Advice and Guidance

Guiding Principles

Supported platforms

We have entered a new era of work related activity where our events and meetings have been moved online. With University-provided collaboration tools, we now have the opportunity to meet and collaborate irrespective of location. These tools also make it easy to record sessions and it is with this aspect that these guidelines are most concerned.

The University provides platforms to make meeting up online easier both to run and to experience. There are 4 centrally supported platforms: Microsoft Teams, Collaborate, Teams Town Halls, and Zoom.

• Microsoft Teams and Teams Town Halls are the preferred options for all internal online and hybrid meetings. Please note that Zoom is not recommended for internal meetings.
• Where staff are engaging with external organisations, Zoom may be the preferred option, although Teams and Teams Town Halls can still be used with external users. The University has purchased an enterprise version of Zoom and this should be used by staff if they need to join a Zoom meeting. Other versions of Zoom, such as the free client, should not be used when conducting University business.

Recording online and digital events

Recording events or meetings is possible through the supported platforms. We don’t normally record physical meetings or events unless it is for a specific purpose and the same should apply to online or hybrid versions. Just because you can record something doesn’t mean you should. However, if there is a good reason to record a meeting,  the "Record" function is helpful. For example, to assist with note or minute taking, or on occasions when not everyone can attend and you want others to have access to what was said.

Before recording your meeting, you should consider the following:

• Does everyone know in advance that the organiser intends to record the meeting?
• Has everyone been told the reason the recording is necessary?
• The organiser must tell everyone that they are going to be recorded before the meeting starts. At the start of the meeting the convenor must remind everyone before starting the recording.
• The normal retention period for any event or meeting recording is 20 days. You must follow data protection legislation, linked below:
• Read our data protection handbook
• There are some circumstances where recordings may be needed to be retained for a longer period. In these cases, this should be articulated clearly to all participants before the meeting takes place.

Responsibilities when recording online events

Organisers of meetings and events

1. If you are the organiser of an event or meeting, you must ensure that participants are made aware of the intention to record the event or meeting. To meet legal requirements, you must also inform participants whether they can opt out, or if they have to opt in.
2. You must communicate to participants the purpose of the recording, the retention period, and what the recording may, or may not, be used for.
3. You should also direct participants to our recording privacy notices below, before recording the meeting or event
4. At the start of the event or meeting, you must advise participants of the intention to record, prior to the commencement of the recording. You must also advise any ‘late joining’ participants that the event or meeting is being recorded.
5. You must also ensure the recording is deleted in line with the retention period communicated to your participants.
6. Where it has been agreed that an event or meeting will be recorded and that the recording will be available publicly, you must make sure all participants are aware of the terms under which the recording is made available and for what it may or may not be used. 

Participants in meetings and events

1. You must not make your own recording of a meeting or event, whether that be video and/or audio, using the recording option on any of the collaborative tools, or using a personal recording device, mobile phone, computer or tablet.
2. You must not download the event or meeting recording from the collaboration tool or make a copy to store elsewhere.

Recording Privacy Notices

You may also want to read through our Recording Online and Digital Events Privacy Notices:

Recording privacy statement (external collaborators)

Recording privacy statement (internal – staff and students)

• If your event isn't free plan your budget and set your fees carefully in advance - ensuring you account for all your costs.
• Consider what types of sessions you want to run - For example, non-teaching lectures and keynote talks, breakout sessions, poster sessions, demonstrations, social events or sponsor presentations.
• Consider if your audience consists of internal, external or a mix of colleagues.
• Pick the technology that facilitates the sessions you want to run - When hosting community events or small project meetings, try to use platforms that are robust enough to handle videos being on all the time. This makes the meeting more engaging.
  • We recommend the use of Microsoft Teams or Zoom for your sessions.
  • If you can't find what you are looking for there are more tools available that might suite your needs. This guide from the Digital Curation Centre aims to provide you with a quick overview of the key considerations to make when conducting workshops, seminars and meetings online. It is not intended to be an exhaustive guide but will provide a basic level of understanding of various tools to help you get started.
  • However, please note that the tools referenced in the resources above are not supported by ISG; the IS Helpline will not be able to provide assistance with these tools should you opt to use them.
• Allow sufficient time for comfort and screen breaks - Particularly if your conference spans over several hours, days or weeks
• Make the information on your conference schedule, as well as how to join and register, available to attendees as far ahead of time as possible, with regular reminders in the lead up to the event.
  • If possible, you may want to create a webpage with all relevant information and links to your registration pages (e.g Event Booking at UoE or ePay for paid events) and sessions.
  • When scheduling online events that will have participants from many countries, be sure to make clear to participants the time and in which time zone the event will be held. This time zone converter can be useful when planning for different time zones.
  • Make sure to send clear and concise joining instructions to participants and encourage them to test the software prior to joining the session to identify any problems. Make sure they receive:
    • A link to the platform meeting room
    • Link to the agenda/notes for the call
• Prepare instructions for your speakers and ensure they are knowledgeable about the technology you are using - An example on such instructions can be found on the Research Data Alliance website.
• Test out the platform in advance with everyone who is playing a key role in speaking or facilitating the meeting - Ensure everyone’s audio and video is properly configured, test using the chat or Q&A, decide together how you will run the session, etc.
• Define clear roles for session chair or facilitator, tech support and Q&A - It is too much for one person to run all these things. Someone needs to monitor chat to see if anyone has audio issues and help troubleshoot these in real time.
• You may choose to amplify your event using social media - Amplification will help to advertise and disseminate your event, helping it to become more impactful and reach people who may not be able to attend on the day.
  • Choose a hashtag prior to the event, advertise it well in advance, ensure it is included in all conference communication.
    • Remember to check the hashtag across all common social media platforms to ensure it is not already in use, before circulating it.
  • Encourage participants to use the hashtag across all their social media platforms.
  • Disseminate the hashtag and relevant conference information on a regular basis in the run up to the event.
  • You may find it useful to appoint a social media manager for the event to coordinate social media channels and live tweet or live blog keynotes.
    • If you are live tweeting keynotes, be sure to notify the speaker in advance and confirm they are happy to be tweeted.
  • After the event, if participants are writing blog posts or conference reports, encourage them to share them using the hashtag.

