Brevity: The Key to a Great Virtual Meeting

Getting to the point is always important in business communication, but it can make or break a virtual meeting. We’ve all experienced someone taking forever to make their point. It drains the energy and people start to multi-task. And with many of us in back to back meetings, if people aren’t concise, the meeting can run long and we show up late and frustrated to our next meeting. 

Everyone in the meeting, both host and attendees, needs to be intentional about getting to their point and making space for others to speak. Here are five simple tips to help you and your team be more concise in your virtual meetings:

1. Make your meetings shorter.

A great way to force people to be more concise is to make the meeting shorter. Research suggests that time pressure helps increase focus and productivity. We suggest 45 or 50 minute meetings instead of one hour, and 25 minute meetings instead of 30 minutes. 

When I share this tip with clients, I often hear, “I tried that once but we ended up just using all the time.” Sticking to a shorter meeting will take commitment on the part of the host and you will need to do it more than once to get it right. The host must remind people, keep things moving, and when time is up, call it. After a few shorter meetings, people will catch on. And they will be grateful for the quick break before their next virtual meeting! 

2. Turn the camera on.

Turning on the camera helps people be brief because without it, you are talking into the void. When you can see your colleagues' faces, they can nod to show they get it, or they can squint to show they don’t get it. These cues help you know if you’ve landed your point or need to go back and clarify.

3. Use a structure when you speak.

Rather than speaking in a stream of consciousness and eventually getting to your point, pause and use a structure (aka framework) to help you make your point clearly and succinctly. Here’s one handy structure for speaking up in a meeting: PREP 

Point 

Reason 

Example

Point summarized

PREP forces you to start with your point, and stop once you’ve made it. You can use this to make a point, answer a question, or state the goal of the meeting. For example, let’s say I need to state the priority for my team at the moment, I can say:

P - Our top priority right now is finishing the virtual presentation skills curriculum.

R - While we have a lot of important projects in the air, this one is the highest stakes and it’s coming up the soonest.

E - Our first presentation class is in one week. After that class, we will have a whole two more weeks before we need to present our storytelling material. 

P- Again, let’s finish the presentation skills curriculum before worrying about anything else. 

4. Once you made your point, STOP TALKING.

This takes discipline. After you’ve spoken, you could pause and say, “Is that enough information?”  “What are your thoughts on what I’ve shared?” But resist the temptation to say the same thing again in different words. To help with this, I literally close my mouth so I can’t say any more words. I breathe and remind myself to listen. 

5. Set clear time limits for participation:

Give clear time parameters for each part of the meeting. For example, "Let's take 5 minutes to hear a few people's thoughts." Or, "Let's go around and share your final thoughts on the project in one minute or less." As the meeting host, you will need to keep reminding people of the time limit. You may worry you’re being annoying in the moment, but your audience will appreciate that you’re taking control and moving the meeting forward. 

And that’s it! Five quick simple tips to be concise in your virtual meetings. 

For more tips on being concise, check out our recent video.