Try these tips and see you can’t make a favorable impression on the whole office so that not only your coworkers – but hopefully your Boss — will notice.

1. Time Management

Correctly handling your time means not only that you not for punctual for appointments, but that you use your interface time — especially with the Boss — wisely by having a written agenda of items you need to discuss. Of course, be flexible and personable if the proper conditions arise, but make it clear that you have a no desire to waste anyone’s time.

Time management skills also include knowing when to offer to show up early or stay late  because it will benefit the team effort, but be sure not to use this tactic for self-glorification or you run the risk of being labeled a “brown-noser.”

2. Tidiness

Helping keep not only your area, but the whole office, tidy is a subtle way to show that you have responsible attributes and respect for others. Take a moment to straighten supply cupboards, groom plants, wipe down kitchen surfaces and police common food areas.

This is not to say that you should become everyone’s maid or create the impression that you are a “clean-freak.” But you can make substantial “brownie points” by subtly maintaining a nice office atmosphere for everyone.

3. Proofreading

Checking your work thoroughly before presenting it for review is a crucial factor in maintaining a sterling reputation with your Boss and coworkers. With the advent of sophisticated word processors and spreadsheets, spelling, grammatical and mathematical errors are easy to locate and correct.

But extra care should be taken to thoroughly review documents for format errors, incomplete thoughts or incorrect facts. If possible, ask another person to proofread your work before submitting it for a final review since there are inevitably mistakes that the author does not catch.

4. Details

Many Bosses have so much to handle that they have to rely on their employees to keep up with all the day-to-day intricate details. To make an excellent impression on your Boss (and everyone else), create a work system where you can access information quickly upon request. Also devise filing and database systems that can be easily cross-referenced when those strange questions come up that require a quick answer. The habit of maintaining a daily log of duties that you perform is an excellent way to keep track of the type of details that so often get lost in the shuffle.

5. Appearance

Everyone radiates a certain “field of energy” that is determined only in part by their wardrobe and hairstyle. A big part of personal attraction revolves around the type of emotional field that others feel around you.

Therefore, cultivating the ability to respond to a variety of situations with a positive attitude creates the kind of field that people — even the Boss — will look forward to interacting with. This is not to say that your personal grooming should not be its a very best and appropriate for the situation, but even the best dressed person can set up a repulsive field when they are angry, frustrated or pompous.

Developing a comedic atmosphere at a business meeting can be a surprisingly effective way to discuss topics like leadership techniques and staff management. Improv players are pros at satire, and they can create parodies that show by the example some of the absurd situations businesses find themselves imposing on their employees — and how to rise above them.

The Riot Act creates a customised, well-crafted experiential agenda that delivers “serious professional fun to seriously successful business events.” Their strategies help loosen up and energize a crowd to set the stage for a unique meeting that is focused on your theme, but with a radically different approach. The Riot Act’s clients include Fortune 500 companies like PepsiCo, Kraft, Yahoo!, McDonalds and AT&T.

In New York City, the People’s Improv Theater offer facilities at their theater where you can bring your corporate team on an outing to swap banter with these masters of wit and humor, all in the spirit of creating a fun and informative enviroment where the lessons are learned by taking a fresh look at the same old solutions.  Half day sessions develop a great sense of commaraderie and leave your team laughing all the way back to the office.

Merlin Works offers team building training events world-wide that utilise the power of improv to connect individuals in unique ways using humor as their tool. They specialise in creating “rock star” moments for your team members as they  demonstrate the fun of taking risks and championing new solutions.  Their improv classes can train your meeting coordinators to add fun and excitement to everyday meetings and seminars.

Some improvisational groups can also help your marketing team devise outings where they can set up anonymously to watch the improv team get consumer reactions to various situations, products and serivces. These fascinating field trips can be set up in a sidewalk cafe along a busy city street where your team can observe how these professional improvisational groups can influence total strangers to follow their suggestions and offer their opinions on the targeted subjects.

This can be a very effective exercise in understanding what motivates buyers and what repels them.

Now that the Internet is connecting people on so many levels, it is only natural that virtual events are becoming more popular. Professional Event Planners are realising how much money they save in fuel cost, surcharges, and equipment when they can create a virtual event and without ever having to leave the office.

