Just as there are certain principles for e-mails and personal meetings, likewise business and conference talks on the phone have some unwritten rules. Following The Daily Muse website, we list them here. Are you already following them?
1. Agree on who calls whom, at what telephone number and when. Mailing three minutes after an important call should have taken place to ask if you can call and what number, delays both sides.
2. If you are the one asking about something, then you should be the first to call. On the other hand, if someone needs help from you, agree to let the other person call you first in order not to chase him or her.
3. Reserve the time which, according to the needs (and experience), the call will take. It may be 5, 10 or 20 minutes. Usually, a call should not last more than 30 minutes. If so, it is obvious that a personal meeting will be better.
4. If you know that you cannot make an important call, notify the person via email or SMS beforehand. Ensure him or her that you will call as soon as possible. Apologies for the delay can be made later.
5. If the callee does not respond to your call, do not leave a voice message immediately. Try to call again two or three minutes later and then leave a message, if necessary, regarding how long you will be available. Do not call again if the situation is not urgent.
6. If you are planning a conference call, set a dial-in beforehand. There are many free providers of these services, such as UberConference.
7. Reduce the number of participants to a minimum. The more people involved in the call, the less they will listen. Contact only those people who are really important for negotiations; inform others collectively via e-mail.
8. Find a quiet place where there is a good signal. Using a landline eliminates technical problems.
9. If you have no other option than to call from a busy office, let your colleagues around know that you will have an important phone call. It is respectful to reduce the ambient noise to a minimum.
10. If you are calling from another device than you are used to, make sure that you know how to deal with the phone. This applies especially to phones with different operating systems. Faulty switching of calls or the inability to lead to another participant only worsens further negotiations.
11. Preferably do not use a presentation during the call to share important information. If, however, you have to do so, use a service such as screen sharing or GoToMeeting Screenleap instead of e-mail.
12. If you use screen sharing, again make sure it works before the start of an important call and that your counterpart is also technically equipped to share necessary materials with you.
13. If you talk to the callee first, consider instead using video conferencing to maximise his or her attention.
Here we have given a few basic tips that should help safeguard you from technical and other problems associated with your phone calls. In the following part, we will add some other equally important principles to the list.
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