Becoming "Virtually Amazing"

How many times have you been to a meeting that could have been an email? Or you are listening to someone give a powerpoint, and you have something interesting to add, or a question to ask, but theres simply no time for interaction? There is a team at the Climate Centre trying to reimagine virtual engagements to make them "Virtually Amazing."
Pablo Suarez, Director for Research and Innovation, argues that there is is simply too much to do on climate change and disasters for us to be wasting our time passively listening. Instead, he says, we should be better at (respectfully) calling "bullshit" when processes don't lend themselves to candid conversations and problem solving.
According to Margot Curl, Learning Coordinator, if everyone who was holding a meeting thought clearly on two aspects - the objective of the meeting, and the audience - we would be having fewer meetings and the ones that did happen would be much more interactive. A quick tip to make a more interactive meeting is to get every person to say one (short) thing right at the beginning, to creative an atmosphere of sharing.
Carina Bachofen, Manager Policy and Partnerships, added that we need to find new and innovative ways of connecting digitally that don't require everyone to be online simultaneously, with sound and video. Working asynchronously, in a distributed, collective manner could potentially solve connection issues, by designing to the available technology.
References and Supplemental Materials:

• Virtually Amazing Manifesto
• Virtually Amazing Website

The intro music is Welcome to the Show, and the background music is Beauty Flow, both by Kevin MacLeod and is used under a creative commons license. The podcast art is by Melinda.

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