Different types of virtual events are available for services like Second Life, Constant Contact, Meeting One and Virtulis Center. Below are a few basic tips to follow when creating a virtual event, Internet trade show or corporate sales kickoff.

Objective

Do you want to simply make a presentation for a large audience, or do you need to have interaction and break out seminars? Determine your ultimate objective early in the process so that you can design the correct platform for your setting. Virtual meeting rooms can be outfitted with audio/visual equipment, white boards, handouts and business card distribution. Map out a storyboard that takes the meeting from registration to participation to wrap up and develop a timeline for all presentations.

Design

Craft your presentation to your particular audience and set the tone to match their knowledge of the subject. Sales presentations and product rollouts obviously have a more upbeat, enthusiastic attitude than scholastic or scientific presentations and both are quite different from public presentations to an audience that is unfamiliar with the subject. Use technologically appropriate language, especially in virtual display booths and resource centers.

Virtual Guides

When the basic structure of your virtual meeting determined, develop a concise guide to online registration, attendance and feedback. If necessary include instructions on translations of both written and verbal presentations. Also provide direct contact information, especially phone numbers, for participants who are experiencing technical difficulties with a computer or Internet connection.

As part of the Virtual Guide, provided a reference sheet that has suggestions for operating platforms, recommended software and Internet connection speed. Also have a direct link to online real-time support for use while the conference is in session.

Partnerships

Be on the lookout for companies that can partner with you on virtual events. Select vendors to help you customize your venue and create additional attractions for participants. If appropriate, setup links between your web sites to promote the virtual event, products presented or information discussed.

Follow Through

Once the event is completed in real-time, make arrangements for it to be archived on the Internet and accessible for replay for at least six months. Make sure all links to video presentations or online documentation presented at the conference have live links for easy access.

Second Life has created a professional, easy-to-use method on-line meeting space that participants can attend from the comfort of their office, home or even their yacht!

Virtual meetings not only cut travel expenses and environmental impact, but provide the flexibility to work with people in a real-time environment regardless of their location.

Practical Matters

For a fraction of the cost, virtual functions like meetings, training events, product releases and seminars can all be conducted on-line. From major companies like IBM to small enterprises expanding their territory, smart businesses are using Second Life to find innovative solutions to the challenge of communicating simultaneously  with participants all over the globe.

A Second Life meeting contains many of the fundamental elements of a face-to-face meeting, a factor that can be hard to recreate using video or conference calls. For one thing, all the avatars for participants are visible, making it easy to tell just who is present at the meeting and who is currently speaking.

Conference Rooms

The virtual meeting room contains many features of a regular conference room. Services include a sound system for amplyfying speakers and a viewing screen where you can run videos, slide shows or power point presentations that everyone in attendence can view.

Translations

One of the big attractions of Second Life for international business meetings is the many translation programs that are offered to make the kind of important real-time translations that cut down on confusion and misunderstandings.

These services use instant text translation programs that  allow you to read the on-going dialog and save the verbatim transcripts for later consideration.

InWorld

The ability to invite interested parties to panel discussions, affiliation meetings and informative lectures is greatly expanded because it is fairly simple for attendees to sign on with Second Life and create their avatars.

To assist anyone having issues with attending a Second Life event, many businesses have a help desk avatar available outside the meeting rooms to help troubleshoot individual issues so the whole meeting is not interrupted and can stay productive.

Another advantage of virtual meetings is that they can be recorded in their entirety and replayed later for the benefit of those who had timing conflicts with the original presentation.

Mixing

Participants in a virtual meeting can ask questions of each other, request clarification on a topic or participate in panel discussions. They can also chat together before and after the meeting, which creates opportunities for members to virtually meet for the first time or “run into” previous acquaintances and renew relationships.

After the meeting, notes can be posted on a virtual bulletin board to announce similar events, related information or post invitations to discuss the topics brought up at the virtual meeting.

1) The Motorola DynaTAC…

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Obviously the man in this picture doesn’t care what holding this huge chunk of metal could seriously do to his health …and reputation. He can get away with it, though. He invented it.

Introducing Cooper. Dr Martin Cooper. Motorola genius extraordinaire. The Daddy, the Don Dada, the creator of the first ever handheld portable mobile phone: an 800 MHz prototype.

