Survey Says: We Need Help with Online Meetings

55 percent said that "building relationships" and "creating an engaging visual experience" were always or often challenging.

Virtual meetings are here to stay — and so is the challenge of keeping people engaged while they multitask during meetings.

In fact, our recently-conducted business survey points to multitasking in meetings as the top challenge to keeping people engaged and focused — nearly three-quarters of those surveyed say the distractions of people caught up in several tasks at once interfere with meetings and impact their effectiveness.

We surveyed 200 business professionals about their issues and challenges with virtual meetings. The survey, conducted late last fall, focused on the challenges people face when leading or participating in virtual meetings; how often they met virtually; and the technology used to conduct remote meetings.

This survey was part of our process to develop a new, effective learning experience for online meeting leaders: Mastering Online Meetings®. The program is designed to help organizations reduce churn and save time and money by improving their virtual meetings.

More than 2/3 of the people we surveyed spend up to 25 percent of their time in online meetings – about 14 hours each week. They reported being frustrated regularly with distractions, and with meeting participants busy multitasking  while attending virtual meetings. Of those surveyed, 55 percent said that "building relationships" and "creating an engaging visual experience" were always or often challenging. The technology platforms were also challenges, according to 44 percent (technical issues) and 42 percent of respondents (ease of use).

Interaction Associates’ survey shows that tackling the challenges involved with online meetings can impact company performance and bottom line results. Boosting the quality of meetings produces a ripple effect throughout an organization: higher levels of productivity, involvement and employee satisfaction. We have found that meetings are the first place to invest effort to create quick, highly-profitable gains in productivity and efficiencies that affect the entire enterprise.

Download a full report featuring all survey findings and tips for successful online meetings at: http://bit.ly/62YE68 [5].