Due to Covid-19, many parts of our life have moved to online. Meetings are rapidly shifting to online as well. In my case, all in-person meetings have become online.
Certainly, the quality of online meetings hasn’t reached to the level of in-person meetings. However, I feel online is enough. Not to mention the cost for movement, I like that I do not need to mind trivial details existed in in-person meetings. So far as I am concerned, I haven’t encountered a situation where in-person contact is a must.
Before Covid-19, we had a certain resistance to online meetings, however at present I came to wonder why I resisted.
While I was watching SNS, I’ve found that the perspective to online meetings is slightly different between Japan and overseas (mostly in English though). In overseas, reaction to online meeting itself is vary flat: people regard it as a tool, for instance, “I will have an online meeting.” On the other hand, in Japan, voices to promote online meetings are dominant such as “no more in-person meetings”. Historically Japanese people on the ground seem to be unsurprisingly very flexible in front of a huge social transformation.
I agree with these pro-online voices. Even if the meeting is held at office, I began to be convinced that online meetings will suffice. Even if time of movement is set aside, I deem, vaguely though, online is less tiring. In-person contacts compels me to make myself agreeable to others or be nice to everyone, regardless of Japan or other countries. Online meetings also require similar social behaviors; however, online occasions impose less pressure to me, thus less stressful.
On the other hand, informal communication is, as is discussed, is difficult on online occasions. Furthermore, managerial staff tell that it is difficult now for them to talk to subordinates casually (which is important in Japanese communication).
However, a couple of tweaks to operation of online meetings may mitigate the lack of informal communication. For instance, we may set out a couple of additional rules, for example, prior to the meeting, participants are allowed to chat during which we can check sound and visual condition, or after the meeting individual break-out sessions can be promoted. (Among the Japanese, this kind of rule may not be clearly stated though, for online communication a clear rule setting will help.)
If online meetings are found to be convenient and efficient among office workers, by complementing their weakness, we may be able to feel more comfortable to work. In other word, if all meetings were back to in-person, I would find myself uncomfortable even if I discount the concern to Covid-19. On this occasion, I would expect online meetings will become a default. ■