Kanban, daily scrum meetings, the Lean framework: There are a ton of agile methods that rely on daily standup meetings to keep everyone on the same page.
As common as these meetings are, there are also a lot of complaints about them. They run on too long. They feel pointless. Organizational issues lead to half the team hanging out in a virtual conference room waiting for the other half to show up. 😵💫
We’ve all been there — or at least, we’ve heard the horror stories.
And you know what? There are ways to prevent these kinds of problems, especially if you’re using a virtual conferencing tool like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, or Google Meet. In a way, video conferencing has some advantages over in-person meetings because you can take advantage of some awesome app integrations! 😀
Let’s look at some of these for Google Meet. We’ll show you the features that should be on your must-have list, plus a few of the best apps and extensions out there. Scroll down to get started.
Why Google Meet integrations are essential for daily standups
The whole idea behind daily standups is to keep them fast and productive. No drifting off topic, no unplanned topics. Everything should go according to the meeting agenda you’ve laid out ahead of time.
Follow the daily standup questions:
- What did you do yesterday?
- What do you plan to do today?
- What blockers might stand in your way?
If you’re using Google Meet to hold your standups, integrations or helpful Chrome extensions are essential. They’ll let you do things like make screen sharing easier or collaborate on a single screen rather than having multiple tabs open. Some will also give you timers and a template or framework to follow, so you can keep the pace going easily. 👏
Those are just a couple of examples. Look around and you’ll find many more integrations designed to enhance Google Meet in various ways.
Features to look for in Google Meet integrations
What kinds of features do you need?
Quite a few will prove handy as management tools to help you run silky smooth standups. You’ll find our favorite features below.
Compatible with various platforms and systems
Agile teams wear a lot of hats. 🎩 As such, they’re notorious for using lots of different devices, platforms, apps, and systems. Select integrations that will work everywhere possible; not just in a desktop browser window, but also via app, on mobile, and more.
Automates notes, reports, and summaries
You’re familiar with a day in the life of a developer and you know one thing is true:
You have enough to do already.
Rather than spending time transcribing meeting notes, generating reports, and summarizing meetings, find an integration tool that can do it for you. These days, there are lots of meeting-oriented apps that use AI to automatically produce transcripts.
Promotes collaboration and productivity
Various tools that come with some integrations will help you promote both collaboration and productivity. Timers, for example, keep discussions brief and productive, while apps that rotate through speakers eliminate pauses while you figure out who goes next. Whiteboarding features and similar collaborative tools will help remote teams work together to brainstorm new ideas or resolutions to blockers.
Creates less work and clutter
Ultimately, streamlining workflows is one of the biggest things that integrations should do for you.
If they create files— like recorded meetings or transcripts — then they should also *store those files in a system that makes it easy to access them. Automations that help you create and schedule meetings are a nice touch, too.
Engagement features
Team camaraderie is super important: When everyone’s enjoying themselves, they work better together, get more done, and pay more attention in meetings.
Good integrations for Google Meet will not only help your team provide status updates, but they’ll also include features that can help you build engagement and camaraderie — like icebreakers or other fun things you can use as a quick way to get the conversation flowing.
Secure access and compliance
Cybersecurity is a huge concern nowadays. In fact, Cisco’s recent Security Outcomes Report, Volume 3 finds that 62% of organizations have experienced major security incidents.
With that, lots of organizations operate under rules and regulations that make compliance a top priority. Whatever integrations you choose, they shouldn’t introduce security vulnerabilities to your digital workspace, and they will need to be compliant with security regulations.
1) Spinach
Spinach is a great choice to enhance daily standup meetings. 🥇 It’s simple to set up: just add it to your browser as a Chrome extension.
With Spinach, team members fill out and submit their standup updates asynchronously. Then, simply launch the Spinach extension directly within the Google Meet window to pull up a sidebar with everyone’s updates!
This eliminates the need to jump back and forth between screens — all your team members can see each other and read any notes within the same window.
Spinach works outside of meetings, too, so that you can make changes to meetings on the fly without going through Google Meet.
