193: Zoom Pro Tips for Presenters with Leanne Hughes

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What's next? This is a question we're all having to ask and answer more frequently. I'm Jenny Blake, your host of the Pivot Podcast and author of Pivot. The only move that matters is your next.

Notes from this episode. Visit pivotmethod.com podcast if Change is the only constant, then let's get better at it. Here we go.

Hello my friends. I'm going to take you behind the scenes of the podcast for a minute and tell you that a couple weeks ago I was planning on doing an episode on Virtual Facilitation Best Practices. Then I started to see everyone and their mother putting this content out online and I felt like, you know what? This isn't a unique value add. While it's true that I might have a lot of tips and advice after facilitating virtually and in person since 2006 when I first joined Google as an AdWords product trainer, today's special guest had so many awesome specific tips that I'm going to turn the mic over to her. But of course I couldn't resist squeezing a few in myself at the end. Without further ado, let me introduce Leanne Hughes, who's in Australia, has her own fantastic podcast. First time Facilitator, she had submitted a voice note to me and having just had a chance to listen back, it is amazing. So if you want some pro tips on how to make the most of Zoom in a pretty quick summary, I'm so grateful that Leanne took the time to record this audio just for you. Listening to the Pivot podcast, even if you think you're already a Zoom ninja, you will get some ideas from what Leanne has shared and even her approach to doing run throughs, because it is a lot to juggle. The extra functionality of Zoom is incredible and it's why it's the go to software right now. But it does mean juggling a lot in addition to just speaking with a smile, projecting your energy and imagining a riveted audience of people even when you can't see them. So I am going to turn the mic all the way over to Leanne today. This will be a quick podcast, short, as I like to call it. It's not as long as a usual conversational episode, but nonetheless I'm sharing it with you because these tips gave me some ideas and I facilitate on Zoom all the time, so I hope they give you some ideas too. And if we missed anything or you've seen something super creative out there, whether you came up with it or you were experiencing it as a participant, let us know. I would love to collect some more ideas. Submit@pivotmethod.com Ask and if you want to learn more about the one and only amazing, energetic, enthusiastic, contagiously positive Leanne Hughes, check out her podcast first time facilitator and you can also go to leannehughes.com virtual/training and you can express interest in running one of these Go live before you go Live sessions with your team. You can learn more about her podcast@first time facilitator.com with that, here we go. Turning it over to you Leigh Ann.

Hey jb, I'm so happy to hear that you're doing an episode on Virtual Facilitation. I think it's one of the topics of the week, if not month. I've really had to pivot some of the podcasts that I've been doing and really focusing more on virtual facilitation. So much so that this week I ran a pilot training session and it was called Go Live before youe Go Live. And I thought I'd share the format with you and your listeners in case they want to do it for their team, their peers. So what it is is you someone organizes a Zoom call, which is what I did. I set that all up. I then invited five other people to join me for one hour and the purpose of this was to get training into what it's like to actually co host a Zoom webinar or meeting. Getting used to all the features and functionalities because I've read a lot of articles, I've sat in and watched other people present, but it's completely different when you're in the driver's seat, when you have one screen on and you're sharing slides. There's so much going on with Zoom if you particularly if you want to create some more interaction.

