# Meetings

Last updated: 2023-10-13
URL for this page: https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/meetings
URL for this site: https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/how-we-work

Our team meets virtually online several times per week. We use synchronous face-to-face meetings to coordinate our individual and group tasks and projects, to plan ahead, to review our past work, and to discuss other relevant issues.

Our online synchronous sessions supplement our asynchronous communication channels (Slack, Asana, Google Workspace, and email).

## Norms

We strive to respect one another's time by
- Setting meeting agendas at least 24 hours in advance. :writing_hand:
- Arriving at meetings on time, or even a minute early. :alarm_clock:
- Starting and ending meetings on time. :heartpulse:
- Sticking to each meeting's purpose + agenda. :hammer_and_wrench:
- Documenting proceedings and decisions. :heavy_check_mark: See below for more detail.

## Weekly cadence

Although we work across several time zones and often asynchronously, our normal work week begins on Monday morning and ends on Friday afternoon.

A description of each of our regular meeting types and our week-by-week meeting cadence is below.

### Mondays
We typically schedule weekly or bi-weekly individual 1:1 (one-to-one) meetings with one another on Mondays.

For example, on Mondays X will meet with Y for 30-45 minutes, then Y will meet with Z for 45 minutes, then Z will meet with Q for 30-45 minutes, and so on.

### Tuesdays
Our weekly group **Business & Operations** and **Leadership** meetings each take place on Tuesdays. **Outreach and Engagement** meetings take place every other Tuesday.

**Business & Operations (B+O) meeting**

Purpose + Attendees: An "all-hands" meeting to discuss matters related to organizational efficiency and strategy across teams and ongoing projects.

Hosts: Lead by Executive Director with Leadership Team Members and Administration as alternative hosts.

As of 2023-06-20, we base much of our discussion and record notes on our [Asana](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/tools-we-use#Asana) instance -- organized by "*Progress check-in*," "*Blockers*," "*Action Items*," "*Needs discussion*," "*Wins & Appreciation checkout*," and our previous agenda and notes, stored in the Team Drive, held in "*Reference*." :left_speech_bubble:

Recordings and uncorrected machine-generated transcripts are stored in the Team Drive.

N.B. Until 2022-05-03 this session was called the "Team Meeting."

**Leadership meeting**

What this meeting is for: leadership team discussions and alignment across the different teams.

**Outreach and Engagement meetings**

This meeting is for:
- Engagement team to update the rest of the team on their recent work + obtain feedback
- Debriefing and sharing out if team members had attended recent in-person events
- Discussing any other communications, outreach, and engagement related issues

N.B. From September 2023, Outreach and Engagement meetings will move to Thursdays as part of the meeting restructuring.

### Wednesdays
No meetings. :slightly_smiling_face:

### Thursdays

**Research weekly meeting**

The weekly group Research meeting takes place on Thursdays.

Purpose: To coordinate on the planning, execution, and completion of key research tasks on both the strategic (why we’re doing the work we do) and operational (what we’re doing and how we’re doing it).

Content appropriate for this meeting:
- Planning of current and future research tasks
- Updates on current research tasks
- Conversations around current research questions
- Demonstration of research findings

Content not appropriate for this meeting:
- Non-urgent organizational business
- Personnel matters

Former names: this meeting was called the 'Research showcase' until 2022-01, and the 'Research + Strategy meeting' until 2023-01.

N.B. This Thursday Research meeting will be restructured in September 2023.

### Fridays
We use Fridays for additional, ad hoc 1:1 or group meetings as needed-- for instance about work in progress or upcoming projects, or co-working / co-writing sessions.

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## Other meetings

### Onboarding new hires

*See also: [Onboarding checklist for staff](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/welcome) + [Onboarding checklist for short-term contractors](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/contractor-welcome)*

### Offboarding / exit meetings

*See also: [Offboarding checklist](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/offboarding)*

### External collaborators

See: IOI's guide to [meeting with external collaborators](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/meeting-with-external-collaborators)

---
## Documentation

### Calendaring

We keep track of our individual and group meetings -- both internal and external -- via Google Calendar (part of [Google Workspace](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/tools-we-use#Google-Workspace)).

We maintain a "team calendar" that includes our group meetings, other team events, official country holidays, and individuals' personal time off (PTO). :spiral_calendar_pad:

Please record your individual personal time off (PTO) in both the team calendar and your own individual calendar.

### Artifacts
We aim to document our working meetings as much as possible. This helps us to communicate well with one another in the present and with our counterparts in the future. For group meetings, we
- Record audio and/or video of group meetings (per consent of all parties). :microphone:
- Provide post-meeting access via shared Google Drive to audio/video recording and transcript of meetings (per consent of all parties), and to assorted meeting artifacts such as virtual whiteboard images and data. See also: [How to save whiteboard artifacts](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/info-management#Whiteboards). :frame_with_picture:

#### Steps for renaming + moving external call notes

We strive to efficiently organize our meeting documentation so that it is easy to find and reuse. We also aim to annually archive notes that are inactive.

If you plan to hold a formal IOI meeting with someone IOI has already met with in previous years, please find the notes document in the previous year's notes folder. You will then rename the file and move it into the current year's folder.

Here is an example.

**Step 1.** IOI met in 2022 with Jo Schmoe. Find the notes document in Google Drive (see illustration below).

> 

.

**Step 2.** Open the notes document and add a new section for your upcoming meeting on 2023-01-25 (see illustration below).

> 

.

**Step 3.** Change the file name from <*JoSchmoe_CallNotes_2022-07-29*> to <*JoSchmoe_CallNotes*> (see illustrations below).

Change old file name ...
> 

.

... to new file name.
> 

.

**Step 4.** Next, move the file from the previous year's folder to the current year's folder (see illustration below).

> 

## Recordings

- We do not record team meetings by default - unless at the request of a team member (e.g. who cannot attend a meeting and wants to catch up at a later time)
- Where meetings with external stakeholders (i.e. not team members) are recorded:
- the meeting should only be recorded with explicit concent from the participants in the meeting;
- within 4 hours after the end of the recorded meeting, the recording should be stored in [Sync](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/tools-we-use?type=view#Sync), and made accessible to all team sync accounts to ensure they're accessible. Where helpful, the person handling the recording should also share a link to that recording in the appropriate team Slack channel. (Also see [the infomation management guide](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/info-management?type=view#Preservation) for more information.)

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## See also

- [IOI job descriptions](https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/job-descriptions)
- Archived copy of this page (via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine): https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://hackmd.io/@investinopen/meetings

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## Further reading
- Center for Community Health and Development at the University of Kansas' Community Tool Box chapter on [Group Facilitation and Problem-Solving](https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/leadership/group-facilitation).
- National School Reform Faculty's [Pocket Guide to Probing Questions](https://www.nsrfharmony.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/probing_questions_guide.pdf), 2017.
- Range's [Run effective daily standup meetings](https://www.range.co/blog/complete-guide-daily-standup-meeting-agenda), 2022.
- Ways of Council's [What is Council Practice?](https://waysofcouncil.net/what-is-council/)

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**Acknowledgements**: We have found inspiration for meeting norms and structures in documentation by [GitLab](https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/meetings/), [JupyterLab](https://github.com/jupyterlab/team-compass), and others. Thank you!

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This page first published: 2022-05-09

###### tags: `about-us` `under-construction`

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