Recent reports suggest that organizations spend up to 15 percent of their collective time in meetings. That statistic climbs to 50 percent for upper management. Despite this, executives consider over 67 percent of meetings to be failures and up to 92 percent of respondents admit to multitasking during a meeting. These figures readily explain why it can be such a challenge to quickly schedule meetings. In a nutshell, people just arenât that keen on them. If youâre the designated meeting time planner for an event, the others likely donât envy you your job. Whatâs likely to complicate this even further is trying to schedule the meeting across time zones.
Since the advent of the pandemic, remote working is quickly becoming the norm rather than the exception. Digital nomads are mainstream and companies are much more likely to have an internationally distributed workforce. As a meeting planner, finding a time and date that works for everybody can be almost as time consuming as the meeting itself. Here are a few pointers that might make your job easier.
In today’s globalized world, it’s common for project teams, customers, and company stakeholders to be located in various time zones. While this geographic diversity brings fresh perspectives, it does make scheduling meetings more complex. Planning a meeting when attendees are in distant time zones requires careful coordination.
With some preparation and creative thinking you can find meeting times that work for all participants. Here are some best practices for scheduling productive meetings across multiple time zones
Use a Time Zone Converter
The first step is using an online time zone converter tool to see how your local time translates in other locations Entering cities or countries allows you to compare time zones at a glance,
Seeing all the different time zones visually makes it easier to identify overlapping hours. Time zone converters also handle daylight savings time dates.
Popular options include:
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World Clock Meeting Planner – Compares multiple cities and time zones simultaneously.
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Time Zone Converter – Converts times instantly as you enter city names
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Every Time Zone – Displays a map with adjustable time in every global time zone.
These tools provide an essential starting point to schedule meetings spanning time zones.
Find Overlapping Working Hours
Look at everyone’s regular working hours and find times where they overlap. Avoid proposing meetings too early or late for attendees as this decreases productivity.
If there’s no time overlap, consider:
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Extending hours – Have some participants start early or work late to accommodate others.
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Shifting core hours – If possible, temporarily adjust working hours to create more overlap.
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Alternating by day – Change meeting time daily to share impact across time zones.
Make a Time Zone Cheat Sheet
Create a table listing relevant cities, countries, time zones, and working hours. Include notes on daylight savings time. Print it out or share with the team to simplify scheduling.
You can also add columns for participants’ names, best contact times, and any scheduling preferences. Having key details in one place avoids confusion.
Alternate Recurring Meeting Times
For recurring meetings with far flung teams, vary the time periodically to distribute the inconvenience.
For example, rotate between an early and late option each week. Or host 2 back-to-back meetings per month – one optimized for Asia and one for America.
This ensures no one time zone shoulders the brunt of difficult meeting times long term.
Sync Calendars Across Your Team
Using shared digital calendars makes it easy to see everyone’s availability at a glance. Platforms like Google Calendar, Outlook, and Calendly facilitate calendar syncing and event scheduling.
Participants can block off times they’re unavailable, enter time zone details, and indicate preferences. Automated notifications and reminders also help keep everyone aligned.
Confirm Times Using a Poll
Double check proposed meeting times by sending an online poll to attendees. This gives them a chance to speak up if the time doesn’t work before officially scheduling.
Popular polling options include Doodle, When2Meet, and Teamup Calendar. You can customize polls with candidate times tailored to different time zones.
Add Time Zones to Your Personal Calendar
Display multiple time zones in your calendar to instantly convert times as you schedule events. Most calendar apps allow adding extra time zones.
Seeing the other relevant zones alongside your own local time avoids confusion when organizing cross-timezone meetings.
Try Asynchronous Communication
When real-time meetings are impractical across distant time zones, take an asynchronous approach. Collaborate through methods like:
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Email – Email chains allow team members to communicate when it’s convenient for their own time zone.
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Project management platforms – Tools like Asana, Trello, and Basecamp enable task coordination through comments, file sharing, and status updates without live meetings.
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Pre-recorded video messages – Record short video updates and email to your team rather than meet live.
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Shared documents – Collaborate via docs and slides stored in Google Drive, Dropbox, etc. with version history and comments.
The above tactics allow productive collaboration across time zones without rigid synchronous meetings.
Tips for Running Effective Cross-Timezone Meetings
Once you’ve scheduled a meeting across multiple time zones, use these tips to keep it productive:
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Send calendar invites early so attendees can plan accordingly. Include time zone details.
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Provide a meeting agenda beforehand so participants can prepare.
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Test A/V ahead of time and ensure everyone has compatible tools.
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Take turns leading meetings to share early/late impacts.
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Record meetings for those who couldn’t join live.
