Imagine if you have a CD stand with a 200 CD collection. Over time, you use each CD, sometimes one after the other and eventually you have 200 CDs, not one in their respective case. Extremely disorganized, isn’t it? Well, recurring meetings and tasks that spawn from these meetings can prove to be a challenge when it comes to working remotely, they can look like a disorganized CD case.
Here you will find out how simple techniques blended with the “correct” use of BaseCamp can organise your recurring meetings and your tasks that spawn from them
Meeting Purpose:
Meeting purpose should be very clear. It can be one of the following
- Update (Ideally it should be recurring meeting)
- Brainstorm (Ultimate outcome for brainstorming should be included and need to consider that all outcomes may not be possible in a single meeting
- Decision (What (proposal), when, Who (decision maker) need to be clearly documented)
E.g discussion about product closure should be replaced by proposals
Proposal: Shut down X product by [time frame], Impact and Data,
Decision-maker – Dhawal
Proposal: Continue product Y etc.
A one-time meeting should be scheduled only after looking at the availability of all participants in Google calendar. Recurring meetings will block participant calendars, by default.
BaseCamp, the God of Project Management
50% of the effort that goes into Streamlining tasks is taken care of by BaseCamp. The remaining 50% is taken care of when you understand the true usage of BaseCamp.
A few pre-requisites:
- Every scheduled meeting should have a Basecamp to-do list or shared google doc if basecamp project does not exist.
- Every to-do should be accompanied by the context for the to-do in the notes section. Also, the desired outcome should be stated clearly. Any proposals by the to-do proposer should also be included here. For all update messages, ensure that all data is provided in the respective to-do.
- Any question on the to-do should be raised in the comments instead of bringing it up during the meeting. This will allow the to-do owner to think and respond. If the to-do owner anticipates discussion on the question, she can be prepared with the response to be presented during the meeting.
- Every to-do point should end in an action item, modification in the deadline or closure.
An example:
Let us consider the example of the Products Team.
The first question they ask themselves is, “what are we going to focus on majorly?
It is but obvious, the Products!!!
The first thing you do on BaseCamp is:
Step 1:
Create a new team where you have all your major focus points (in this case “Products”) as To-Dos.
Step 2:
Create standalone projects of these To-Dos.
Note: These standalone projects will have all the major aspects that the team respective team is focussing on with regard to the respective product.
One extremely important thing to point out about BaseCamp is that it allows every team to collaborate seamlessly with each other.
For example, let us consider the eLumine v2.6.0 Optimization Update.
This update is an initiative that the eLumine team has taken and needs to collaborate with multiple teams to complete the project.
Here are the steps we followed:
- Created a sub-project for eLumine v2.6.0 Optimization Focused Update.
- Create To-Do Lists inside this project for each aspect of your plan of action. You can see in this case, for eLumine v2.6.0, the following aspects had actionables:
Pre-development, Marketing Plan, Development, QA, Release, Post-Release.
- Setup a God-level update of this task in the project of the concerned product, in this case , eLumine.
In this case, the eLumine project has its focus points listed down in the form of to-dos list that are continuously being pursued. How do you add your new spawned v2.6.2 here? It’s simple, the marketing tasks related to the update go under the “Marketing to-dos list”, the Development tasks related to the update go under the “Development To-dos list”, and so on and so forth.
Moderator & Scribe:
Before we move on to the tasks/to-dos spawned from these meetings, let us discuss the two most important roles to define in the recurring meetings that your team conducts, a Moderator and a Scribe.
- Moderator: As the name suggests, the Moderator is someone who maintains the decorum of the meeting and makes sure the agenda is fully discussed with no delays. Here are a few responsibilities the Moderator shall assume, it can change with every team:
– Meeting moderator should ideally circulate the last meeting minutes at least 2 days in advance.
– To make sure the meeting starts and ends on time.
– To make sure team members do not drift off the agenda and spawn new discussions.
– Makes sure the meeting agenda is put up on BaseCamp before the meeting.
– The Moderator should bring in participation from everyone by asking feedback specifically from those typically not participating.
– The meeting should not end before the action items are summarised and discussed by the moderator.
– Checking basecamp a day before and updating todo’s.
– Moderator should send a message in the group about asking for updates a day before the meeting.
– The moderator should decide on topics to be discussed based on meeting time.
- Scribe: Every meeting should have a scribe who works with the moderator and takes notes of the points and todos during the meeting. Nobody wants to write up a meeting after the fact and this helps to structure the thought process and everyone can contribute. Being able to structure conclusions and follow up actions in real-time makes a video call more effective than an in-person meeting. Here a few responsibilities the Scribe has to assume:
– To pen down important notes and discussion points.
– To pen down all the tasks and to-dos and who they are supposed to be assigned to.
– To make sure all this is uploaded on BaseCamp just the way it is and in-turn informs the moderator of the same.
Make sure that you have a designated Scribe and Moderator for all your formal Meetings.
How to Deal with New Tasks spawned from Recurring Meetings and where to add them?
Let’s put the Products Team under the Microscope once again and see how new tasks, that are spawned from recurring meetings, are dealt with.
It’s Wednesday, the CEO is waiting for his hot cup of updates from Team Pegasus.
The meeting commences, the team leads opening BaseCamp, almost as if to flaunt their well-organized tasks, the CEO is impressed with the neat and tidiness. 🙂
BaseCamp opens on the screen being shared (coz working from home is the new normal) and then Team Pegasus is opened under “Teams” and the to-dos of the same team are opened.
All the Products are listed as To-Dos, as we discussed above.
Now, enter “eLumine”, the update to be given, the famous eLumine v2.6.0 update.
Always keeping in mind that there are other products/updates to be discussed in this meeting, the team leads have kept in mind that updates need to be more in the form of an “overview” for the CEO to understand what this task/update is all about and what it brings.
The eLumine Optimization Update Marketing Plan link is placed in the notes among other updates for eLumine.
Clicking on the link will take the shared screen straight to the concerned To-do/task in the respective Project/sub-project.
Imagine doing this for all your Products and all your tasks (from weekly/recurring meetings).. Impressive? Not yet? Read below:
Importance of My Assignments and BaseCamp Search Feature
“Ctrl+J”, your secret to using BaseCamp with lightning speed.
Tired of always going back and forth, switching between Home, the unending projects, the tasks and so on? Tap these two keys together and a search panel will open up.
This will take you to any to-do list under any project in the blink of an eye.
Scroll no more, the BaseCamp Search Feature is here.
Yeah, the search feature is amazing, but do you want all the tasks that have even the slightest bit to do with you? Are you seeing the possibility of never missing out on any tasks assigned to you? YES, My Assignments saves the day. Here, all the tasks assigned to you, assigned by you, tasks you are mentioned in, etc. are shown under one hood.
