Importance of Physical Meetings in the Technological Age

In Australia, conferencing is used in various fields, such as legal, corporate, education and in many other public sectors. It enables organisations and individuals to meet each other in a virtual environment and work with each other cost effectively. However, like any other technology, online conferences also have its detractors, who believe that this technology is isolating people from each other. Their opinion has resonated among many others who also feel that conferencing, though beneficial to a business, creates a gap among people. This adversely affects the human factor of the organisation and results in intangible losses for the firm. The benefits of Conferencing are known to all Australian organisations, but there are many negative aspects that must also be considered while deploying such solutions in an office. The initial setup costs are quite high and usually out of the budgets of small and medium sized firms. The costs related to bandwidth, downloads and cabling infrastructure can also be quite hefty, more so if the professionals are located within driving distance of each other. However, since online events eliminate the need to travel, companies save a lot of carbon credits, which can be used to develop the business further. Moreover, these carbon credits can be traded in the international market in exchange of commodities or currency, thus benefiting the organisation monetarily. Group conferences can also pose security threats, as the confidentiality of the virtual meeting can be compromised if hackers override the security protocols. Therefore, unauthorised parties can access the meeting and record it, broadcast it in real-time or disrupt the online conference altogether. This can be avoided in case of physical meetings, as the venue can be scanned for bugs and only the designated members can join the meeting. This proves beneficial for organisations that are engaged in performing confidential work and cannot rely on technology due to the loopholes associated with it. Business networking is an important task for many professionals and companies, as it allows them to expand their corporate network. However, online business meetings have limited the scope of networking with new group members. Therefore, professionals have to rely on the moderator to introduce all participants and cannot approach a potential business lead by themselves. This creates problems in lead generation and indirect marketing, thus hampering the growth of the business in an indirect way. Employee productivity in an office depends largely upon their motivation towards work and many professionals do not like being confined to their desks. Along with these, there are many individuals who are unable to adapt to new technologies easily and do not respond well when online conferences are used on a daily business. Both these groups become resistant elements when virtual conference solutions are deployed in their firm. Therefore, it is essential that the companies should take into account these factors and strike a balance between physical and virtual meetings. They must work towards ensuring that their clients and employees are able to adapt to remote conferencing and still enjoy the benefits of conventional meetings.