As some employees are eager to return to work and others prefer to stay remote, offices are reopening with a hybrid model. But many companies have meeting rooms that aren’t ready for this new normal.  

Our take on hybrid meeting rooms: Creating better and more productive meetings and meeting spaces for both your in-person and remote workers starts with identifying and clarifying the communication needs of each department. 

If you don’t understand the needs of your remote and in-person employees, you can’t design and deliver future-proof hybrid meeting spaces that meet those needs. Here are some questions to ask end-users to start uncovering what they need and want. 

• Do they need Zoom, Microsoft Teams, or both? Choosing a platform isn’t just picking an AV solution, it’s deciding how you want people to communicate across your organization—as well as outside of it. While settling on one platform will make your life easier, in some cases a multi-platform approach is the best choice.
  
  
• Do they need specific capabilities like wireless presenting or whiteboarding? Think about how your employees work when they are in-person. Now think about what tools you need to replicate that experience remotely. For example, if your teams use whiteboards in every in-person meeting, then you need Smart TVs with virtual whiteboarding capabilities for your hybrid meeting spaces. 
  
  
• How often will they be hosting meetings? If users are hosting meetings every day, it’s especially important that they are able to walk into the room and make a video or audio call right away. If they are only hosting high-stakes meetings with company leadership, you need a way to make sure potential issues are identified and resolved beforehand.  
  
  
• How many participants will be in-person and how many will be remote? Understanding how many people will participate in-person and how many will participate remotely will help you design meeting spaces where people can be clearly and consistently seen and heard no matter where they are. 
  
  

The big picture: As you start thinking about upgrading meeting spaces for hybrid work, it can be tempting to focus on the hardware you think you need, but AV Solutions believes the right process starts somewhere else. Rather than focusing on equipment, AV Solutions first helps companies identify the outcomes they want to achieve.

If the outcome you want is successful video calls in hybrid meetings, you have to identify and clarify what each department needs to make that happen. Skip this step and the risk of making a bad hardware investment is high. Nail this step and making the right equipment choice is a cinch. 

Talk to us about your meeting room vision and how we can help you realize it. Give us a call at 225.326.3832 or use the Contact Us page on our website to tell us about your project.