Remote Team Meeting

While every team is different, most remote team meetings will benefit from following a similar structure. So while this agenda template is relatively simple, don’t be deceived. It’s an excellent framework for virtual meeting agendas for almost any team.

Think of it this way. Your team is your most important investment. But bad virtual meetings have become the bane of modern companies. That's a shame. In truth, nothing cultivates trust and connects your team better than a well-run team meeting, even if you're not in person. This simple remote team meeting template will help your team meetings be more useful than ever.

Without an agenda, meetings can often involve more time, effort, and people than needed. They get disorganized and end up being a waste of time. People get bored and tune out. This a major issue for virutal meetings, especially conference calls.

This malleable remote meeting agenda can be customized to fit any type of team meeting so you can focus on the insights and initiatives you need to without wasting any resources.

6 Tips for using your remote team meeting agenda

Give your virtual team meeting a purpose.

If your team meeting doesn’t have a goal or purpose, why should anyone even dial in? Instead of having a wishy-washy reason for being in the meeting, state a clear purpose. 

Writing out the meeting’s purpose helps for two reasons. It makes it very clear what you’re going to use the meeting time to accomplish. It also makes it clear what the meeting is NOT for, helping keep the discussion focused. If the meeting discussion goes on a tangent, you can point to the purpose of the meeting as a reason to table that discussion for another time.

Celebrate even the small wins

It’s great to start your staff meeting with some positivity. The little celebrations don’t have to be significant strategic gains or completed projects. This section of the agenda is about seeing the steps along the way to these wins, as much as seeing the victories themselves.

Put your data in the remote team meeting template

If possible, don’t just include links to data on the agenda. Put the actual numbers in as well. This data helps make sure that everyone on your team has a chance to see them before the meeting. It’s also useful to have data on the agenda in case you want to refer back later.

Have everyone summarize their updates in advance

For the updates roundtable part of the meeting, share the meeting agenda as a doc everyone can edit. (Hugo is an excellent tool for this.) Ask team members to put 2-5 bullet points in the agenda summarizing their updates. These bullet points on your meeting notes will help updates go more quickly (and be less tedious as a result).

Phrase meeting discussion topics in the form of a question or action

A common mistake when setting agendas is that topics are too general. Something like “PR Agency” gives almost no indication of what might be discussed. “Decide whether to renew our PR agency contract,” however, lets everyone at the meeting know precisely what needs to be accomplished.

Assign all action items before the meeting is over

Every task that comes out of the meeting should have an owner. The owner doesn’t necessarily need to be the person who will ultimately do the work. But someone should be directly responsible for every action item. Put the person’s name in your meeting notes next to their action item.