One of the things that is becoming more important to all of us is
“virtual communication,” whether one-on-one or with teams. Some of
us are old hands at this, others are still learning. I’ve copied
below three recent columns on the subject from Point Lookout, a free
weekly email newsletter produced by Chaco Canyon Consulting. I’ve
found the columns to be direct, usually insightful, and often quite
helpful. (Back issues of the newsletter can be found at
If you find these columns to be helpful, you may want to subscribe.
……jim
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Virtual Communications: Part I
Participating in or managing a virtual team presents
special communications challenges. Here are some
guidelines for communicating with members of virtual
teams.
Katrina picked up the pencil and punched Ed’s number. The circuit
completed and she could hear the line ring. It rang again. She
started tapping the pencil on her desk. The line rang again. ‘Still
not there,’ she thought, tapping the pencil. ‘Where _is_ he?’
Then Ed’s voice came on the line, but it was his outgoing message.
Katrina thought for a moment, and hung up. “Damn,” she said out
loud, to nobody.
Frustrated as she might be, Katrina has just done something smart.
Rather than leave Ed yet another message, she decided to just
hang up, saving both Ed aVirtual teams depend on effective telephone and email
components. Here’s Part I of some guidelines for virtual team
communications.
Have regular check-ins
If you lead or manage the team, check in with each team member
regularly. Depending on the nature of the work, you might
check in daily, or two or three times a week — less often
than that risks disconnection.
Make appointments
Making appointments minimizes phone tag, which is expensive in
terms of stress, frustration and time spent. When you want to
talk with someone, make an appointment, possibly by email or
by text message.
Keep your appointments
Running a little late when someone is waiting outside your
office does hurt, but not nearly as much as running late for a
phone conversation. When you’re late for a phone appointment,
the caller often has less idea what’s happening or when you’ll
be available.
If you’re running late, take time out in advance — if you can
— to advise your next appointment that you’re late.
Rescheduling is best.
Agree on message response times
Adopt a standard of reasonableness for the elapsed time to
respond to email or phone messages. A rough rule of thumb:
respond in about half the time you thought was reasonable
outside of the remote management context.
Use meta-responses
If you can’t return a message promptly, send a message saying
so. If you can explain why, all the better, but at least let
your partner know that you’re aware of the delay, and estimate
when you can respond.
Define a three-level priority scale for messages
Green messages (good news or bad) are non-urgent, yellow is
possibly urgent, and red messages are urgent. Use this scale
for email and voicemail, taking care never to inflate a
priority just to get attention.
Agree that non-response is a performance issue
Agree that failure to respond to (or at least to acknowledge)
a message within a “reasonable” time could be a serious
performance issue. Clearly define the kinds of circumstances
that could excuse the failure to respond.
***************
Virtual Communications: Part II
Participating in or managing a virtual team presents
special communications challenges. Here’s Part II of
some guidelines for communicating with members of
virtual teams.
Ed picked Katrina’s number from his cell phone menu, slid his coat
just a bit off his right shoulder, stuck the phone between his
shoulder and his ear, froze for a moment with his right arm halfway
out of his coat sleeve, and listened. “Good,” he said aloud to
himself, “Ringing. Maybe she’s in.”
He listened to the ringing as he slid his right arm out of his
coat, then his left. He threw the coat on the hard hotel bed and
sat down on the desk chair. As he began untying his left shoe,
Katrina’s voice came on the line.
It was her outgoing message. She gave her name and said, “Press
star to skip this message.” Ed pressed star, thinking, ‘Thank you,
Katrina.’ He’d heard her message thousands of times, but he could
never remember how to skip her message.
When Katrina recorded her outgoing message, she gave a gift to all
of her colleagues by telling them how to skip her message. For
repeat callers like Ed, it saves a few seconds every time. It adds
up, and it can be a wonderful thing when he’s rushed, or at the end
of a long day. Little niceties like that can make the difference
between a high-performance team and one that struggles to survive.