Now, the phone in the photo might look huge, but believe it or not, it’s a smaller replica of the real prototype. The real one apparently weighed in at around 4.5 lbs (fondly called ‘the brick’).

In April 1973, Cooper must have been pleased as pie as he stood on the streets of 6th Avenue, New York, and made that first call.

So, that’s how you get the ladies, huh?

2) The Nokia Mobira Senator…

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Is it a personal stereo? A suitcase? No, believe it or not, it’s a mobile phone, and it was Nokia’s first baby (born in 1982). The Mobira Senator wasn’t a walk-around mobile phone, but a mobile phone nonetheless: a portable one designed for a car. It weighed 21 lbs (enough to lopside any vehicle it was in, perhaps?)

3) Motorola DynaTAC 8000X…

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On the market in 1983, the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X was the first commercial handheld mobile phone and was a close but much slimmer cousin of its original predecessor, weighing in at a more manageable and respectable 1.75 lbs.

Now this model had a rather long antenna which probably made walking around people somewhat of a challenge without almost poking someone’s eye out. In today’s ever more densely populated world where you can just about swing a toothpick, a mobile phone that size wouldn’t have gone down too well.

4) Siemens Oxford C1…

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Siemens jumped on the bulky bandwagon in 1985 with its Oxford C1 model. The company also designed a suitcase to go with it (though it looks like it had a torrid Gone-with-the-Wind affair with a car battery).

And just in case any aliens were looking to invest in the new product, Siemens made sure it printed its name in large bold print across the full length of the suitcase, so it could be viewed from space. Ah, brilliant.

5) Ericsson Hotline…

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Weighing in at a hefty 4kg, the 1988 Ericsson Hotline was the equivalent of how you’d imagine a mobile phone would look if it grew a pair of arms, dipped into an 80s wardrobe and dressed itself. Either that or the chief technical designer was an ex DJ and looked to one of those huge speakers you’d find at an 80s disco party for design inspiration.

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6) The Motorola Bag Phone…

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The 1992 Motorola bag phone was designed to make it convenient for people to walk and talk on their mobile phones. Unfortunately, it turned out not to be quite as ‘mobile’ as they envisaged and it might as well have been called a car phone. Apparently, the bag phone was so heavy that a lot of people just couldn’t be bothered to carry it around with them and left the whole caboodle in their cars. The culprit wasn’t so much the phone, but the accompanying battery and transceiver that weighed it down.

7) Siemens Xelibri…

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Released in 2003, would anyone have guessed these were indeed mobile phones? Or would it have had people screaming “don’t stick that thing in my arm”? There’s just something about this range that’s very reminiscent of health check kits used to test blood sugar levels.

Not a good look — and the consumers seemed to agree, which is why the Xelibri was only on the market for all of 18 months.

Shame that.

8) The Samsung P300…

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Like the Siemens Xelibri, the Samsung P300 appears to have had serious identity issues. This time, this one thought it was a calculator. Not it’s fault, really. Samsung, what were you thinking? Who’s the uber-dominant tech wig that came up with this brilliant idea?

Calculator or phone, it really doesn’t look that great either way.

And to think it was designed as recently as 2006.

Worrying.

9) The Nokia Vertu Bucheron Cobra…

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Nostradamus couldn’t have predicted this one. Neither could he have predicted that the words ‘mobile phone’ and ‘$310,000’ would share the same sentence one day — which is how much one of these sparkly babies went on the market for (in 2006).

If a phone is ugly to start with, then slapping gold cobras, diamonds, emeralds and 439 rubies on it only serves to accentuate its hideousness. Someone must have seen sense because only a cautious eight of these visual eye-aches were ever created.

Nokia did eventually see the light …and produced a cheaper model …at $115,000 a pop.

Great.

Enhanced Technology and Communications

Video conferencing has been around for a while, but only recently has it gained enough in quality to make it worthwhile as a tool for most businesses. Lagging internet connections make for jumpy movements and disconnected voices, but increased infrastructure is improving that.

Less Travel and Reduced Environmental Impact

Meetings that once required days for travel and required accommodations to be scheduled now take place with people at their desks or in nearby conference rooms. Educational opportunities widen as virtual students pop into classroom world-wide.
More Business Meeting Options

For today’s businesspeople, that means options are changing. The benefits of seeing someone in a meeting or presentation give more to communicate with than phone or email can provide, since visual cues are lacking during most of the correspondence.

