The Value of Face-to-Face

Blogger: Bill Pray

As travel budgets are slashed and communications technologies become more important for enterprises to complete business transactions, I was reminded this weekend about the value of face-to-face communication.

First, I caught a Dentyne advertisement that touted the "original instant message" (for the romantically inclined only). The campaign is a tongue-in-cheek shot at today's social networking and communications technologies. In fact, the Dentyne website only gives you three minutes to browse their ads in the campaign (on your first visit - also includes a one minute warning) with the advice that life is lived outside of the Internet with other people.

Second, I was talking with an acquaintance who is a commercial construction architect. He expressed frustration that he couldn't get a project moving forward because he needed face time with the engineers, which required traveling to another state. He said that was the only way he could establish a relationship that would move the project out of its stalled state.

Third, I spoke with a friend who is an international director of operations. He lamented that his job was nearly impossible with a ban on travel in his organization and what would only take a few days now takes weeks through e-mails, audio conferencing, and web conferencing.

New technologies, such as online virtual worlds, are whittling away at some of the challenges of time and distance for meetings and providing additional use cases where technology can supplant the face-to-face. For example, Qwaq provides a virtual world solution that many of Qwaq's customers are using to replace travel, according to Remy Malan Vice President of Enterprise at Qwaq. IBM Sametime 3D, demoed in the Innovations Lab at Lotusphere 2009, is another example. 

Video conferencing also appears to be surging in the current economic situation because it approaches, as close as possible, the face-to-face experience. Customers have mentioned implementing solutions like Cisco's Telepresence or Microsoft's RoundTable to cut travel expenses without forgoing the face-to-face visual experience.

However, face-to-face meetings still need to happen. The key for the enterprise is to identify when face-to-face meetings have to happen and when communications technology can be more cost effective. As I mentioned in my previous blog on mandated web conferencing, there are scenarios that may require face-to-face meetings - such as when trust needs to be established. It is the intelligent application of communications technologies that provides the enterprise with effective collaboration and a competitive edge in today's market.

Comments

[Tsahi Levent-Levi]

Bill,
I wrote about this just the other week: not all face to face meetings can be replaced by video conferencing.
http://blog.tmcnet.com/talking-video/2009/03/can_telepresence_replace_face-to-face_meetings.html
Tsahi