COVID-19 resulted in a rapid shift from face-to-face meetings to video conference calls. This shift to meeting each other online is clearly visible in, for example, Zoom’s daily user count, which was up 378% on 22 March 2020 compared to a year earlier. Video conferencing turned out to be a workable and very welcome solution for engaging with colleagues and clients temporarily, but these calls are considered to be nothing like the real experience with terms as ‘zoom fatigue’ already being coined. As working from home policies are becoming the norm, how can the video conferencing experience be improved in the future?
Perhaps the first step towards an enhanced customer experience is currently being developed by the start-up Mmhmm. One of the benefits of face-to-face meetings is that you can watch both the presenter and slides at the same time. What if you could have this experience during video calls as well? Mmhmm enables the user to achieve this, by having a background in which you can make your slides appear over your shoulder. Furthermore, you can move your face around the screen, shrink or enlarge your image or even let yourself become transparent or completely disappear. And with co-pilot, a new functionality from their latest beta version, you can create a collaborative presentation, where each of the presenters can advance the slides and manipulate the images on the screen.
Even though tools like Mmhmm could be a good start and give an additional dimension to work meetings, these meetings are still far from a real-life interaction. The next step here might well be Extended reality (XR) – a term encompassing AR, VR and MR – for work meetings and conferences. At present, numerous start-ups are developing this experience, such as MeetinVR, and Spatial. Can you already imagine yourself sitting at a virtual desk surrounded by the avatars of your colleagues, sharing your screen in thin air and scribbling on virtual post its? It may not be long before you own a VR headset and some of your meetings actually look this way.
References:
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Hi Jetske! Thanks for the interesting post.
Personally, I can imagine that VR meetings may become a standard practice in the future. However, in the current state, I have some concerns about the improvements that the technology provide in comparison to video conferencing. Particularly, I would say that the term “zoom fatigue” may be present and even more apparent in the case of VR meetings. In general, long exposure to VR may cause discomfort, headache, stomach awareness, nausea, or fatigue. Combining this with the experience of attending some boring corporate meeting might be a terrifying combination. While I believe that the technology may be beneficial in certain types of meetings, for its wide-spread use creators should first address the potential negative effect that the use of technology may have on general health.
Hi Vojtech, thank you for this valuable addition! I completely agree with you that we are far from the scenario where XR will catch on widely and prolonged exposure does not have any adverse effects. Therefore, I myself am curious to see the future developments of XR for business purposes. Perhaps companies will adopt XR only for a number of meetings that highly benefit from the experience, such as workshops. Or, further technological improvements may be required before XR could actually gain popularity (or it does not catch on at all ;)).
Thank you for sharing this! It is crazy to think how fast our world changed due to this pandemic. Covid-19 really forced innovation on everyone. For me personally, I believe that Zoom meetings are way more effective than real-life meeting. When you are on zoom everyone know the aim of the call is to get work done. Thus, no one is distracted by anything or tempted to talk about something else. You just want to get off the call as soon as possible in order to continue whatever you were doing before that. In contrast, when you are in a real meeting, you take more time settling in, starting the actual meeting discussion and getting everyone focused. You have to book a room and make sure no one will disturb you during the meeting. This is why I believe companies will soon realize that it is more effective and cheaper to do everything online and thus will start to develop extended reality meetings. However, it is not because it is more effective that it is necessarily the best option as having human contact is also necessary for good cooperation,
Hi Amandine, thank you for sharing your perspective on this. Very interesting to read about your experience with Zoom meetings and how this differs from my own. In my personal experience within consulting numerous meetings were much less effective than they used to be in real life. Individuals were easily distracted, even during the already shortened 30 mins calls/presentations, and many of my colleagues stated that they would love to go back to the office to see someone else than their screens. Nonetheless, I definitely believe that the success of a Zoom meeting depends on how it is run by the people in it, e.g. how the meeting is structured, what you want to achieve and whether the participants ‘care’ to listen. Apparently this all worked well in your case!
Furthermore, I find your last point interesting and indeed believe that we will see an interesting trade-off between cost reductions associated with virtual meetings and employee’s desires for real-life social interaction in the future.
Hi Jetske,
Thank you for your contribution. I find it very interesting to see how quickly the world of video calling is changing. With the new features of Microsoft Team, you can already place people in a meeting room or lecture room, but this is another big step forward. According to my own experience and that of my colleagues, the current video meetings are very effective. As mentioned in a previous comment, this way is very efficient and does not lead to too many distractions. However, I notice and hear from other people that they miss social contact and interaction. I think this form of meeting changes that. By being virtual among people the interaction with people will feel more personal. However, I see as a possible problem that this way of meeting could become a replacement of the real-life meetings after the Covid period. Possibly this will lead to less physical contact and employees will feel lonely more quickly.