5 tips to boost your
Video Conferencing experience

New to video conferencing? Check out our top 5 tips for a better experience:

1. Setting up
Be ready for the meeting before it starts. The other members of the meeting do not need to see you very close up whilst you are adjusting the camera or altering settings on your laptop/PC. 

Set an agenda and conduct the meeting as if you were together in the same room. Look at the camera and avoid being distracted by other issues, especially incoming emails, mobile phones, pets and children.

Men looking at phone while using a laptop

Position yourself at an appropriate distance from the camera and try to avoid having the camera too low and looking up at you or too high checking out the hair line!
If working from home because of the current situation other people understand the different pressure faced so be relaxed and do not fret if someone else enters your space to offer you tea or ask a question not realising you were in conference.

2. Room lighting
Lighting is very important as sitting in front of a window with bright sunlight streaming through with create a silhouette of you. Sunlight bouncing off bright shiny surfaces can also distort the image and produce odd looking skin tones!


The light in the room should be checked on screen before the meeting. The colour of room also affects how you are seen. Neutral colours are always best however it is recognised that many meetings are being held in peoples spare rooms and dining areas at the moment.

3. Background
Continuing on from the lighting the background that you present in front of is very important. It not only can say a lot about you but it can be very distracting for the other meeting members. Other people walking about, children playing outside visible through a window, pets playing, all acts as a distraction. Bookcases are often chosen as this creates a “work” look but be very careful what books are left on your shelves! Try also to avoid any moving objects, this is often curtains moving in a breeze or plants moving near an open window.

4. Equipment
Choosing the right equipment is also important. A laptop with its own microphone and camera may be fine for a quick one to one but when part of a larger meeting or when needing to create a good image a better quality camera, and specifically camera angle, can create a world of difference. There are many good manufacturers of specific conference cameras, microphones and software such as Logitech which for not too high a cost can drastically improve your image.

External video camera for video conferencing

5. Teaching from home
Whilst all the above are important there are a couple of other points to note when educating remotely. Children are easily distracted so ensure you look at the camera making the pupil engage with you.

Teaching from home: teacher doing a video conferencing

Watch out for those book titles you may have forgotten were on the shelf, use various forms of engagement to keep the pupils interested and bring pupils together via Teams or similar package.