions:

• What platforms were you using this time last year? Five years ago? Ten years ago?
• What was your work characterized by – last year, three years ago, five years ago? A decade ago?
• How were you working a year ago? Three years ago? Five years ago?
• What type of conversations were you having virtually? Team meetings, team development, educational etc.?
• What about digital distractions? Digital minimalism?
• What devices were you using a year ago? Three years ago? How has this changed how, when and where you do your work?

In the last year, we have had great writing released including Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism which explores the experience of those who detox digitally.
The last year has also seen a huge wave of the audio-book, the podcast and other audio devices, thanks to the present nature of Apple Car Play, Alexis, and Google Home Minis.

It’s also likely that your work may have become either more global or focused in nature, depending on the industry you are in, and the geographic location you reside in. Technology thankfully is reducing barriers.

What do you note about how your work and ways of working have changed in the last year?

What additional changes do you want to embrace?

What do you want to change?

Best,
Jennifer

​This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations Tip takes us into the landscape of coaching. Coaching is one of the many varied conversations which are taking place in the virtual space today.
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Coaching has been leveraged by organizations and individuals for several decades now. Similar to sports coaching, business, executive and team coaching, supports individuals and systems to get their best work achieved. A coach is there to help a person/group/team tap into their knowledge, and create the conditions for success.

Whether it’s a business owner looking to accelerate their business, a leader to help their team be successful, or someone in career transition looking to land their next best role, coaching is a collaborative conversation, supporting the client to set goals, take action, expand their awareness and benefit from enhanced accountability. Together, these areas fuse to create the conditions to more focused and informed actions.
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Let’s look at each one in turn. Coaching is grounded in helping the person or group/team being coached, get clearer on the results they want. As philosophers have written for millennium, without a clear destination it’s hard to get there. Work around vision as well as goal setting, and resourcing is foundational to the coaching processes.
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Coaching is also about supporting informed action and also enhanced awareness. Many times, the things that help and hinder us are “below the waterline”. As I share in my recent workbook planner “PlanDoTrack”, it’s the habits, assumptions, values and beliefs which shape our behaviors and then results. Shein first published on this decades ago in his work from Harvard.
Think about it. As a team, if you have a belief that you will succeed with a task and have your leaders blessing to do what you need to do to make that happen, you are more likely to experiment, take risks, innovate, share information etc. If there is a belief that only one person will succeed, it’s likely that information won’t be shared, competition will ensue, and potentially you won’t be successful.

In coaching, we may spend a bulk of time “Going below the waterline” to explore, and make explicit these assumptions, beliefs, values which are driving and shaping decisions, behaviors and results.
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Coaching is also beneficial due to the accountability between the coach and client. In today’s disrupted world, enhanced accountability can mean that we do keep our eyes on what’s important, rather than feeling whiplashed from bouncing from one marker to another. Peer accountability can play a key role when the coaching conversation is expanded to many, as in group and team coaching.

Where might coaching benefit your organization or your self? What results are you looking to achieve in the next 12 – 18 months?

Set up a call to discuss how we can support your organization with coaching services, or training of your leaders in coaching.  Reach out with an email to me at info@potentialsrealized.com.
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I look forward to hearing from you,
Jennifer

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations tip gets you to think about how you can “prime” people for success BEFORE a virtual call. Is there something you can have people watch, read or do, so that they are ready to have the conversation?

Several ideas for pre-work could include:

• Having people take a self-assessment such as StrengthsFinder if you are working on a topic such as strengths. Have them complete the assessment prior to the conversation so you can start the conversation there.
• Have them review a reading on strengths
• Create a video around strengths

What are the things which will set people up for a good conversation?

Enjoy!
​Jennifer

This week’s Effective Virtual Conversations post takes me to one of the areas I hear about the most from professionals of all kinds today – “How can I minimize my digital distractions and create more focus in the virtual space?”
Digital distractions are created by a variety of things. Consider:

• The bing of your email
• An “urgent” email which isn’t an urgent email as you are bcced in
• An instant message that comes through via Slack
• Having to toggle back and forth through different screens instead of being able to lay things out in one way
• Having different people on your team using different frameworks/platforms for reporting

The cost of digital distractions is multi-fold:

• Work doesn’t get done
• Projects are not completed
• People are frustrated because they are not able to finish tasks
• Motivation suffers in the short term
• Engagement levels drop
• Turnover occurs much more quickly

There are significant human and business costs for both.

So, what are some ways to reduce digital distractions? Consider these items AS a TEAM. They need to be team based so everyone is doing them.

Be intentional as a team (and possibly as an organization) as to what the expectations are in terms of being “on” and when people can be off. It’s not uncommon for some organizations to have a block of global working hours where everyone needs to be available and meetings can be called.

• Experiment with “offline” blocks of hours where people can engage in their deeper work projects. Deeper work projects might include proposals, new projects, addressing strategic issues, working on systems to ensure process and people flow.
• Turn off the technology or close it off at certain times of the day (this will need to be discussed as a team/organization in terms of what is realistic and appropriate.)
• Think twice with subject lines, ccing and bccing (which really shouldn’t be used widely, if at all).
• Consider when having an analog copy of paper/hard copy might make a task move faster or be completed at a greater depth of synthesis. Deeper thinking of work cannot be completed with just cut and paste.
• Provide workspaces and/or flex arrangements so people can work with less distraction.
• Consider the best platform for the work.

What can you do as an organization or team to create more focus in the digital space?

Best wishes, 
​Jennifer