Holding a face-to-face, in-person meeting is quite often unproductive for small businesses. However, workplace collaboration apps are turning that tide by increasing ROI. Small Business Trends interviewed Bhavin Turakhia, CEO and founder of Flock for a list of 7 ways in-person meetings are a productivity drag and how to solve the problems associated with them.
Reasons to Avoid an In-Person Meeting
You Need to Travel to Them
In-person meetings take up time to get to. The travel time is an issue because employees aren’t working when they’re on the move.
The Solution: “Breaking focus and concentration on a task to do something else (in this case getting into a meeting) is the big problem,” Turakhia says. “Teams can use technology to solve and improve a variety of their daily operations. These innovations range from collaboration apps, to project management tools and software.”
Employees Are Often Late
Lack of punctuality is another way that productivity drops before, during and after these in person meetings. According to numbers supplied by Flock, people usually arrive anywhere between 5 to 30 minutes late. That translates into a big drop in productivity for the people who showed up on time.
The Solution: It’s a good idea to plan your schedule to arrive at least 10 minutes before any meeting starts.
These Meetings Can Get Bloated
With these types of meetings, sometimes organizers tend to over invite people from different departments. The result is too many people in one space.
The Solution: Team collaboration apps work well for teams of all sizes and types and not everyone needs to be in the same room.
Employees Don’t Get Back to Work Quickly Afterward
Not only is productivity time lost during the meeting itself, but there’s a lag time before most employees get back to whatever they were doing before.
“People don’t pick up tasks 30-40 minutes before or after a meeting, ultimately leading to about 22 percent drop in productivity,” Turakhia says.
The Solution: He highlights the fact larger companies like international fast-food giant McDonald’s have made the switch from emails to collaboration apps like Flock so things move quicker.
In-Person Meetings Often Lack Planning
Some of these meetings are unsuccessful because they don’t have a good agenda and no one has supplied the details for everyone to be informed. It can be a simple case of deciding to have a meeting and then trying to backtrack once the date and time has been set.
The Solution: Team collaboration apps are simple to use. A mobile phone or desktop and an internet connection is all you need to get started. Filling out the spaces provided lets everyone know what’s on the agenda.
In-Person Meetings Are Outdated
Corralling everybody together in the same spot for face-to-face meetings takes a lot of time and energy
The Solution: Today, there are under five million users of collaboration apps globally and potential is 300 to 400 million users. Smart businesses will stay on top of his current technology wave because there’s room for growth and innovation.
In-Person Meetings Can be Distracting
People carry their mobile devices with them everywhere they go in today’s work environment. That can make in- person meetings unproductive because employees get distracted by their smartphones.
The Solution: If there is no way around having a face-to-face meeting, you should leave your mobile device back at your desk and bring in a notepad and pen to stay focused.
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