Standout features
- Share the same view with one click.
- Choose or randomize a speaker so no time is wasted deciding who will go next
- Pull in Jira tickets and add context easily.
- Use timers to create awareness of how long each team member speaks.
- Facilitate standups automatically to keep them short and productive.
- Set up reminders to alert your team of upcoming meetings.
- Use baked-in icebreaker prompts to create a fun, engaging experience.
Pricing options
- Free 30-day trial for teams of any size, no credit card needed
- Free: For up to five users
- Business: $6 per user per month
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
2) Fellow
Fellow is another app that you can add to Google Meet via a Chrome extension. It lets team members collaborate on meeting notes, agendas, and action items within Google Meet, helping cut down on clutter in the form of extra tabs open for everyone.
For standup use cases, this means you can create a meeting agenda in Fellow to add to your meeting. On top of that, when people bring up topics for later discussion, you can easily jot them down in-meeting to save for later.
But, while Fellow offers several meeting-enhancing features, there are no standup-specific features that help keep things quick and efficient.
Standout features
- Sync meeting agendas as an overlay in Google Meet.
- Collaborate on meeting notes in real time.
- Keep track of items to follow up on at future meetings.
- Join Meet calls directly from the Fellow agenda.
Pricing options
- Free: For up to 10 people
- Pro: $6 per user per month
- Business: Custom pricing
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
3) GoLinks
GoLinks offers a Chrome extension that lets you do a variety of things directly from your browser bar; all you need to do is use slash commands.
For example, you can use the command “go/meet” to join or start a meeting in Google Meet, or use “go/standup” to start a standup meeting. It’s a quick and easy way to get standups started right from your browser, however, it doesn't facilitate meetings or provide meeting summaries or historical notes.
Standout features
- Use slash commands to start or join meetings.
- Search go links from your address bar.
- Create your own go links to access Jira tickets.
- Share go links via voice or images.
Pricing options
- Free: For unlimited go links
- Starter: $1.99 per user per month
- Pro: $3.99 per user per month
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
4) Miro
Miro is an app that adds a lot of functionality to Google Meet. Use it to create a Miro board and from there, team members can share ideas, post documents, pin post it notes, map out schedules, and more.
Miro brings engaging visuals to your meetings, plus you’ll get the benefit of easy teamwork and a few fun things like emojis and icebreakers. 🧊🔨 That said, much of Miro’s functionality is manual — like building the standup template and sharing notes after the fact. You also don’t have easy access to notes from previous standups, which can make follow up a little cumbersome. 😵💫
Standout features
- Collaborate in real time on content shared by team members.
- Use templates for scrum meetings, brainstorming, retrospectives, and more.
- Use management tools like timers and voting to keep meetings on track.
- Set the tone with emojis, icebreakers, and other engaging elements.
Pricing options
- Free: For unlimited members
- Starter: $8 per user per month
- Business: $16 per user per month
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
5) Hypercontext
With Hypercontext, you can create agendas directly in Google calendar and collaborate on them with other team members. You can also take notes in your calendar or use calendars to host asynchronous meetings for team members in different time zones.
However, Hypercontext doesn’t facilitate your standups for you, nor does it have any timer functionality to ensure that team members keep things concise. ⏰
Standout features
- Create and collaborate on shared agendas within Google Calendar.
- Automate meeting agendas across all calendar events.
- Take notes or hold async meetings within your calendar.
- Track and assign tasks with project management tools added to Google Calendar.
Pricing options
- Basic: Free for unlimited members
- Pro: $5.60 per user per month
- Business: $8.80 per user per month
- Small team starter plan: $5 per month for up to five people
Enhance your team productivity in standups with Spinach
Ready to make the most of your standups? With Spinach, you can! ✅
We give your standups structure, plus all the tools you need to rotate through speakers, keep meetings moving fast, and keep everyone engaged. You can also use it to create icebreakers, instant meeting summaries, and more.
If you’d like to give Spinach a try, add the Chrome Extension here.
try spinach for free