General Tips

• Prepare and pre-load any presentation slides - or ensure the speakers know how to pass controls between them if all presenting from local devices.
• Ideally prepare a couple of slides with screen grabs on where to mute/unmute and troubleshoot audio settings as people often struggle to find these.
• Webinar participants tend to arrive early - about 5 minutes before the official start! Until you hit broadcast or start the webinar, they will usually be seeing a blank screen and can’t hear you. Be sure to regularly post welcome messages in the chat though stating when the session will start along with links to any shared docs. You can share your screen with an introductory slide stating the key information, too.
• It is best if the session chair or facilitator, along with the presenters can enable video - at least at the start of the meeting so people feel more at ease.
• Begin by explaining how the session will run and where you want people to add questions -Also flag up if they need to select an option such as ‘to everyone’, ‘privately’ when adding a comment, etc. Not all platforms offer all functionality, and that’s a factor to bear in mind. The chat in Microsoft Teams, for instance, is always visible to all attendees.
• It is generally best if people mute when not speaking but they often forget to unmute so watch videos for moving mouths - It is a good idea to share a screenshot pre-meeting showing where the mute button is - it can be hard to spot on some platforms. Most platforms allow the main host to mute participants, so keep an eye on any additional noise that you might need to cut.
• If you are hosting a meeting with multiple participants, the hand-raising feature in many platforms can be useful - This essentially gives the chair a queue which ensures everyone gets a chance to speak and nobody is allowed to dominate. Remind people to put their hand down afterwards. As with face to face meetings, it is important that the moderator keeps to time and ensures everyone has a chance to have their say.
• Remember - a meeting that was scheduled to run for an hour but is done in 15 minutes doesn’t need to keep going for the full hour! - If you get things done earlier than envisaged most people are very happy. Conversely, if the meeting looks likely to run over the time allocated, it is important to check with participants if they are OK to continue for a period of extra time. Make this period of extra time clear and have a cut off point.

Icebreaker Ideas:

• For smaller meetings  - where people do not know each other, an icebreaker or set of introductions at the outset can help. The moderator should move through the list of attendees as participants will not know what order to proceed in. Alternatively just try and generate some ad hoc discussion amongst a few people while you’re waiting for the call to start to set everyone at ease. This usually helps to generate higher levels of participation later on.
• For larger groups - you could start a document presession to collect very short bios. Ideally these would include photos, Twitter handles, relevant skills / expertise and something individual that helps to break the ice and build rapport. If your technical solution allows for breakout rooms, you can split attendees in smaller groups for a short period at the start of your event to allow for small group networking. This requires all your attendees to have microphones.

Running a Q&A Session:

• Ideally have one or two people available to moderate questions - On Microsoft Live Events, you have the option to moderate questions before making them public. At the end of the meeting, you can also download the questions raised during your event. If you have a shared agenda and note taking document, you can also ask attendees to ask questions there. This allows them to ask questions anonymously and “vote” for questions by just adding +1 to questions. You will need multiple people to work on this. It is almost impossible to chair, watch the chat window and collate questions and notes alone.
• For Q&A sessions following a presentation, it is a good idea to have 2-3 questions selected before opening it to others just in case there are none or there is a lag time.
• Try to engage the audience during the session by asking questions at the end of each talk, using online polls or opening up chat - Sometimes people are very quiet and it can take a long time for questions to be written out so have enough gap-filling material to hand. As noted above, have a few questions ready to pose in case there is a gap. You can also consider collecting questions from participants ahead of the session via email or google doc so you have some to start with.
• Try to encourage a few people to ask questions orally so it’s more of a discussion, not just chat which can be quite alienating - However, this can be difficult to moderate if you have more than 20 people so bear the size of the group in mind. Ask people to make clear in the chat or by raising their hand if they’d like to ask a question orally so that these can be done systematically by the moderator. Again, a note taker who is looking at the chat box is vital for this.
• Make use of online polling platforms such as Mentimeter to allow audience participation - These can keep the audience engaged and can be quite fun (quiz competition works particularly well). They can also collate results automatically and can be used for analysis afterwards.
  • Please note that Mentimeter is not supported by ISG and IS Helpline will not be able to provide assistance with it.

For additional technical support and guidance on large scale and bespoke events please contact University of Edinburgh Hospitality and Events Collection, via events@ed.ac.uk or 0131 652 2189. This includes video conferencing, live streaming and technical assistance with your event.

They are also able to provide conference and events advice and other aspects of Event Management including delegate registration, abstract and financial management.

For advice and guidance for each of the Online and Digital Events Platforms, please see the relevant webpage:

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams Live Events

Blackboard Collaborate

Microsoft Stream

Zoom

EventsAir