Prof. G V Muralidhara

The setting for a face-to-face meeting!

Every day many of us attend at least two or three online meetings. Though video conferencing predated the pandemic, online sessions for our regular interactions have become commonplace in the last 18 months. When someone invites us to a discussion, we presume it would be online unless they specifically mention that we would meet in person. We have become adept at using Zoom, Google Meet, WebEx, or GoTo Webinar through repeated exposure. Meeting online when people are at different locations is convenient. Is it an appropriate and natural choice when the people concerned are co-located ❓

<aside> 🥱 Face-to-face meetings have their own advantages. The participants can't keep their cameras off to avoid being seen by others. When sitting around a table, it is easy to see one another's facial expressions, check for attentiveness, or observe body language suggesting disagreements or restlessness. We also find that people are more forthcoming in a face-to-face meeting compared to an online discussion. In addition to all these, we can serve refreshments to lighten the mood, break the session's monotony or pause a drifting conversation!

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Do you miss attending face-to-face meetings? Write to us with your views.