Here’s Part II of my guidelines for communications within virtual teams.
Use Call Waiting only with Caller ID
Interrupting a call just to find out who else is calling is a
destructive practice. Get a service called “Caller ID with
Name on Call Waiting,” which lets you see who’s calling
without interrupting the current call. Even with this service,
interrupt a call only for emergencies or when the second
caller calls a second time.
Think “inbox” when leaving voicemail
For voicemail, follow the format we use for email: first give
your name, your full phone number, the topic, and the
priority, and then give the body of the message. It’s a
courtesy to the listener.
Speak slowly in voicemail
Speak clearly. If you’re calling from a noisy environment,
such as an airport, try to find a quiet place to make your
call. Slow down even more when you say your phone number or
email address.
Don’t make up voicemail messages on the fly
Be realistic — you’ll probably have to leave a message when
you call. Be prepared to do so.
Leave only simple voicemail messages
Complex voicemail messages are hard to follow. The recipient
almost always has to write them down. If possible, send
complex messages by email. Thirty seconds is the practical
maximum, especially if the recipient gets lots of voicemail.
Say goodbye only once
It’s amazing how many people say multiple goodbyes. One will
do the job.
How many voicemail messages will your team send this year? Think
about how much time you can save, and how much confusion you can
avoid, if your team follows these guidelines. Just don’t try to
explain them in voicemail.
***************
Virtual Communications: Part III
Participating in or managing a virtual team presents
special communications challenges. Here’s Part III
of some guidelines for communicating with members of
virtual teams.
Here’s Part III of my guidelines for communications in virtual
teams.
Don’t give the time or date in voicemail
Most systems already provide the day, date and time for
messages. Why duplicate it? And if you’re in a different day
and time yourself, you could just confuse the recipient.
Give your phone number twice
For voicemail messages, supply your phone number not only near
the beginning, but also at the end.
If using a desk or wall phone, press the button to hang up
Replacing the handset to hang up creates a clattering sound
that can be irritating in voicemail.
Eating, drinking and chewing gum are no-nos on the phone
Whether live or in voicemail, avoid these activities. Even
when you’re muted, you never know when you’ll need to speak.
Sit up straight or stand when you’re on the phone
Slouching or lying down interferes with full use of your lungs
and diaphragm. You need the full power and nuance of your
voice.
Learn how to use your voicemail system
Learn how to skip, skip-with-erase, move to mailbox,
reply-immediate, pause, repeat, transfer to email, forward,
forward with preface, forward to list, sort by priority, and
whatever else your system offers.
Learn the remote commands too
If you call into your office system to pick up messages, learn
the most useful commands. And carry them on a wallet card.
Customize your outgoing message
If you know you’ll be returning at a specific time, record an
outgoing message that tells callers when to call back. This
can really cut down on your voicemail.
Consider calling someone’s voicemail directly
Often, you don’t really need to speak to the recipient live.
If a voicemail will do, call voicemail directly.
Suspend interpretation of silences
If someone doesn’t respond to a message — email or voice —
check whether the message was received. Going ballistic is
usually a bad idea, especially when based on a
misinterpretation of silence.
Always confirm — don’t rely on silence
Never leave a message of the form “I’ll let you know if X
condition is satisfied, otherwise execute Y.” Always confirm
either way, because messages don’t always arrive.
Slow down your “offense” response
In person, we use body language, facial expression, and tone
of voice to adjust our communications and our interpretations,
and this keeps us out of trouble. By email and phone, where
these adjustments are problematic or impossible, we’re more
likely to offend and feel offended. Slow down and ask for
elaboration. Breathe more.
Most important, express appreciations verbally, publicly and often.
In person, we smile, we nod, we backslap, and any number of other
things that express approval non-verbally. Remotely, these gestures
are unavailable to us, so when we want to encourage each other, or
express approval, we have to say things verbally that seem
unnatural, artificial or forced. It takes practice. Get started
today.
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