You will be able to run a presentation that works for people in the room and online.
A town hall in a meeting room in the office, twenty people around the table and thirty more joining from home and the regional offices. The speaker presents to the room. The laptop at the end of the table shows the slides to the online group, but the camera points at the screen, the microphone sits next to the projector fan, and the people online can hear the speaker only when she faces their way. At question time, the room asks six questions. Nobody notices the three waiting in the chat until the session has ended.
Hybrid talks are now a normal part of working life in many Singapore workplaces, and they are harder than either a room or a call. You have two audiences with different experiences of the same talk, and the people online are easy to forget. This lesson covers how to make a hybrid talk work for both.
The first job is basic: the people online need to see the slides clearly and hear everything that matters, including questions and comments from the room, not just you.
Share the slides directly from the laptop into the call, rather than pointing a camera at the projector screen. Pointing a camera at a screen produces a blurry, washed-out image that is often unreadable.
Sound is harder. A laptop on the table picks up the person nearest to it and very little else. If the room has a conference microphone or a speakerphone system, use it, and test that people online can hear someone speaking from the far end of the table. If you are moving around, a wireless microphone that feeds into the call helps. If the room has none of these, stay near the laptop when you speak, and repeat every question from the room before you answer it, as lesson 7.2, Listen, check, answer, then stop, suggested.
Do a test with one colleague joining online before the session. Ask them to tell you honestly what they can see and hear, from your position and from different seats in the room.
In a hybrid Q&A, the room has a natural advantage. People raise their hands, the speaker sees them, and the questions flow. The people online have to type in the chat or unmute and wait for a gap, which rarely comes. Without a plan, the online group gets left out.
So take questions from remote attendees first, or alternate between the room and online. Say so at the start of the Q&A. "I'll start with a question from online, then go back and forth." Starting with online questions signals that you have not forgotten them, and it encourages more of them to ask.
Wei Ling's quarterly operations review is hybrid, with site managers in the room at headquarters and others joining from Johor. She now opens every Q&A with "Let's start with Johor," and the number of questions from the remote sites has gone up.
You cannot present, watch the room, read the chat and manage questions all at the same time. Ask a colleague to watch the chat for you.
Their job is to follow the chat during the talk, answer simple technical questions such as "the slides are frozen" or "can you share the link", note any questions for the Q&A, and raise them at the right moment. "We have a question from online. Rahul is asking about the timeline for the second site."
Brief the colleague before the session. Tell them which questions to raise during the talk, such as urgent clarifications, and which to save for the Q&A. Agree a signal, such as a raised hand, for when they have something. This one arrangement fixes most of the problems remote attendees face in hybrid talks.
When you present to a room, it is natural to look only at the people in front of you. To the people online, that looks as though you are speaking to someone else while they watch through a window.
Treat the camera as one more member of the audience. As you move eye contact around the room, one person per sentence as in lesson 5.3, Eye contact, stance and gestures, include the camera lens in the rotation. Look at it when you make key points, when you welcome the online group, and when you take an online question.
Position the laptop or camera so you can glance at it naturally, ideally near the front of the room and roughly at eye level. If it is at the far end of the table behind everyone, you will not look at it, and the online group will feel it.
Address the online group directly from time to time. "For those of you joining from Johor, this affects your site first." It costs a few seconds and makes the remote audience feel part of the talk.
Most hybrid problems are setup problems, which means they can be solved before the talk starts. In the activity, you will plan the setup for a hybrid talk, including who will watch the chat and how remote questions will be taken.
Plan the setup for a hybrid talk, including who will watch the chat and how remote questions will be taken.
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