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In today's world, conference calls are become a standard meeting format. They can be very effective and certainly more cost effective than flying people around all the time. On the other hand, they can also make communications more difficult by eliminating the visual from a conversation. We could probably go on for a bit about the way it influences the use of PowerPoint in a meeting.

I've been conducting and participating in conference call meetings for years. I like to think that when I'm facilitating such a meeting I do a fairly good job. But there are challenges in phone-based meetings that are clearly different from face-to-face sessions, especially when there are people in the call you have never met face to face before or have very little experience with. I'm sure I could learn how to do this better than I already am (assuming I don't suck at it and simply fail to realize it).

I would think "How To Facilitate A Conference Call" would be an excellent topic for a podcast. I know I would like to hear it.

The only question I have left is, "If we assume that Mark and Mike already have this one on the list, where does it stand among the hundreds of ideas on that list?"

Mark's picture
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Paul-

Thanks for your input. We agree that conference calls are a necessary skill in the managerial world. Alas, so is everything else we cover.

As always, we don't share our podcast queue. Often, we have to be sensitive to coaching clients who don't like topics which relate to areas that we are coaching them.

It's a privilege to serve you.

Mark

pneuhardt's picture

Mark,

I didn't necessarily expect a response to where this was in the queue if it was there at all. I just like to engage in interesting and often unusual thought exercises. What is the meaning of life, how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop, exactly what is it that my cat thinks lives under the stove, can the Cowboys advance in the playoffs with Wade Phillips, what will Manager Tools share with us next? Things like that...

mauzenne's picture
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[quote="pneuhardt"]I just like to engage in interesting and often unusual thought exercises. What is the meaning of life, how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop, exactly what is it that my cat thinks lives under the stove, can the Cowboys advance in the playoffs with Wade Phillips, what will Manager Tools share with us next? Things like that...[/quote]

Although licks of a Tootsie Pop (long time since I've hear *that* one) beat us out on your list, glad to see we're somewhere on it! :-)

Mike

asteriskrntt1's picture

I am guessing a good starting point would be the podcast on how to run a videoconference. Of course it is different but as with so many of the manager tools ideas, applying just a couple of the concepts presented makes a huge difference.

*RNTT