How to Have the Best Virtual 1:1’s Using RemoteHQ

One-on-ones are a fantastic way for managers, directors, and executives to build stronger remote teams. Arguably, we think 1-1 meetings might be the most important meeting you can have as a team leader. However, they can also be a time suck if they’re not held efficiently.

Problems with Existing 1:1’s

Before the meeting

We all know the set-up struggle. We often are caught thinking, “What documents should I have open for the meeting? Where does that document even live again?” Not to mention that an agenda also has to be curated as well. It’s a similar thought process of deciding whether you should join the meeting early to set everything up or just wing it while your manager is joining. It’s not a lot of your time, but it is still valuable time spent doing a tedious, repetitive task.

During the meeting

How many of you have had to awkwardly interject to ask, “Hey, can you stop screen sharing? I want to show something.” It’s almost like a game of hot potato where control of the screen is jumping back & forth between the two team members! The impact is disrupted conversations and time wasted in transitions.

Even more irksome is that you’re only able to see your team members’ screen but you’re not allowed to touch. If you want to do anything, you have to verbally direct where the cursor should be moved. “A little more to the right. No, not that button, the blue one. Okay, now can you hover over the icon there?”  Ugh!

The above is assuming that you’re even able to clearly see the screen being shared. You’re always having to cross your fingers that the other person has strong bandwidth and good connection so their screen isn’t pixelated. If it is, well then you’re out of luck my friend.

Also, talk about the possibility of an embarrassing message popping up when you’re sharing your desktop with your manager. That would be awkward! Rather than having to constantly remember to switch on you ‘do not disturb,’ wouldn’t it be nice if privacy was always ensured?

With all of these issues with screen sharing, you may simply say, “Forgot it; I’m not going to rely on the screen my manager/teammate is sharing. I’ll open the window/application myself.” The con with that though is now you’re furiously toggling between browser and application windows during the call. All of a sudden you have too many things open and you’ve lost context!  

After the meeting

Unless you were able to simultaneously lead, engage, and document in the 1:1 meeting, there may have been a few things you missed. The web browser, documents, or files showcased via screen share are lost after the meeting ends.

The pain of this only increases for recurring meetings like weekly 1:1’s. There is no statefulness. With no automated record of previous interactions, more time is wasted remembering what was said when.

The next meeting

It’s simply a rinse and repeat of the tedious tasks and annoyances listed above. How can you get out of this seemingly endless cycle?!

Our Solution

Enter RemoteHQ. On top of our meeting rooms acting as virtual war rooms, we make it easier for team members to prepare for their meetings & for team managers to organize and save employee performance. Perfect for team 1:1’s!

Before the meeting

Avoid the set-up time all together with our app persistence! Automatically carry over apps across recurring sessions. So the next time you join the meeting room, the persisted apps will open immediately. This way, it’s super easy to pick up right where you left off. For our team 1:1’s at RemoteHQ, we persisted apps like Trello, Notes, and Google Drive. This way no one has to spend time prepping the meeting room 🙌

During the meeting

Screenshare? We’ve moved on from that. Have you heard of Shared Browser? It’s a web browser that lives in the cloud and gives individuals the opportunity to co-browse and co-edit together. Stop interrupting one another to ask for control, begin taking action yourself, and avoid any pixelation.

In addition to serving as the place your team talks, RemoteHQ can also be the place your team works too. With apps integrations such as Google Docs and Trello, there’s no need to toggle between web browsers and applications. Bring everything into RemoteHQ and keep your focus by working & communicating in one place.

After the meeting

On the room dashboard, workspace members can easily view who attended each meeting as their avatar will appear next to the session log. It’s another verification of who was present during the meeting in addition to the calendar rsvp.

For further detail, within our session history, RemoteHQ automatically captures meeting artifacts. These include the timeline of meeting attendees, any notes that were taken, chat messages sent, files uploaded, and more. By leveraging this feature instead of having someone manually gather and share takeaways, time will be saved and takeaways will be documented in an easily searchable archive.

The documentation of session history also provides a digital trail of all correspondences during meetings. This is helpful for team 1:1’s because it’ll provide a space to document and save key decisions or notes to ensure mutual alignment. It’ll also be a helpful reference to refer to when reflecting on quarterly/annual performance reviews!

The next meeting

Easily join again through the workspace or single meeting URL. It’s easy to remember where to go for what as room names follow the format: rooms.remotehq.com/workspace_name/room_name

Forget the operational pre and post-meeting work 😅 Discuss and work in RemoteHQ - a platform that’ll give your team 1:1’s focus and control.