Everything That Goes Into Booking In-Person Meetings for Distributed Teams

Organizing in-person meetings is something many people think anyone can do. But rarely do they truly know the detail that goes into it or do it as often as executive assistants (EA). As an EA, planning a meeting for a distributed team often requires travel logistics, venue research and booking, attendee coordination, and budgeting—and that’s before you’ve factored in doing these tasks for 15+ individuals.     

In short: just because someone knows how to use a calendar invite or how to book a flight, doesn’t mean they know about the complexities of booking in-person meetings for distributed teams.  

Keep reading to see exactly what’s involved in the meeting planning process or go deeper in our recent webinar: Stand Out with Successful Meetings: Insights from Expert Planners, in partnership with ASAP (American Society of Admin Professionals) now on demand. We review how to streamline the planning process, enhance attendee experience, and achieve meeting objectives efficiently.

The Figures Around Meeting Planning

Did you know that meeting planning takes up to 25% of an EAs time each week, and that 62% of EAs plan and manage 10-20 meetings every year? It’s a major portion of your time and focus—and one that isn’t going to change any time soon. In fact, 59% of travel buyers have expected business trips to increase in 2024 compared to 2023, with North American companies being more optimistic, with 66% expecting an increase in travel volume. This indicates that a general desire to meet face-to-face is still very much a priority, even with remote and hybrid work.    

Destination Research for Distributed Teams

When booking meetings for distributed teams, the destination of the meeting is more complex than it might seem at first. You can never assume that one location will work for everyone or is most cost effective because you have an office location—it requires a lot of research, communication and planning. Because of this, it’s useful to be able to visually see where all your attendees are coming from to allow you to choose the most convenient location. Tools to help you do this are explained in more detail below. 

Even when you think a destination looks suitable, travel arrangements or costs might make it more difficult - or even impossible - for certain attendees to join. Remember to check travel requirements for those traveling abroad, and - as good practice - you may also want to check whether individual attendees have responsibilities that might make it harder for them to travel long distances, like childcare or medical challenges. 

Finding The Right Venue

Choosing the right meeting venue is crucial when organizing an in-person meeting for a distributed team and has a lot to do with the purpose of your meeting. Is your meeting a formal corporate event? A creative brainstorm? Or a networking event that will require conversation, food, and drinks? Criteria like catering options, audio visual equipment, and comfortable seating for long sessions should never be left to chance, or the last minute. 

To make sure everything runs smoothly, aim to visit (either in-person or via virtual tour) the meeting space beforehand to confirm it meets all your requirements.

Attendee Coordination

As you well know, booking an in-person meeting for a distributed team requires a lot more coordination than simply firing out a calendar invitation and hoping for the best. There’s so much more that rests on an EA’s shoulders: finding a suitable date and time, sharing calendar invites with each attendee, tracking RSVPs, monitoring schedules, and managing cancellations or last-minute joiners, and more. 

Attendee coordination is something you have to manage consistently until the meeting wraps because these things can change at any time. So, make sure that you’re monitoring for any changes in attendee requirements or issues with travel and location, as these will need to be sorted quickly and thoroughly. 

Travel and Accommodation Logistics

If you’ve been an EA for even a short time, you likely know all about how much time and effort goes into booking travel for distributed teams. Not only do you have to manage different methods of travel (flights may not always be the best option, after all), changes and cancellations, check-ins, tickets and documentation, travel preferences per attendee—but many companies now have sustainability factors to think of, too. 

When booking travel and accommodation, think about who you’re booking it for. What kind of hotel room will they need? Will they be happy with a taxi, or do they need a car service? If traveling by plane or train, do they need a first class ticket? Small details like this can be the difference between a great meeting experience and a disappointing one, so remember to do your attendee research. 

Tracking Expenses and Budgets

And after all that complexity, you’re still expected to keep within strict budgets and keep expenses to a minimum. With so many attendees and changing demands, it’s all too easy to let an in-person meeting for a distributed team spiral out of budget. It’s important, then, to keep track of all the data relating to the above factors in real time. 

Pre-meeting cost quotes, bulk orders of food and drink, and off-season travel are your best friends if budgets are particularly tight. And don’t be afraid to remind attendees about company policy if you’re worried about rising costs. 

Of course, all of this can be made infinitely easier with the help of the right tools. 

How The Right Tools Can Help You

An EA is a relatively solitary role. There’s rarely a wider team to share the burden of your responsibilities with and - as this blog has highlighted - there are a lot of individual responsibilities that fall into your lap every single day, even the ones outside of meeting planning. That’s why it’s especially important to ask for the kind of tools that can help you share some of the burden. 

For example, the TROOP platform has been expertly designed to make each of the above challenges less stressful and less time-consuming. Because no matter how incredible you are at your job, you’re still only one human being! 

TROOP is a meeting planning and group logistics platform that enables you to:

• Discover, research, and compare options for locations and venues in one place
• Manage attendee logistics including calendar invites, RSVPs, and live schedules
• Have visibility and tracking of expenses and budgets

With dozens of data points to support making optimal decisions for your team’s meeting objectives, you’ll never have to shoulder all the responsibility of booking meetings for dispersed teams again.  

Conclusion

Learn more about how to streamline and improve your in-person meetings for distributed teams, watch our recent webinar: Stand Out with Successful Meetings: Insights from Expert Planners now on demand. Also, check out our guide Mastering Meetups: How to Plan In-Person Meetings Effectively.