So here is a checklist of things that we each experimented as the co host. The first thing that we did is we asked everyone else for feedback firstly on our sound so if they could hear us loud and clear. Feedback on our lighting and the background, that was really helpful. Also feedback on if we were looking into the camera, because I think a trap often when we're on a webinar is we're looking at the other person on the screen, but really we should be looking into the camera to really engage the eye contact. We also shared our screen and what we discovered was when you share a Google Slides presentation, you can't immediately share it while it's on full screen. And I'm getting into the detail here, but I find that if I do have something created on Google Slides, I'll export it to PDF or PowerPoint, have that on full screen, and then when I share my slides in Zoom, what it does, it shows it in full screen rather than everyone seeing my desktop and what's going on in there. We also tried out the whiteboard feature in Zoom and there's a cool trick. My friend Steph Clark, what she did was she uploaded a picture of blank post it notes that was the image on her screen. And then we actually annotated over the top of that so it looked like we were actually writing on these post it notes. Just getting a bit more engagement into into the meeting. We ask people to raise their hand. And I think the hardest thing about running a meeting or a webinar on Zoom is the content, like constant context switching that you're doing. You're talking about a topic whilst you're also trying to look at chat, seeing what if people are raising their hand and that can help you. Well, it. I certainly have lost focus before, so we were just practicing the context switching. Now another way to sort of isolate that is in a webinar I ran the other day. I had my slide presentation, but every fourth or fifth slide it said have your say. And that was a prompt for me and everyone else on the call. I looked over at the chat, I responded to questions I see, I had a look at who was raising their hand and then I responded to that. And then after that went back to my presentation. So I wasn't doing a lot of context switching. The other thing I discovered through this, go live before you go live was a way that I set up my slides. So usually I use the full screen and I've got images and text that runs around. But what I figured out is that it's probably helpful to stack your content on say 3/4 of the screen because if someone's viewing it, they're going to see the content, but they'll also have the overlay of the chat box and participant box in Zoom, which means that if that's covering some text it's not very accessible. So think about adjusting your slides that way. I also use the ask a question feature. Now that is a feature of Zoom webinars. And again, that was part of my have your say part. Now that is a webinar feature, not a Zoom meetings feature. Polls in zoom. Awesome. So you can pre. Before you even start your call, you can actually have some polls happening. So if people arrive, they can start interacting immediately. Now with poll questions, what I suggest, I think you talk about reducing the friction. I just ask some really simple questions. They don't even have to be related to content just to get people engaged and to start interacting from the beginning of the presentation. And I would also suggest, if you are new to this and a lot of people are getting used to remote work and jumping on these online calls and they may be unfamiliar with the technology. So I would spend about 10 minutes orienting your participants to zoom, getting them to raise their hand, getting them to answer questions in chat. Even if it's something as I post an emoji to describe how you're feeling today, a really great icebreaker. Jonas Rianto, I got him on my podcast the other day. What he does is he has an opening slide of about 12 different images, just random photos. And he says, right, he's labeled each image 1 to 12. And he goes, how would you describe your day using one of the photos? Put your response into chat. So what I love about that is it's quite prescriptive, but people can just look at that and answer. Then they can go into breakout rooms and discuss why they picked a certain picture. Um, yeah. What I've discovered with Zoom and running webinars as opposed to face to face workshops, is you do have to be really specific with the instructions that you give. Very pointed, very deliberate instructions. That's probably the biggest change that I've noticed. I spoke about breakout rooms. That's probably the best feature of Zoom. So you can allocate. So pre. Allocate breakout rooms if you've got people that you want to. I think someone in Momentum asked about design sprints. So if you want certain people in different teams, you can allocate that beforehand or you can do that in real time when they're in the breakout rooms. As a host, you can send broadcasts to them and there's also a one minute countdown to get them back in. What I find also is everything is a bit slower in terms of interaction on the online facilitation, in the way that you facilitate online. For example, if you ask a question In a workshop, that's almost an immediate response, whereas online people take a bit more time to consider their response before typing it into chat. So just keep that in mind when you work out timings. So that's possibly like. I mean, I could go on and on, but I'm very aware of time and I'm sure you've covered a lot already, Jenny, but I just wanted to share those tips and hopefully that gives some of your listeners some structure if they want to run their own go live before you go live sessions as well. Thanks for all that you're doing, Jenny. I'm loving the all of the Pivot updates on your podcast as they come out live. Thanks.

