How to organise an Online Meeting: An easy guide

How to organise an Online Meeting An easy guide www.pro-wild.eu THE DAY BEFORE Table of Contents WELCOME LET’S GO SCHEDULE THE MEETING MEETING PREPARATION TODAY IS THE DAY CONCLUSION USEFUL TIPS MEETING JOURNEY 03 04 06 07 08 10 12 13 16 2 3 to the PRO-WILD online meeting guide! This guide is here to help you get ready for hosting an online meeting, whether it’s a small group catch-up or a larger session with external guests like farmers or policymakers. You’ll find simple steps and tips to make sure your meeting runs smoothly, feels welcoming, and helps everyone stay engaged. Hosting an online meeting can feel just as challenging as an in-person one, even if it takes less time to organise. The good news is, you don’t have to do it alone! It’s always helpful to have a teammate to support you before, during, and after the meeting, someone to bounce ideas off, help with tech, or keep things running smoothly. Just like with face-to-face meetings, a clear agenda is essential. But online meetings also offer some great tools to keep things interactive and fun, perfect for bringing together PRO-WILD partners and stakeholders from all over Europe. With a bit of planning and support, your online meeting can be productive, engaging, and enjoyable for everyone involved. Don’t forget to consult the PRO-WILD project Stakeholders Engagement Strategy for more insights about your stakeholders. For any other questions or assistance, please contact the HCC team ([email protected]). WELCOME When scheduling across countries, check time zones and choose a slot within everyone’s working hours, it makes joining much easier! 4 Depending on the goal of your meeting (catchup/updates, planning or decision-making), you need to define the timeframe of your meeting. Is it going to be a short meeting (up to 2 hours) or is it going to be an all day meeting? Define your objectives and agenda carefully, ensuring that you allow time for ice-breakers, questions or feedback and breaks. Be as realistic and precise as possible in the agenda, identifying correctly all the discussion points and the expected outcomes. In the world of online meetings, there are various platforms that can be used. The most common ones are Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet. Then how to choose the right one? It’s simple, use the one you have the most knowledge about and that you know how to navigate. Here is a comparison between all three platforms based on strengths, ease of use and basic features. Choosing the right platform Criteria Zoom MS Teams Google Meet Strengths Excellent video/audio quality, strong webinar & breakout room features, widely recognized and easy to adopt. Deep Microsoft 365 integration, strong collaboration tools (chat, files, tasks), enterprise-level security Simple, browser-based, fast setup, seamless integration with Google Workspace (Docs, Calendar, Drive). Suited for External meetings, large webinars/events, training & workshops. Internal team collaboration, organizations already using Microsoft 365, secure enterprises. Small/medium teams, education, startups, Google Workspace users. Ease of use as a Host Very easy to set up and manage meetings; intuitive controls for webinars, breakout rooms, and recordings. More complex interface; powerful but requires some learning to manage channels, permissions, and events. Extremely easy; just share a link via Calendar/Meet — no downloads or plugins needed. Ease of use as a Participant Simple to join via link, app, or browser; external guests find it straightforward. Smooth if within the Microsoft ecosystem; can feel heavy or confusing for external guests. Easiest of the three; click-to-join in browser, minimal setup needed. Basic features (free plan) 100 participants, 40-min group meeting limit, screen sharing, whiteboard, breakout rooms. 100 participants, 60-min group limit, persistent chat, file sharing, background blur, 5GB storage. 100 participants, 60-min group limit, screen sharing, captions, Google Drive integration. 5 6 Zoom → Best for external, large-scale, or training-heavy meetings. Teams → Best for internal collaboration in Microsoft-heavy organizations. Meet → Best for quick, simple, and costeffective meetings in Google environments. In the following sections, this guide will focus on the Zoom platform, as it is the tool our team is most experienced with and the one we recommend for external and large-scale meetings. While other platforms have their strengths, Zoom’s reliability and user-friendly features make it especially well-suited for these purposes. Now that you chose the right platform, let’s schedule the meeting and send out invitations. Before you do so, make sure that: You have a Zoom license for longer meetings You check all settings from the Meetings tab Enable Co-host option Enable Breakout-room option Enable waiting room Some organisations/Zoom accounts from Universities do not have the option to record the meetings. Make sure to check this with your organisation. Schedule the meeting 7 If you checked all these, go ahead and schedule your meeting. Add all important details, making sure you select the correct time zone. Save the meeting, copy the meeting link and use it in your invitations, agenda and emails. Online meetings run smoothly when there is someone there to help you through the day. Make sure to have at least one person in the meeting that acts as a co-host. The co-host can support you by admitting people to the meeting, making sure everyone is on mute when not presenting/asking questions, overseeing the chat, opening breakout rooms and most importantly, is there in case you have any internet problems and can keep the meeting open. To ensure that your meeting will run smoothly, you can test out the meeting and all the technical setup the day before. The day before the meeting Open zoom meeting Ensure audio, video & screen sharing are functional Open breakout rooms and test the functionalities Make sure you can share your slides properly in presenter mode, especially when using two screens Mentimeter: An interactive polling and quiz tool that makes presentations more engaging by collecting live input from participants. https://www.mentimeter.com/ Miro: A collaborative online whiteboard that helps teams brainstorm, map ideas, and cocreate in real time. https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVMeLiCtk=/ Slido: A Q&A and polling platform that makes meetings and events more interactive by gathering real-time questions, votes, and feedback from participants. https://www.slido.com/ 8 Meeting preparation Get ready for your online meeting just as you would for an in-person one: prepare your presentation carefully and allow time for feedback and questions. If you’re concerned the session might feel a bit flat, consider using interactive tools to break the ice and keep participants engaged and active. TOOLS USEFUL 9 Invite participants to drop their current favorite song into the chat. Build a “meeting playlist” you can share afterwards. Ask participants to change their Zoom background to an image that represents their mood, favorite hobby, or dream destination. Pin on image slide type - you can use various images for participants to express feelings or ask where are they from. ICEBREAKER EXAMPLES 16 www.prowild.com www.prowild.com How to organise an Online Meeting An easy guide www.pro-wild.eu The PRO-WILD project protects and promotes wild relatives of wheat, sugar beet, and oilseed rape, harnessing their valuable traits to improve nutritional quality and resilience to biotic and abiotic stresses. The project involves 19 partners from 11 countries and is co-funded by the EU, UK and Switzerland. www.pro-wild.eu Authors: Elena Ion ([email protected]) Alina Alexa ([email protected]) Brașov, Romania, 2025. Design and pictures: Canva.com