The increase in virtual meetings, and the similarity of our surroundings in them, is causing problems with memory. So how do we overcome virtual meeting memory loss?
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About memory, retention and access
Memory is a complex beast. Have you noticed how you sometimes cannot recall what someone said yesterday, and yet an unexpected smell or sight can give you immediate clarity over something that happened years ago?
Memory relies on associations. Picking up on one thing, brings to mind the things around it, and then these trigger other memories:Oh yes, last month’s product meeting, we held it in Sue’s office, she had laid out a map of the issue on the wall, just above the donuts Jamie brought, which Jack got down his shirt, he only spotted it when he got up to speak about the recent decline. Lisa had to move out the way and almost knocked her coffee over Jeff’s analysis …
And all of a sudden we have enough cues to piece together the whole meeting: sights, feelings, smells, context, connections, sounds, layout, … feeding through to agenda, highlights, actions, insights!
Virtual meetings lack cues to support memory
But now, the meeting room is always ‘your office’, the view is a grid of head and shoulders, the wall coverings are the same, one slide runs into another, one meeting into the next, and they all look, smell, sound, and taste pretty much the same.The content changes, but the associations, which otherwise might help you remember that content, are now associated with practically every other meeting you have had in the last five months.
Celia Harris and Catherine Stevens recently illustrated this point in their article: Don’t remember who attended last week’s board meeting? Or what was discussed? Science says you can blame COVID-19. As they point out, the lack of differentiated memory cues mean that: We forget who said what, who was at which meeting, what tasks and appointments we have, and even what day it is.
And this loss of memory is impacting our work and our effectiveness. The product of a meeting is change in the people, it is essentially ‘learning’, and the more that learning is lost, the more meetings we end up having to top it up.
Increasing memory cues in virtual meetings
So we need to work out how we fix virtual meeting memory loss. Because, even when the health risks return to normal, our meetings will likely still reflect the practices we are learning right now. And that means we need to find ways of getting our virtual meetings to work better with our memories than they do currently.There seem to be two main ways of doing this:
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more emphasis on our documented records (notes, and diaries etc.) to augment and support our mental recall
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creating distinctive sensory cues for each meeting so that our minds more easily make connections and associations which better link what is easy to remember with what is important to remember
Strategies to improve virtual meeting memory
What follows is a number of simple practical ideas to implement improvements to virtual meeting memory in practice.
Some you will like. Some you might hate – so don’t use them. Simply make your choices and keep the ones that work for you and your teams.
The more you use, the more memorable hooks you create which then associate to the things you want people to remember. Your mind will make the links it needs, you just have to feed it with enough unique combinations of material to enable it to do so.
As long as it doesn’t get in the way of the content, there is no such thing as a silly idea in this space. In fact, the more bizarre the idea, the more likely someone is to make a humourous aside linking it to the content. Any distraction will be a momentary effect, but the effect on retention will be much longer.
Please add your own ideas in the comments at the end of this piece. And bear in mind that, as long as it doesn’t get in the way of the content, there is no such thing as a silly idea in this space.
One additional thing you may notice as you ponder the ideas below, is the potential for humour. And the advantage of that is that it not only makes things more memorable, it also makes them more fun.
Virtual Meeting Memory Strategies …
1. Vary your virtual backgrounds
Most conferencing software now comes with the ability to change to a virtual background (even without a green screen). If you ask your team to make a habit of picking a different background picture every day (you can upload them from Pixabay for free) it will provide more visual and differentiated cues for people to associate with content in the meeting. The more random and obscure the images they pick, the better it will impact virtual meeting memory.
2. Create a thought provoking dummy attendee
Dummy attendees are fairly easy to include in most conferencing software. The easiest way is to open up the meeting link in a second browser, and join using a different name, such as Carol Customer, or Mother Theresa. The dummy attendee can serve two purposes. On the one hand, it provides for another memorable component to differentiate the meeting. And on the other hand, it has the potential to introduce a new perspective on the topic being discussed. For more on this, see our virtual customer blog post.
3. Use a different humorous icebreaker in each meeting
Icebreakers create a great opportunity to create unique visual and emotional connections with the meeting topic. For some ideas on what you might do, take a look at our blog post on Icebreakers. For the purposes of improving virtual meeting memory, consider those that are visual, high energy, likely to provoke humour, and which can be related to the meeting topic. Giving people a few minutes to Google a visual metaphor such as a Gif or a picture, and paste it in the meeting whiteboard can work really well.