Thank you so much, Leanne. I love all of these tips, especially the post it one and trying that with a whiteboard. I'll just add my mom recently we had a family zoom she put up. It was Easter the day we were talking, so she put up a blank page. Maybe she was using Photoshop, but it doesn't matter. And then we all had family draw times, so that was really fun too because there were kids involved and it's fun to just sketch around in a way. For people who like doodling while talking, it gives you something to do. I also want to give a shout out to Dan Rome. He's the author of Back of the Napkin. I interviewed him for Speak Like a Pro back in the day. Way back in the day. I'll put a link to that virtual conference in the show notes in case any of you want to check it out. Dan just created a course called Online Meeting Magic, and if you go to his website, napkinacademy.com, you can get a free PDF. It's the online Meeting Magic checklist. Dan is somebody who is so creative at using visual skills and drawing to do everything from sales planning to figuring out what's next to leading magical online meetings. So that's somebody that I really respect in this space and some tools and courses and resources that I think you would all find helpful. I mentioned very briefly before I introduced Leanne, so much of the success of online meetings is going to come from your energy. And that is sometimes hard to generate when you're sitting down in your house positioned right in front of a camera and you can't always see everybody. Or maybe you're starting to speak and then you see the chat box blinking and then you see something people are saying and then you're looking at thumbnails and then someone in their thumbnail is distracted or you're Looking up their nose or they come off of mute.