Saving Time and Staff Absence

While cutting some of the travel is good for the budget, removing the days out of the office for the staff to manage meetings with other locations is a better reason for video conferencing. Commercial flying to remote locations can take a day or two out of the work week. Finding a larger meeting room off-site to accommodate all the participants takes more time to track down.
Working Flexibility for Employees

For larger projects, video conferencing allows an employee to work at home, rather than relocating temporarily to another location for the duration. Larger companies can take the world-wide stage as an option to stagger work in different countries to meet deadlines and schedule video conference meetings to keep all involved on where to start and end for the day’s work.

There are still occasions that call for actual travel, but video conferencing can help you make the most of those business decisions by knowing how to get the most out of the options available to you.

Stay organised and make certain you personally use the video conferencing option to understand how to make the best use of it before telling all your employees to use it. The best management practices lead by doing and make the most of everyone’s time and abilities.

Keeping up with the video conferencing angle allows great flexibility for businesses to expand and grow into better practices for profit and productivity. It is a great information and communication tool for companies to build their ability to work.

Patients are accustomed to visiting doctors in their offices, but video conferencing can change some of those visits. Disease management for treatment of a long-term disease, specialist referrals, support services in campuses and remote offices, remote patient monitoring, and nursing call center services all bring new opportunities.

Telecommunication

Journalists are beginning to get press videoconferences to allow international presence. Access to a computer allows them to ask questions and report on more events without relying on second- or third-hand information.

Education

Classes taught by video conference bring teachers and students together over long distances to experience the classroom feeling without extensive travel. It also creates options for virtual tours and meeting exciting people who can’t visit a classroom, like NASA officials or native language speakers in the same age group as students.

Surveillance & Security

Remote monitoring, motion detection, and video broadcasting are some of the features used for surveillance. Warehouses or empty facilities keep things safe by the video conferencing tools. They also could set up a person to reason with if someone enters during a time other than the norm without automatically alerting authorities.

Government Ministers

Busy officials can link in to meetings via video conferencing instead of traveling. This means they can get more use out of their time and still attend meetings at more than one venue when necessary.

Emergency response
During an emergency they’ll show up at the door, but video conferencing helps keep them trained to deal with the worst that can happen while saving on fuel and travel expenses.

Budding families

Families spread over large distances or in different countries are beginning to use video conferencing to keep in touch and show how much the babies grow. This alternative can be cheaper than plane tickets, especially for new grandparents who want to make weekly or daily appointments.

Prisoners

Video Conferencing makes for easier connections between parents and children, especially when getting regular visits scheduled with out-of-state children. Lawyers and judges are finding video conferencing benefits for hearings and depositions to speed proceedings by increasing the number of arraignments and “Assignment of Counsel” sessions per day and eliminating travel to the jail.

Seniors

Letters, phone calls, and emails only go so far, and all of them lack the nonverbal cues so vital to communication. Ideas to keep seniors included in the family life are meals and sharing stories to different generations. They also have added security when alone in the house to call someone on the video conference to stay alert during times when a repairman is expected.

Churches

Whether it’s bringing conferences to more people or simply spreading the message from the church, video conferencing proves to be very effective. There are no virtual sermons yet, but group counseling, education, and meetings between officials are on the rise.

The Mute Button

It’s important to remember whether your mute button is on or off. As a facilitator, you must give the respondent time to take the mute off and answer.
The responders must use the mute button when not speaking and remember to put the sound on when necessary. Don’t mutter into the microphone or talk to yourself. Always assume they can hear you. Limit sidebar conversations within the room and pay attention to the speaker.

Gestures

Be aware of every single gesture you make. Talking with your hands might be acceptable when in the room with other people, but watching it on video can make others nervous or dizzy.

This is especially true when lagging video may only catch a few movements and makes the image at the other end of the conference jumpy and disjointed. Gestures may also give someone a bad impression of you, so try to isolate any bad habits, like scratching your nose, ahead of time to keep them from creeping into the video conference.

Forgetting Introductions

You may not see everyone at all times during a video conference. Introductions make people feel more like they know who is talking. Make nameplates with at least 4 cm letters for easy reference.

When more than one location is involved, make a plate with that name, also. Address everyone directly when asking questions. “Mike, did you have those numbers?” “Susan, can you tell me…?”

