Today, there is a metamorphosis of our meeting spaces at work taking place before our very eyes. This is because of an interesting convergence of change in the nature of society, collaboration, and technology. And we believe that in this current scenario, when it comes to designing collaboration rooms for your business, more is less and less is more…
This interesting convergence is taking place due to various factors. In the past, internal teams, business partners, and clients were mostly regional. This meant that the people you would work with were located within the building or within driving distance. Most meetings were conducted face-to-face.
Enterprise users would book large rooms for these group meetings. Also, organisations wanted to bring in remote participants and presentations via video technology when necessary.
This fuelled the need for expensive, technically complex boardrooms, executive rooms, and more. These rooms needed a large investment in AV design and implementation to ensure a quality user experience.
And even while all of this was going on, the world became virtual. Remote working became normal and accepted. Your internal teams, business partners, and clients may not even be in the same country anymore.
This means that instead of face-to-face meetings in the boardroom, organisations now use audio and web conferencing, with about three to five people at any one location. The boardroom is not appropriate for these more frequent needs. What is needed are smaller rooms or an open area to meet.
Technology needs for smaller meeting rooms
The technology needs for these meetings is also different. User interfaces need to be standard, not customised, as they are intended for self service. Systems need to be standard, repeatable, scalable and reliable. In its most simplified terms, businesses need more rooms with fewer features and fewer rooms with more complex and expensive technology…what we call more of less and less of more!
Many new products have hit the market to serve this new need. Many of them are great, offering installation times in hours instead of days. They also meet the need for high quality, high reliability, ease-of-use and scalability. Many, however, are not great and rely on deceptive marketing and user confusion to carve out a niche for themselves.
The process to select the right collaboration solution for an enterprise hasn’t changed. The following are the steps to follow:
Create a user segmentation plan, admitting that no organisation has a single “typical user”.
Document all use cases and conduct an analysis of the organisation’s existing systems.
Make a decision regarding the correct blend of solutions needed.
Consult with outside experts who have performed this type of analysis before, provided they have no vested interest.
So, there you have it…the right way to design next-gen collaboration solutions for your enterprise. Follow the tips, but remember….when it comes to designing a collaboration solution for your business, more is less and less is more…
You can know more about designing the right collaboration solution. For more information about designing the right collaboration room and solution for your home or business, contact Actis at 022-30808080 or at contact@actis.co.in.
(Content courtesy: www.networkworld.com and Image courtesy: Bayer India)