Part of the skill of facilitation is not just these technical skills and learning all the cool add ons or functionality that you can use. Like Leanne shared. Part of it is this mindset of bringing your best energy no matter what is happening on the other side of the screen. For so many new virtual facilitators, this is really hard to do because you want, you crave, you almost need that in person feedback of seeing people's faces. Are they engaged? Are they smiling? Are they distracted? Are they bored? The best thing you can do is just keep going. Bring your best energy. I mentioned present with a smile, get excited, connect to yourself with your excitement about your content or facilitating this meeting. Move quickly. Leanne said sometimes people take longer to respond. That's true. Keep moving. Sometimes I like to leave lots of extra time for people to chime in and sometimes I say let me know in the chat and I'm going to keep going. I'll come back to what you've written in this next section. There is a bounce back skill of the show must go on when weird things happen, when you lose even seeing your own video thumbnail, just keep going. And this takes practice too because in the beginning you might be worried, oh no, something is going haywire, something is wrong. That's why I love what Leanne is doing of having a run through going live before you go live, especially for a bigger program or maybe even something you're getting paid to do. She said it, but I'll repeat it. Don't forget you've got to look in the pinhole tiny circle on your laptop or computer while you're presenting. Otherwise you won't be making eye contact with the audience. I know that's weird to say, but it's very easy when you're presenting to be looking at your slides or looking at the chat, looking elsewhere and it actually conveys sort of a weird message to the people watching. So as strange as it is, I mean don't forget to blink, but do remember to look at the camera and not at the screen. Sometimes I'll present with a dual monitor. I loved Leanne's advice to leave some room on your slides so that if people have chat or the participant window open, they're not missing information. Sometimes I'll present on a dual monitor and when I do that I will sometimes turn off my video of my face while I'm speaking to the slides and then I turn my video back on when it comes time for Q and A if you've heard my semi rants on Screen Fatigue and Digital Introversion previous Pivot podcasts, you'll know that video for over an hour is just not my jam anyway. I don't really know who needs to look only at my face for that long. So for that reason I do like to have slides and when I'm in some information based slides, I'll just turn my video off. Is it the end of the world if someone cannot see my face for 10 or 20 slides and then I turn back on? No, that's my personal preference. You can figure out what your preferences are and how you want to work it. I also think if you're going to present something on Zoom where it's just your face or other people's faces and and there's no slides, then at least for those who can't make it live, give the video version and the audio. Because as beautiful as you are, as wonderful as it is to see everyone's faces and some people might want that for others, they're going to catch up when they're on the go. They're not going to want to sit in front of their computer again with the sitting, and watch a video where there's not really a requirement that they watch that recording on video. Another thing that is important to mention right before you hit record or you're ready to go live, make sure that you mute all participants. I always like to have a co host with me, so as soon as someone joins, ideally someone from my team, I make them a co host of the meeting and I ask them to help monitor throughout the presentation. If anyone comes off of mute, even accidentally, please mute them because you really want to get a clean recording for these things. They can also help in the chat. They can put links to anything that you're mentioning, resources, answer questions before you have time to get to them. And sometimes I'll miss a question that comes in when I'm in the more heavy sort of presentation part and my team member can copy and paste that question when we open it up for Q and A at the end. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a total grump. I do love seeing people on video and I love hearing their voices. So I'm not trying to have it totally silent or one directional meeting either. But I'll often say and when we open it up for Q and A, please feel free to come off of mute or come off of video if you want. I would love to say hello and see your face with one caveat I never force people to come on video. I think that's really bizarre, actually. I really do. Even though it's sort of a norm right now with everybody working from home. If you are going to require people to be on video, tell them in advance. A lot of people will assume that if they are not the presenter, they won't have to be on video. And you don't know what they're wearing, what they look like, their hair could be messy. They just might feel self conscious. So I always like to say this is audio only or this call, I'll be on video and it's video optional for you. I always say at the end of our momentum calls, this is a low pressure, no pressure video environment. If you want to be on video you can, but there is never any pressure to do so. On the other hand, sometimes I've been hired to facilitate something where it's important to the organizer that everybody be on video Brady Bunch style. We see their faces. Maybe even a lot of schools and teachers are requiring this so they can see if people are paying attention. Whatever your choice, just be clear about it. The last tip I'll share before wrapping this one up. Of course, I always like to hear your tips too. It was really helpful on a zoom meeting I was on recently when the presenter said right at the beginning, FYI everybody, you can change the view on your screen. In the upper right hand corner you can click Gallery view or speaker view. Gallery View is the Brady Bunch lockup of however many people. If you have nine people, it'll be three rows of three and then speaker view is that it only highlights the person who's speaking at that time. Most people don't know that they can toggle that setting on their own. They think that it's only the presenter who does that. Similarly, as a presenter, I once made the mistake thinking I controlled that. So if I put Brady Bunch View on, then everyone else would see that and so would the recording. And that is not the case. I said that was my last tip, but I lied. The last thing. Waiting Room Feature Zoom because of security issues, recently turned this back on for everybody. For a while it was not the default. The waiting room is that you have to admit people manually, one by one. This can be great if you want to start after a certain time or you really want to make sure that you are aware of every single person who's joining. I would just recommend that once you get going, you do need a second person to admit people because otherwise you're going to be talking and trying to present while having to admit people who come late. So just make sure you pay attention to that. It's never a bad idea to do a run through as Leanne said, and to have a backup team member as a co presenter just so that you can have help in the chat and with all these extra features that are going on. We just recently did our first Zoom Momentum Coffee Talk slash Brilliance Barter and a great tip came from Justine who talked about having a zoom hangover sometimes. She heard from another facilitator that that if you toggle the three dots next to your video in zoom you can turn off. It's called hide self view and this person had made the comment that it's unnatural for us to be looking at so much stimulation at any given time, but especially looking at ourselves for an hour or more. In a way it's like looking in a mirror. This is what he said. It's so true. So maybe you would get less zoom fatigue. Screen fatigue or as Justine so brilliantly called it, a zoom hangover. If you just hide self view and remember that's those three dots in the upper right hand corner of your little thumbnail. Goes without saying, but you can also pass this along to any participants if you are the one facilitating. I know I speak for Leanne and myself when I say we hope you found this helpful and let us know what other really cool things you've seen people do. I would love to hear it. Thanks everybody.

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Pivot podcast. Make sure you don't miss an episode or my insider tips and templates by signing up for Pivot List, a curated twice monthly newsletter where I share the inside scoop on what I'm reading, watching, listening to and the latest tools I'm geeking out on. Sign up@pivotmethod.com pivotlist get show notes from this episode@pivotmethod.com.

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Remember, build first, then your courage will follow. Hasn't it always.