Hello. This is Kagawa from the WS (Webmaster Support) department.
The WS club holds a general meeting once a month called the monthly meeting, where all members gather.
Even if all the members gathered together, since the WS club is divided between Yoyogi and Kamiyama, it is difficult to gather physically...So we decided to start holding meetings in a slightly unusual format, as shown in the photo at the beginning.
In this article, I would like to tell you about a somewhat unusual general meeting of the WS Department.
What prompted me to hold a general meeting?
As Deputy Manager Kurihara has mentioned several times in past articles , many of you may already know this, but our WS Club has two bases: Yoyogi (5 people) and Kamiyama (7 people).
However, even though we work in the same department, there are people in Yoyogi and Kamiyama who we have never met, or perhaps even spoken to. I have heard comments from members who have just joined the company such as, "What kind of person is Mr./Ms. XX in Yoyogi?" and "I get nervous when I call them."
Therefore, we decided to hold a meeting once a month for all Kamiyama and Yoyogi members to gather, hoping that by fostering a sense of unity as colleagues in the same department despite the distance between us, we could smoothen and revitalize communication at work.
A slightly unusual meeting structure where real and virtual events run in parallel
Although it was a meeting, this time it was not a typical business meeting, but rather the purpose was to stimulate communication between members. First, I discussed with Matsunaga, the leader of the Yoyogi team, and decided the direction of the meeting.
The points emphasized are as follows:
- Everyone can be an active participant
- To become a place for interaction between Yoyogi and Kamiyama members
- It’s not hard to prepare
We were busy with regular project work and kept postponing it many times, but Matsunaga and I managed to come up with this meeting after much deliberation.
Flow of the WS Department General Meeting
- Divide the Yoyogi and Kamiyama members into three mixed teams and gather in separate rooms for each team (three Yoyogi rooms, three Kamiyama rooms, a total of six rooms).
- A PC was prepared in each room, and everyone could access Google Hangouts from six different locations and "gather" via video conference.
- The question setter announces the "theme" and "what they want you to think about" (one person is nominated in advance each time and the question setter thinks about the theme in advance).
- First, leave the group hangout and create separate hangouts for each team.
- Each team will discuss and summarize their opinions on the topic given by the questioner.
- The team representative presents and shares the opinions expressed within the team with everyone.
- end
*The team combinations change each time. *The question setter changes each time.
*The topic of the question is free. It can be about work or personal matters.
*Discussions within the team will be announced on the spot and summarized by the team leader.
The overall picture can be visualized as follows:
1. All-group hangouts
We will switch to this when the theme is announced at the beginning of the MTG or when the team representative presents the team's summarized opinions.
2. Team-specific Hangouts
When we have team discussions, we switch to this mode so that we can focus on the discussion within our team.
(We decided to have separate meeting locations to ensure close communication within the team.)
The meeting will proceed by switching between the two Hangouts mentioned above.
"Okay, let's meet in 15 minutes for a group hangout."
It was a rather strange-feeling conference body that was created.
Try it yourself
To be honest, I didn't know what would happen until I actually tried it.
However, some of the concerns we had, such as switching between each team's Hangouts, went more smoothly than we had anticipated, and there were some unexpected positives, such as the fact that each person was closer to the camera they were connected to, which gave us a better view of each person's facial expressions through the screen.
(In a typical remote conference with a large number of people, it is difficult to clearly see each person's facial expression.)
And most importantly, I think the best thing was that everyone enjoyed the conference.
In this way, the members' emotions are directly conveyed through their facial expressions.
Of course, there are areas that need improvement.
The topic can be anything (it can be work-related or personal), but so far the topics have been pretty heavy, like "how can each individual achieve their budget" or "how can you increase productivity?" (lol), and so far the participants have ended up not being able to come up with an answer on the spot.
The emphasis is on communication. However, to be honest, I also want each team to be able to clearly summarize their opinions and share them with everyone.
Therefore, I have decided to discuss the content of the theme to some extent with the person who comes up with the theme in advance. It would be one option to let everyone know the theme in advance and have them prepare their thoughts, but I think it's more interesting to come up with ideas on the spot than to have ideas prepared in advance.
Even though it's a general meeting, we're not in the same space.
This is a slightly unusual meeting that was born out of the fact that the WS Department works in two locations, Yoyogi and Kamiyama, but by starting this meeting, I feel like the distance between Yoyogi and Kamiyama has somehow become closer than before.
We are not sure how long we will continue with this meeting, but for the time being we would like to increase unity within the WS Club through this meeting once a month!
KAGAWA YUTARO