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Share notes, action items, and resources after meetings in a shared online workspace.
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Avoid overly long meetings – aim for 30-45 minutes to stay energized.
Proper planning and preparation sets up cross-timezone meetings for success!
Benefits of a Diverse, Global Team
While scheduling can be challenging, having a globally distributed team brings many advantages, such as:
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Expanded market understanding from staff immersed in key regions
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Fresh cultural perspectives that reduce insular thinking
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Specialized expertise by tapping talent worldwide
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Better customer coverage with staff in multiple time zones
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Increased creativity through diversity and greater idea exchange
The scheduling headaches are well worth the benefits!
Time Zone Scheduling Tools and Services
Dedicated tools can simplify planning meetings across time zones. Here are some top options:
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Worldtime Buddy – Lets you compare multiple time zones and find optimal meeting times.
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TimeBridge – Suggests meeting times based on participants’ calendar data.
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TimeTrade – Automates scheduling through integration with calendars.
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ScheduleOnce – Uses calendars to identify availability and confirm meetings.
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Doodle – Popular poll service to propose and vote on meeting times.
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ZipScheduler – Automated scheduling assistant that identifies best mutual times.
These services provide an easy way to coordinate effective global meetings.
Make International Collaboration Easier
With globally dispersed teams here to stay, learning how to schedule productive meetings across time zones is an essential skill. By using time zone converters, finding overlapping hours, alternating schedules, syncing calendars, and embracing asynchronous tactics, you can make collaboration flow across any distance.
While it does require some extra planning, the diverse perspectives brought by a multi-timezone team are worth the effort. Follow these best practices to schedule meetings that accommodate everyone.
Soon you’ll be leading engaging discussions with global partners, customers, and colleagues – no matter how many time zones separate you!
Ready to get started?
It might seem self-evident at first, but it can be a really neat way to narrow down the scheduling window without causing conflict amongst your attendees. When youâre meeting across time zones, your participants are likely to have only part of their working day in common. Being aware of this overlap will make it easier for you to book a meeting time on everyoneâs planners.Â
Traditionally, people try to schedule meetings through discussion. This often leads to long-winded back-and-forths with attendees trying to push for their preferred times in an email thread. However, when trying to coordinate a meeting across time zones, doing it via email or chat isnât just inefficient, it can also be counterproductive. Doodleâs online scheduling tool, for example, automates much of the process of scheduling an event, bringing it down to minutes.Â
A big part of coming to an agreement on a meeting time is ensuring everyoneâs had a chance to pitch for their preferences. An online poll is the ideal way to do this. With Doodleâs meeting time planner, the survey feature comes in-built. You can make a clutch of pre-selected time slots available to your attendees. Then each of them gets to cast their votes for whichever slot suits them best. Once all the votes are cast, the results are there for everyone to see. This shifts the onus of meet scheduling back onto the participants, taking the pressure off any one individual. Â
If youâre scheduling a meeting well in advance of it happening, thereâs a chance people arenât going to remember it when the time comes. The final step after settling on a time slot is syncing the meeting time on planners and calendars across the board so that itâs set in stone. If youâre a Doodle user, a great way to do this is to integrate your online calendar to your Doodle account. This way, when youâve decided on a time to meet, itâs marked on your calendar and you donât have to worry about it anymore. This is especially important when your attendees are joining in from different places and everyoneâs calendars can display the meeting in local time.
The important thing when scheduling a meeting across time zones is to use a mechanism that takes the heat out of the scheduling process. You want people looking forward to the meeting and not annoyed at the fact that theyâve had to go out of their way to attend it.Â
Outlook Calendar Multiple Time Zones
How do you schedule a meeting across time zones?
When you’re meeting across time zones, your participants are likely to have only part of their working day in common. Being aware of this overlap will make it easier for you to book a meeting time on everyone’s planners. 2. Use a Meeting Scheduler Traditionally, people try to schedule meetings through discussion.
How do you schedule a meeting?
Use a poll creator like Doodle, Polly, Calendly, or Simple Poll to allow your meeting participants to say what days and times they can meet. While time zone scheduling can be difficult, including all the participants in the process can help you effectively schedule meetings. 7. Add a different time zone to your calendar
Can a team schedule a meeting across multiple time zones?
Whether your team is fully remote, hybrid, or simply has offices in different corners of the globe, scheduling a meeting across multiple time zones will always present a challenge. These 9 tips will help your team start removing friction from meeting planning, no matter where everyone is located.
What is a time zone converter & online meeting scheduler?
Time Zone Converter: Can convert time between multiple time zones, which is particularly useful for those who often find themselves traveling or scheduling international meetings. Online Meeting Scheduler: Helps you schedule online meetings and webinars across different time zones.
