Keep office clocks visible for a virtual workshop

When a virtual workshop includes people in several offices, it is easy to lose track of whose workday is ending or whether a proposed break lands in the middle of someone’s night. A clock on the wall only tells you the time where you are.

Use TooLab’s World Clock to keep the office times together in one view. You can check the local time and date for each location while planning the session or hosting it.

Set up the office clocks

1. Open the World Clock in your browser.
2. Add or select the city for each office whose local time matters. Choose a nearby city in the same time zone if the exact office location is not available.
3. Arrange the clocks in a useful order, such as your office first, followed by the other workshop locations from west to east. This makes it easier to scan the time differences.
4. Keep the World Clock visible while you plan. Put it on a second monitor, or place its browser window beside your workshop notes. If you have one screen, leave it open in a separate tab and check it before announcing a time.

For a workshop, label each location in your notes by office or team, not just by city. If attendees are joining from different parts of a country, confirm their time zone rather than assuming everyone follows the same local time.

What the clock view means

The clocks show different local times

That is expected. Each city follows a time zone, and some locations also change their clocks for daylight saving time. Use the displayed local time for that location when discussing a start, break, or finish.

One location shows a different date

The offices are on opposite sides of midnight. A meeting at 8:00 a.m. in one city might still be on the previous evening somewhere else. Say the date along with the time when confirming a session, especially for invitations sent across the International Date Line.

Two cities show the same time

They may currently share an offset from UTC, which is the time standard used around the world. That does not guarantee their clocks will always match. Daylight saving rules can differ, so check again when scheduling a future workshop.

A time seems wrong for an office

First confirm that the selected city is in the right time zone. A city name can be misleading if an office is far away or if a country has several time zones. If the city is correct, check the date and time settings on your device, then refresh the page.

How to avoid scheduling mistakes

1. Confirm the city or time zone. Check with the office contact which location they mean. Do not rely on a country name alone when the country spans multiple time zones.
2. Include the date in the invitation. If offices fall on different calendar days, write the date and local time for each group. Avoid messages that say only “tomorrow morning.”
3. Check daylight saving changes. The date when clocks change can vary by location, and some places do not change clocks at all. Recheck the World Clock for workshops scheduled weeks or months ahead.
4. Check your computer’s time zone. On Windows 11, open Settings › Time & language › Date & time and check the time zone and automatic time settings. On macOS, open System Settings › General › Date & Time and check the time zone and automatic date and time options.
5. Refresh the clock page. If a city appears stale or incorrect after checking the location and device time, reload the page and compare it again. Keep the page open during the workshop so you can check times without searching again.

Keep the clocks useful during the workshop

Choose only the locations you need. A short list of three or four offices is easier to scan than a long list of every participant’s city. If attendees are spread across many time zones, group them by region or use a representative city for each group, after confirming that the group shares a time zone.

Check the clocks before you announce a change to the agenda. For example, if a discussion runs long, look at the finish time for the office with the earliest evening deadline. You can also use the view to choose a break that gives each group a reasonable pause without pushing one location too late.

Keep your clock view private if it includes internal office locations. When sharing your screen, share the presentation or meeting window rather than the full desktop if you do not want attendees to see your notes or other open windows.