A MEETING MASTERS MEMO

Created by
John K. Mackenzie

Previously we published Department of Justice ADA guidelines on meeting accommodations for the visually impaired. In this memo some thoughts about what location meetings provide that virtual meetings don't, can't or won't.

It seems that webcasting, while promising in theory, often remains clumsy in practice. Erratic video delivery and participant connection problems are common complaints. Yes, money is saved. But the cost of saving money seems to be more than some companies can afford.

What do traditional group meetings achieve that virtual meetings don't, can't, won't or never will?

1. Group Therapy (The continuity connection)

The off-site meeting assumes a new responsibility: Group therapy. People share anxieties and concerns, plans and problems, in a way that's difficult if they're scattered around the country. The process of going to a meeting, and mingling with others, confirms corporate culture and continuity in a way web-based conferences cannot.

2. Presentation Impact (The power of the group)

You can introduce a new product, or service, with a virtual meeting. But you won't build the contagious excitement or feedback opportunities you get when your audience experiences the same event in one location.

3. Lessons In the Lounge (Extracurricular intelligence)

Anyone who has repaired to a local wine cellar after a day's meeting knows that off-site assemblies provide a superb environment for informal exchange; often as useful as anything on the official agenda. And these encounters are not limited to the lounge. Hallways, hospitality suites, and coffee shops are right up there along with your basic Bud and Margarita.

Job-title barriers to candid discussion soften. Anecdotes about customer situations surface that would never make the company webcast. Suppressed grins, gripes, and groans emerge that reveal more about marketing and sales than any e-mail memo or pixelated whiteboard. Employees, who hardly ever see each other, talk over company problems and potentials that would never show up on any teleconference. And 3-D body-language provides supplementary communication cues difficult to sense via desktop video.

4. Recognition Environments (Meet you at the beach)

Holding reward and recognition meetings at attractive off-site locations provides a degree of employee involvement that's tough to replicate with a webcast. It's the nature of group situations to amplify recognition value and importance. Those who win awards get a chance to relish the disappointment of those who don't, while enjoying a degree of public envy and admiration denied by desktop isolation.

5. The Executive Audition (Looking like a leader at the lectern)

You won't hear much about this because it speaks about the unspeakable: Meetings are often more important for those who give them than they are for those who come to them.

Appearing on stage, with video rolling and VIPs in the audience, gives middle managers on the prod a great way to bench-press their visibility and executive potential: Not to mention the opportunity for entre act schmoozing. Using meetings to build career clout works best in a group situation that geographically fractionated web transmissions cannot provide.

6. Dimensionality (Does the medium massage the message?)

Assuming some truth to Marshall McLuhan's assertion that, "The medium is the message" a question arises: To what extent does a two-dimensional webcast alter the impact and value of information otherwise obtained in a 3-D environment? We don't know. But we suspect there are substantial differences.

Video Conferencing

Video conferencing is another technology that solves the wrong problem. The problem that it solves is one of making it easier to hold meetings. But the problem is not that getting to and from meetings takes time. The problem is that most meetings themselves waste time.

Probably over 90 percent of all business meetings fall short of achieving their objectives -- often by a wide margin. It turns out that productive meetings are very difficult to plan and prepare. If corporations want to reduce the productivity lost in meetings, the answer is not to make it easier to arrange and attend meetings. The answer is to make it harder to call a meeting without clear advance communication of the background and expectations, thoughtful planning of the discussion process and effective facilitation..