Hybrid meeting leadership: the chair has to act as a TV host

The person running a hybrid meeting has to speak to two audiences at once: the people in the meeting room and the people behind the screen. That takes practice, and there’s plenty to learn from professional TV presenters.

Hybrid meetings are part of everyday life in most workplaces: some participants sit together in the meeting room, others join from home or from another location. Flexibility, the chance to focus and digital ways of collaborating have proved their worth across industries, but they put new demands on leadership, and on whoever runs a meeting that’s part video call, part in person.

Learn from Breinholt, Linde and Corden

Hybrid meeting leaders need new role models. There’s inspiration to be found in Danish TV hosts Sofie Linde and Anders Breinholt, and in the big American talk show hosts like James Corden and Jimmy Kimmel: hosts who are used to talking to, and holding the attention of, both the guests in the studio and the viewers at home on their sofas.

In short, whoever chairs a hybrid meeting has to learn to see themselves as a TV host, reaching both the physical audience around the meeting table and the people at home. That takes preparation and practice, both in general, by training the meeting skills themselves, and before each meeting, when the content has to be razor-sharp before you walk in.

Get through to people, or you’ll lose them

It may sound obvious. Of course everyone prepares for their meetings. But the hybrid meeting needs extra preparation and practice. Perhaps even cue cards, like the ones TV hosts use when they don’t have a teleprompter.

Above all, TV hosts can teach you presence and how to get people engaged. As the person running the meeting, you have to switch between speaking directly to the people in the room and to the people behind the screen. Both groups need to feel included and engaged in what you’re meeting about. That means you have to be switched on and reach all the way into people’s living rooms, where you’re up against every other screen and distraction.

Speak to the people at home

It’s easy to lose the people at home: there are always emails to answer, documents to read and feeds to check. If you don’t hold their attention, they’ll soon have tuned out.

A few good tips will take you a long way. But just as you can’t get fit by reading about it, you can’t read your way to running good hybrid meetings either. You have to practise. And fortunately, you don’t have to do it alone: Breinholt and the other studio hosts weren’t born good at this either. They’ve practised and had help, and it’s worth considering whether you and your colleagues should get started too.

Tips for running hybrid meetings

• Be present for everyone: Switch between speaking to the people in the meeting room and the people at home, and look into the camera when you’re speaking to the participants behind the screen.
• Communicate with energy: Smile without overdoing it, and know your agenda, so you don’t fumble.
• Get yourself ready before the meeting: Mental preparation matters even more in hybrid meetings. Set time aside, and never rush in.
• Create dialogue and engagement: Bring everyone in. Ask questions, and invite responses, especially from the people on screen.
• Emphasis and language matter: Speak clearly, and turn your head towards the microphone.

Want to take hybrid meeting leadership further?

Do you or your leaders need practice in getting through to every participant, both in the room and online? That’s what we work on in talks and workshops. Also read Hybrid meetings: 5 good reasons why they HAVE to work and Hybrid meeting culture: five steps to reinvent your meetings.