5 Tips to Lower Your Stress Levels from too many online meetings.

So how can we lower our stress levels from too many online meetings during our work week now that more of us are now remotely working from home?

Back in March 2020 many governments decided to perform a “state lockdown” due to the COVID-19 pandemic crisis.

However, as everyone else also was also not traveling anymore, a new normal has been established – lots of remote meetings.

Does this sound familiar?

Initially, I even assumed my days would be less packed and then got overwhelmed with the number of meetings requested to attend.

Due to the Corona Virus, the daily routine of many people has changed completely.

The adoption of collaboration tools such as Microsoft Teams, Slack or Zoom was taking up big chunks of daily work time.

Some would even say, the driver for the digital transformation is neither the CEO nor the CFO, it is COVID-19

How Many Online Meetings is Enough

 Right now people are meeting online for everything from work, to happy hours with friends, to therapy sessions or even working out.

A large number of these meetings can seriously deplete your precious resources. 

One of the primary obstacles to recovering from meetings is the time it takes to switch from one point of focus “the meeting” to another “productive work.

After a fruitless or stressful meeting, your productivity is drained as your resources are reallocated to deal with the resulting mental stress. 

The end result is that it often takes longer to fully engage in the next piece of work.

I’ve noticed it takes me half an hour or 45 minutes.

Add in multiple meetings per week, and you might lose hours of productivity in a week, forcing you into overtime just to get your actual work done.

Reference:

When too many meetings turn remote work into a Nightmare?!

5 Tips to Lower Your Stress Levels from too many online meetings.

 1.Start each day with exercise.

Research proves that regularly scheduled workouts help build mental acuity and focus all day long.

Regular exercise and movement help improve cognitive skills and focus in a number of both direct and indirect ways.

This helps reduce inflammation, improving sleep and increasing the supply of oxygen to your brain by forming new blood vessels.

Any simple, low-impact aerobic activity will help build focus.

Try walking or cycling, as well as mind-body movement disciplines such as yoga and Pilates. 

2.Schedule strictly meeting-free time periods.

Reserve certain time periods for deep work when you feel you are most productive, and resolve to schedule no meetings during these time periods. 

The simple act of scheduling meeting-free times in your calendar that are dedicated solely to this type of work activity helps you relax, knowing you won’t be diverted into other activities that cause distractions and impede focus.

3.Take regular breaks throughout the day. 

Making a habit to taking a few minutes each hour to stand up, walk away from your computer, stretch and get water helps you maintain a deeper level of focus throughout the day.

At a minimum, get up and walk around for a few minutes every hour to change your physical and mental state. 

Disengaging for brief periods helps you maintain focus throughout your workday. 

4.Decline Meetings Without Agenda.

Unless it is for informal gatherings such as a “virtual coffee break”, or “virtual after work drink”; there the title speaks for itself.

Make clear the reason for the online meeting and set goals for the reason your scheduling it.

5.Define the working-hours,

Days can become very long when staying in the home-office.

There are many apps out there to keep you on track and schedule out your day so you can stay on track and set reminders.

Attending to emails on certain times during the day and not so spasmodic. Social media at certain times only to stay on track of focused work.

Keep your daily goals in front of you and a priority list.

How to Make You’re your online Meetings more Productive

Instead of worrying about the number of meetings you have every day, you start focusing on how to make them more productive.

Here are some of the best ways to make meetings more productive that are backed by science:

• Keep meetings under 20-minutes. It’s enough time to be taken seriously, but short enough to maintain people’s attention. It also doesn’t interfere too much with everyone’s busy schedule.

• Thanks to Parkinson’s law of triviality, which argues that groups of people often give disproportionate weight to pointless discussions, invite fewer than eight people.

Stick to between 3-7 talking points so that your presentation will be more memorable.

• Encourage attendees to stand-up. Or have a walking meeting.
• Make sure that you create and send out a purposefully constructed agenda.

Reduce the amount of meeting you have per day by filtering out unimportant or standing meetings.

Instead, you can reject these requests or suggest alternatives.

Some of the most popular options would, through email, online chats, collaboration apps, or virtual meetings.

You could also consider more one-on-one meetings instead of bringing together your entire team.

Create FAQ sheets, Wikis, or videos that your team can access for recurring questions or problems.

Reference:

https://www.calendar.com/blog/perfect-amount-of-meetings-per-day-backed-by-science/.

Watch you Stress levels and Don’t let online meetings ruin your workday.

Meetings are essential for the success of your company, but as with everything, too much of a good thing can wreak havoc over time.

Learn to manage your focus and attention as the mental resources they actually are.

You’ll find it’s easier to switch directions and dive back into more meaningful work tasks. 

Facts on Stress Levels and Online Meetings

Back in April, Zoom founder and CEO Eric S. Yuan said the company hit a major milestone by serving more than 300 million daily meeting participants during the pandemic.

This large uptick in the number of meetings during COVID-19 is also why many people feel burnt out on virtual meetings and experience reduced professional efficacy, said Hayes Drumwright, CEO of POPIn.

“People are burned out on recurring conference calls that don’t feel productive.

Anyone who has participated in a 20-person conference call can attest to it,” said Drumwright.

Stress Levels and Online Meetings?

 “Being connected doesn’t mean video streaming all day with your colleagues.”

It means understanding your role on the project, or in the business, and having clarity around your contribution to the team goal.”

Since online meetings often focus on a person’s face. Things like posture and hand placement that would normally provide insights in an in-person meeting can go missing in a video call.

Online meetings can also be stressful for people since they become hyperaware. Our self-esteem can be challenged with the feeling that they’re being watched and may worry about how they look.

How surreal it would be to hold a mirror next to the face of the person you are talking to? That’s the video chat experience,” Robertson said.

“Your brain is distracted by the view of self and thinking about how you look. If you’re showing engagement or smiling enough this affects your focus on the meeting.

It’s exhausting.”

Reference:

https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/15728-zoom-burnout.html