Something Else in Your Mouth
Food, gum, or other items that might otherwise occupy your mouth are a definitely no-no during video conferencing. While you might not always have the camera on you in some larger meetings, no one wants to look over at you and see your jaw working.

The kindest assumption they can make is you’re attempting to talk and not being heard. At worst, they see your open mouth and what occupies it during their possibly lagging connection.

Time

Begin and end all video conferences on time. This is respectful to all attendees, because they definitely have other work to do even if they are not scheduled for another meeting.

It also lets them know what to expect. If someone constantly drags meetings from a half hour scheduled to two hours actual time, no one wants to go and their attention wanders. Adults are alert for 30 to 45 minutes at a time; schedule appropriately.

Accessibility is yet still another benefit derived from video conferencing. This is particularly true for a business’ client base, which tends to value ease of access without removing the advantages of face to face meetings. Also, as a way to streamline one’s business operations into a more fluid and dynamic system, video conferencing provides a unique tool. Whether it is clients, partners, associates or co-workers, both the small and medium sized business and the transnational business gain by utilizing the video conferencing option.

The expenses saved in time and money by using video conferencing transpire into the more collective interest of protecting the environment against the unnecessary strain that the prodigious amounts of business travelling places on it. As more businesses adopt video conferencing capabilities, a pattern of business practice can be instituted that will serve to enhance their role in being socially responsible stewards of society.

Video conferencing is the 21st century response to many of the challenges facing businesses as they try to gain greater participation in the global market and remain competitive. Saving time and money, creating ease of access and facility of operations and protecting the environment are all achieved in this one simple solution.

1. Arrange the meeting early. When setting up a meeting, giving all of the potential attendees as much advance notice as possible will increase the likelihood that the meeting will be well attended. In addition, should one of the key participants find the initially suggested meeting time inconvenient, having arranged the meeting early gives other attendees the greatest amount of time possible to find alternate meeting times that are workable. Since the most successful meetings are those at which all of the critical participants attend, planning ahead is integral to success.
2. Provide attendees with a written agenda ahead of the meeting. Giving participants a written agenda increases the probability that attendees will come to the meeting prepared to discuss the topics that the meeting’s organizer has defined as being the primary discussion points. This practice will help to avoid confusion as to the purpose of the meeting and can help to steer the meeting to the critical points as the meeting progresses. Providing the agenda ahead of time allows attendees to comment on the agenda and to bring a written copy with them. Giving participants the ability to voice any concerns about the agenda prior to the meeting means that should these concerns surface during the meeting, they are more easily dismissed. In addition, because written copies are available both before and during the meeting (bringing additional copies of the agenda to the meeting is a good practice), attendees can take notes directly on the agenda and have prepared issues.
3. Schedule meetings with the schedules of attendees in mind. If the participants in the meeting tend to be busiest early in the day, scheduling a meeting before noon, will have two effects: it may ensure that the meeting will not run past its scheduled time (a benefit) and it may result in participants who are not thoroughly engaged (a detriment). Conversely, meetings scheduled later in the day may be freer to run their course, but participants may be tired and less engaged than they would be earlier. Having a good sense of the schedules of the attendees can lead to a more successful meeting.
4. Use electronic scheduling whenever possible. In the internet age, more and more systems allow meeting organizers to invite attendees electronically. As systems become more integrated, w-mail programs and linked to cell phone and planners, and each communicate with each other. The advantage of using such a system for organizing a meeting is that, in most cases, the meeting will be automatically added to the invitees’ schedules, reminders will be set, and full attendance will become more likely. Furthermore, because of the ease involved in using such systems, attendees will have an easier time participating ahead of the meeting which may have a subtle or dramatic impact on their attitudes upon attending the meeting.
5. Be prepared for changes. The single most important characteristic to be emulated by individuals in all types of commercial endeavors is to be adaptable. As the pace of business continues to accelerate, those with a penchant for change and an ability to seamlessly integrate new methodologies and approaches into their repertoires will have the highest likelihood to succeed. For example, if one has arranged to have an in-person meeting, having a contingency plan to allow some, or all, of the attendees to participate remotely can make the difference between a successful meeting and one that must be rescheduled.

Following these top tips for arranging a meeting can have a dramatic impact of the level of success of a meeting.