My name is Meri Aaron Walker. I am passionate about helping independent business people who are seeking sustainable meeting practices to save money – and the time to enjoy it – by transitioning some of their face-to-face meetings into virtual meeting rooms. It really is possible for people to express our deepest values and create clarity and lasting connections with others using virtual meeting tools – and now is a great time to start doing it!
Connecting Online
My passion for virtual meetings started way back before we even had browsers like Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Safari. In the late 1980s, as I finished my master’s in Communication, I began working with technology companies. And I met some fabulous geeks who showed me how I could use FidoNet to get into the Internet – using a home office computer – to connect with people around the world who shared my love of alternative photographic printing processes.
Alternative photographic prints – like blueprints and brown prints – were things that not too many people in my local group of friends knew much about. I was highly motivated to find new connections with people who would exchange developer recipes and printing tips with me. I knew it was possible to make beautiful prints in new ways and I was hungry to do it. The long and short of it was I connected with a lot of people that I have still never met face-to-face but we developed relationships that I treasure today – some 20 years later.
In the process of learning to use a home office computer to pick up arcane art skills, I also learned to create and sustain virtual relationships with others. This opened doors to distance teaming, document exchange, and many other ways to do business more efficiently, which kept me from having to drive or fly around the country all the time simply to benefit from the knowledge and skills of others.
Connecting Face-to-Face
Ever since I can remember, I have devoted myself to the search for effective, efficient ways to collaborate and create new things. I love working with people who may be quite different from me and not always able to be in the same place with me at the same time. At age six, I was the “hub” for the gang of kids on my block who all came from different countries and spoke different languages than I did. I called the games we played together since I was the only native speaker of English on the block and I created ways for us to connect – even when our mothers didn’t want us to play with “others.” At age twelve, I started reading books about people who traveled to different countries to work in different cultures and people who taught people to talk and work with each other in ways that made their difference fun. I read Margaret Mead, Carl Jung, Eric Fromm, Victor Frankl, Herman Hesse, Carl Rogers, John Dewey, and whatever else I could get my hands on.
The quest continued through adolescence and young adulthood and led to a bachelor’s degree in English, a master’s degree in communication, advanced training in Nonviolent Communication (NVC) and certification in the teaching of English as a foreign language. Because my son was born with multiple handicaps, including hearing and speech disorders, I’ve also spent a lifetime developing the personal sensitivities and skills it takes to connect with people who learn and communicate differently.
I have traveled extensively in the US, working as a photojournalist for 14 years, and also spent many years teaching in public and private secondary schools and colleges in the US and Europe. Throughout my working career, I have maintained my own independent business, facilitating strategic planning, coaching executives, and teaching leadership and teamwork skills to businesses and nonprofit organizations across the US and in Europe.
Because my earliest personal experiences online were so rewarding, when the Internet began to really blossom in the early ‘90s, it was easy for me to see that virtual meetings and distance teamwork would become crucial skills for everyday business and education in the 21st century. In 2001, a colleague and I published a business communication book, “Teamwork is An Individual Skill”, to share best-practices we had mastered for face-to-face and distance teamwork. Shortly afterwards, I met Nancy White (a living virtuoso of online facilitation!) and trained with her and other internationally known facilitators. My passion for investigating and using virtual meeting and distance teaming tools and meeting practices has gotten me out of bed every morning for over twenty years now.
Virtual Meeting Rooms
Virtual meeting rooms offer a way for people who need to share their expertise with others to meet and exchange resources without having to waste scarce resources of money, time and fuel to do it. They can’t be used for everything, but when people understand how to structure and manage virtual meetings that everyone enjoys, virtual meetings can support strong, vital connections that prevent us from having to travel all the time. Whether our trips are cross town, cross country, or across the globe, with global warming staring us in the face, we simply have to find new ways to make fewer trips so we can reduce the carbon footprints we’re leaving with our business travel! For me, virtual meetings are the wings of independent business and I enjoy sharing their gifts and opening up new possibilities for people in private tutorials, in webinars and local workshops.
Nowadays, I am a full time virtual meeting coach and producer. I am grateful to be able to share the empowering and economically sustainable meeting practices I’ve learned with small business owners around the globe! It is joy for me to work with individuals and teams privately as well as in webinars and workshops.
When I’m not working, you can find me gardening, hiking the hills above my home with my partner, John, and my sweet old dog, Lady, learning to fish the wild rivers of southern Oregon, or mentoring young people who are challenged by difference.