4. Summarise the main points in the chat, and save it
Good concise notes created at the time aid memory. Rushing from one section to the next so they blur together does not. Take a moment at the end of each section to conclude its main points. Nominate someone to summarise the key points in chat (or on your virtual whiteboard). Have the rest of the group agree it (and/or augment it). This aids memory in a number of ways: It highlights what is to be remembered. It reinforces the memory through writing, reading and review. And it provides a record that people own and to which they can return. Make sure you save the chat where people easily access it (for example the meeting whiteboard).
5. Save a screen shot of the faces
Before the meeting finishes, use a screen clipping tool to capture a gallery view of the meeting attendees. Perhaps they can be miming an action, or pulling a face. And add it to the meeting whiteboard. This will create another, referenceable, visual connection with the meeting and who was present, and this can help trigger other memories. Unfortunately, the order of faces in gallery view varies for everyone, but showing people the image when it is taken can help reinforce that connection.
6. Use filters on your webcam
I cannot admit to being a fan of this one, but I have noticed that some web conferencing tools have added filters. These are basically cartoon augmentations of the webcam faces. A number of them exist, and that number seems to be growing, so soon the variety may enable them to have meaning related to the topic. And the fact is, it does create another visual cue that can support virtual meeting memory.
7. Do a meeting review
Meeting reviews help reinforce the key pieces of information through reflection, and this naturally improves memory. This is true even though such reviews are more about process than content – the connections are still made. Inviting people to augment the review with images (or animated gifs) people can find online can help this process further. This again is partly due to the visual connection, and partly due to the energy and humour lift it can provide.
8. Use a whiteboard to capture discussion and ideas
Meetings that are held solely using web conferencing tools retain little visual connection with the content. Augmenting the meeting with a whiteboard has much greater potential to engage with the visual. In this way, they can be much more memorable, and the content more accessible. This is because of a number of factors:
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The persistence of the visuals themselves (they are not just presented and removed as they are in a presentation deck)
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The opportunity to interact with them, and augment and build on the ideas (adding your own thoughts reinforces the original)
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The structure between the visual ideas in how they are laid out on the board (makes it easier to retain the connections, and thereby remember)
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The ability to see the overall flow of the discussion through the visuals and the layout
9. Change the background to your whiteboard
Many whiteboards provide the opportunity to pin (and expand) a large graphic arrangement as a background. This can be one thing or many. It can be something that reinforces the theme, or an aspect of the topic. Or it can reflect the overall flow. And even if it is none of those things, it can still be unique to that meeting and a visual structure that helps the memory connect the dots. Even simply changing the colour can help – it doesn’t need to be anything complex. As long as it has enough hooks for people to link to.
10. Be creative about the layout of your whiteboard
Of course, the more logical and obvious the connections, the more the arrangement of the whiteboard will aid memory. So even though you could just borrow a Rembrandt as the backdrop for your next meeting, you may have better options. Thinking through the flow of the meeting and its connections before it happens can enable you to see the meeting as a process. This enables you to lay things out logically, and even pick relevant local background images. All of this makes the result more memorable.
11. Annotate the whiteboard at the end, and save it for all
At the end of the meeting, give people 2-3 minutes to illustrate and adorn the content of the whiteboard with images they can search for on the web. This helps create a visual summary of the meeting in a way that is easier to remember, and reinforces some of the main points in the minds of participants while the content is still fresh.
12. Change your wallpaper & other items in your office
As we mentioned earlier, part of the memory issue is having the same visual surroundings for every meeting. Because you are always in the same room – your home office. One way to help your room act as a better memory cue is to change things about it. Use your computer’s personalisation settings to change your screen background daily. Find a different object or ornament to take into your room each day and place it beside your screen(s).
13. Screen capture everyone holding up their object
Building on the above, a quick and easy icebreaker is for everyone to hold their object up at the start. Then take a quick screenshot and paste it to the meeting whiteboard. This creates more visual cues unique to the meeting. If you wish, and you have the time, ask people to briefly explain their object. You can get them to do this verbally, or by annotating their area of the screenshot with a sticky note.
14. Include music or a gif at various points
Another difference that can be included is to share a piece of music, perhaps from YouTube, as people are gathering. Or during breaks. Pick a different piece of music for each meeting. Using ‘epic’ as a search term tends to throw up compilations of film scores, These work quite well, since they add a visual (and sometimes emotional) connection as well as the audio. Again, while ‘silly’ or ‘out-of-place’ may normally seem like criticisms – in this case they can equate to ‘distinctive’ and ‘memorable’.
15. Include images in the minutes
Although whiteboards are tending to make them redundant, many people still create meeting minutes. If you do this, consider annotating the minutes with relevant or linked images. The connection does not have to be perfect – think of them more as adornments than illustrations. But the visual images will add memory cues, and these will serve to help people access associated content.
Track your progress to ensure the efficacy of this strategy.