Hybrid Meeting Challenges
Shin-Osaka Leaders is one of the most experienced in holding hybrid meetings among the Division C clubs. We started holding hybrid meetings as early as the summer of 2020 and have held over 50 hybrid meetings so far.
Still, we face some challenges in running our meetings smoothly. One such challenge we've been facing is how to show the timing cards, which are used to show the speakers how much time they have remaining. When the Timer is at the venue and uses physical timing cards, they are too small on the online participants' screen. The solution we came up with is to use a lot larger timing cards and have the timer stand in front of the stage camera capturing the speaker's image for the online participants.
This seemed to solve the problem. That is until we reached the Evaluation Session. During this session, one of the venue speakers received an evaluation from an online evaluator. Naturally, the speaker stood at the lectern to show how she was reacting to the evaluator's suggestions. This made the timer hesitant to stand right next to the speaker. Eventually, the speaker ended up holding the timing cards, making it hard for her to take notes, minimizing the effect of the speaker standing in front of the stage camera,
After the meeting, some members suggested standing between the camera and the speaker, slightly to the side so that they can show the timing cards without blocking the view of the speaker. This should work, and this shows how we work together to make our meetings as effective as possible.
