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Photo: Jelena Živković / Moment RF / Getty Images
Micro on, ring light on fold-away mode and always looking nicely into the camera: This is a good start for the video conference - now everything just has to be linguistically correct if it becomes international. Is your business English enough to cope well with hybrid meetings? How do you say that you will bring in a few colleagues or that the colleague is in the home office today? In cooperation with the linguist Maren Pauli, who is responsible for the English courses in companies at the language learning app Babbel, here comes the test: How well are you linguistically prepared for hybrid meetings and video conferences?
Even getting started can be difficult. If you are unsure, it is best to write down a few introductory sentences. And presenting from home has many advantages, Pauli believes: “You can create the environment you want, which helps a lot in keeping nervousness in check. Notes and small aids are also much easier to use than would be the case with a presentation directly in front of the participants. "
Her advice: As a greeting and to directly lighten the mood, it is advisable to ask the participants a question: »Hello everyone, thank you for joining today. How is everyone doing? «Nobody will give an extravagant answer to this - but the polite phrase makes for a pleasant introduction. According to Pauli, an alternative question would be: "Where is everyone joining from today?" Where are you connected from today? This can be a good icebreaker when there are participants from different places.
A short round of introductions may also be helpful: "Before we get started, let's go around and introduce ourselves to the group". Before we start, I would like to start with a short round of introductions.
If no one answers, you as the moderator can address someone directly: "Let's start with you, Paul!", Because in a large call in particular often nobody answers first.
To say goodbye, you can come up with a sentence - for example, "Thank you all for joining the call / meeting / presentation today and have a great rest of your day!", Thank you very much for being there today, I wish you all have a nice rest of the day.
But now we start with our quiz - so that you can also get the planning and the meeting over the stage without a speech accident.
Have fun!
