Conference Call Etiquette
To Do or Not To Do, That Is the Question
Conference call etiquette, does it even exist? Yes, it does, and we've got some recommendations to help make your next conference call a winning one.
Anyone who has done any conference calling at all can regale you with horror stories of “conference calls gone bad” where a call was ruined by the sound of typing on keyboards, barking dogs or crying babies or traffic in the background, people's side conversations, latecomers, the loud crunching of chips or pretzels, annoying static, shuffling papers, the sound of “on hold” muzak, or the presence of uninvited and/or unknown participants, just to name a few.
If you are participating in a conference call, just because people can't see you doesn't mean they can't tell what you are doing. No one would ever think of going to a meeting in the office conference room and chowing down on a bag of pretzels, the crunching and smacking of lips alone would elicit more than disapproving stares from their colleagues and manager. Similarly you would never think of taking your laptop to an important meeting and start furiously typing up other work during the conversation. The sound alone would not only annoy the other people in the room, but also shows your disrespect for them and for the meeting and also that you are not fully engaged in what is going on.
No one wants to present any of those images of a lack of respect and consideration to their colleagues or their boss or even to their customer! Nevertheless, when you can't see other people and other people can't see you, subconsciously you think “Who will know?”. I can tell you from experience… everyone will!
Like anything else, good teleconferencing manners, i.e., “conference call etiquette” is just as important for participants as planning and organization is for the person hosting the call. You always leave the impression you make, so be sure to leave a good one, whether anyone can see you or not!
So what are the ground rules for good conference call etiquette? How do you know what you should and shouldn't do? How do you know how to rein in your conference call participants to make sure that your conference call is a good experience for everyone involved?
Well, good conference call etiquette starts by treating a teleconference like you would treat any other face to face meeting.
- Be on time
- be prepared
- pay attention
- participate actively in the discussion.
What are the specific things you can do to make sure you have good conference call etiquette or, that as a conference call host you encourage good conference call etiquette, we'll spell that out in our next post.
