Meeting Online vs. Face to Face – Which is Best?

Ever been to a meeting that you didn’t feel was entirely necessary? Sorry, silly question, we’ve all been there before.

But perhaps you’ve been to a meeting that didn’t need as much time and organisation. Maybe it would have been just as productive to bring people together online?

Face to face meetings are important and business still works on good ol’ fashioned rapport, no matter how much tech comes along. However, the way conferencing and meeting technology has advanced it would be naive to think physical meetings are sacrosanct.

For starters, the cost saving of not traveling can be substantial. It’s not just those coming from far-flung locations; expenses tend to rack up when people regularly travel from shorter distances. But it’s more than that. Even if coming from the other side of town, that travel time quickly eats into the day’s productivity. Add to that the fact that virtual meetings will nearly always conclude quicker than face to face due to a more singular focus on the screen with less pleasantries and interjections.

There’s no right or wrong answer as to what’s best for a company but here’s a hint to begin integrating virtual meetings: start with a physical meeting by all means but follow up that with online collaboration until such a time that humans in the room will only do to move things further and solidify relationships. Set the expectation of working in such a way and it will start to become far more natural and combat any notions of ‘that’s just the way we do it’.

Now the only question that remains is how will you spend that extra time and money?

Want to learn more? We researched the uptake in conferencing solutions amongst different age groups. The results are interesting.

Whether you choose to meet in person or online, here are some simple do’s and don’t’s to follow and help ensure optimal meeting success.

Originally published Nov 24, 2015, updated Aug 21, 2020