As the world increasingly relies on zoom meetings for human interaction, be it work or school, there are little things you can do to make the meetings less awkward. If (like me) you find it hard to socialise on zoom, here are some things I’ve been doing to appear more confident and sociable in those dreaded breakout rooms.
- Turn your camera ON
Where social interaction is limited, it’s always nice for everyone to “put a face to the name”. It’s always fun for me to see other people in class via zoom and it makes the professors feel like they’re actually talking to students rather than to a computer.
2. Look into the camera
One mistake a lot of people make it looking at other people on zoom. While this is a perfectly normal instinct, when you don’t look into the camera it looks like you’re not maintaining eye contact. Practice looking into the camera to look engaged when other people are speaking.
3. For goodness sake please check your mute settings
Half the time I’ll be on zoom and when someone is speaking, there will suddenly be a loud voice from someone’s unmuted mic. So please, please, check if you’re “on mute”.
4. Try a fun virtual background
A messy background for an interview or work meeting is probably not the best impression you can give people. Luckily, zoom has the virtual background function which works just like a green screen! You can now hide your messy background without having the camera 1cm away from your face, perfect! Zoom has a few virtual backgrounds available but there are plenty of places you can download it. They also serve as a great conversation starter or ice breaker!
5. Touch up appearance
This isn’t a tip that makes you appear more friendly per se but it helps with self confidence and if you’re more confident you’ll appear more friendly(?). This is definitely an easy fix for those who are looking particularly rough during a 7A.M. meeting or the parents who have been chasing after their children. Or if you just want to look fresher in general, this touch up appearance function has saved me on many occasions. The function can easily be found in the settings as shown in the screenshot above!
Happy zooming!
