Key lessons on staff engagement from 1 million Microsoft Teams meetings.
Trailer for the full show.
Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Skype, Google Hangouts are all here to stay, but in my view what is missing from virtual working are three distinctly aesthetic elements of corporate culture: rituals; symbols; and myths.
A UK company has just passed 1 million Microsoft Teams meetings in their organization of 40,000. As a result they've made accelerated progress on strategic goals, learnt a great deal including how virtual meetings are causing fatigue but also realigning how files are stored and structured, and that ultimately there is still a place for a real office with colleagues in it.
MS announced in June 2020 a number of ways to make virtual events less exhausting. The new features include 'Together Mode', which places a live avatar of meeting participants in a virtual setting, and is aimed at making videoconferences feel more natural.
"It was totally motivated, conceived, prototyped, tested, and realized during the pandemic," said Jaron Lanier, scientist at Microsoft Research, speaking of Together Mode. "I suspect had it not been for the pandemic, it would have been years of testing and development to release something like this."
In spite of all this COVID era progress, people still want to go back to the office to see their colleagues.
However hard we try, technology isn't going to be as energizing as the physical world in my view because it lacks some basic human needs. I was listening to the story of the destruction of the Mar Elian Monastery in Syria by the ISIS forces. Once this 4th Century monastery was destroyed the Christian community dissipated after 1600 years of continuous inhabitation based around a building and remains of a sacred person.
It says something about the need of people to belong and for the leaders of organizations to create symbols, rituals and myths which sustain people. So I raise the question about what business leaders can do to send the symbols of the company culture to their staff in their virtual offices; if there are to be millions more meetings we need to link teams not just with software but with culture.
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Jim James is the Founder and Managing Director of the EASTWEST Public Relations Group. He recently returned to the UK after 25 years in Asia where he was an entrepreneur. Whilst running EASTWEST PR, he was the Vice-Chairmanof the British Chamber of Commerce in China, he also he introduced Morgansports cars to China, WAKE Drinks, founded the British Business Awards, The British Motorsport Festival, EO Beijing, and was the interim CEO of Lotus cars
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