"Hey, everybody. Why am I here?"
On more than one occasion in my professional career, this is essentially how I have joined a videoconference. I get a reminder "ding" on my computer and learn that my name has been added to a list of folks discussing … well, I don't what we're discussing or why I'm a party to it.
Believe it or not, I'm not a curmudgeon (provided you hooligans get off my lawn). I've always said that a little bureaucracy goes a long way. Jumping through the occasional hoop that's oversized and very low to the ground can help avoid waste, fraud, schedule conflicts, and an overflowing back burner.
One of those metaphoric hoops is meetings. I'm not against meetings. They are necessary and useful—but only when they are necessary and useful. Apparently, these days they need to be simpler, too.
Recently, I read about a disturbing trend identified by OWL Labs in its 9th Annual State of Hybrid Work report. They call it the "meeting tax." Based on a survey of 2,000 U.S.-based, full-time workers, with data collected last summer by a third-party research agency, 77% of respondents reported they've lost meeting time due to technical difficulties.
OK, I'm not surprised that most people have had videoconferencing issues. I use Slack for internal meetings almost daily; I can't remember a week where there wasn't at least one incident when a camera or microphone misbehaved on one side of the conversation. When the videoconferencing platform fails to properly execute a meeting—well, let's just say it's a good thing my mic isn't working.
The whole "I can't hear you, can you hear me" dance is annoying, but we tend to get things resolved fairly quickly. However, respondents in the OWL Labs study said they lose more than six minutes on average when they try to start hybrid meetings, and 27% lose 10 minutes because of tech setup. Per meeting.
Not discouraging enough? Also according to the report, 67% of respondents "admit they've abandoned attempts to get video technology working in a meeting space altogether," and 21% said it "happens almost all of the time."
Lest ye get too disheartened, the same survey found 45% of respondents think their employer's hybrid meeting equipment is effective and they like it, while another 42% said it was fine and they deal with it. Only 2% said they don't like it, though 9% complained it rarely or never works and 2% felt the equipment was outdated. You can't please everyone, I guess.
Boom Collaboration recently offered their own take on current conferencing trends, based on input from its distributors, MSPs, resellers, and customers. And the magic word, which should not be a surprise to anyone in our industry, is simplicity.
"The videoconferencing market continues to evolve, but the priority is clearer than ever," explained Holli Hulett, Boom's co-founder. "We've reached the point where simplicity beats features. If a system isn't easy, it won't get used."
If we take simplicity to its next logical step, we land on BYOD. Again, it should be no surprise that people want to use their own devices during a meeting or collaborative exercise. A subset of BYOD is BYOM, where folks use the videoconferencing software on their laptop to run the meeting while utilizing the fancy cameras, mics, speakers, and displays in the meeting space. According to Boom, BYOM is quickly moving to the primary workflow in many environments.
Yes, there are connectivity concerns when you bring in personal devices. And yes, there are network security concerns, even if employees are using company-owned equipment. I will also concede there are training concerns, because you still need to know how to connect to and properly use all the existing equipment in the meeting space.
Know what's more concerning than all those things put together? Investing in a hybrid meeting setup that nobody uses because of technical difficulties.
