Making conferencing meetings work

Conversations, conferencing and collaboration

To find out what makes a ‘distributed’ meeting effective the University of Cambridge, in conjunction with BT and Dolby, carried out global research.

Good sound quality is crucial to a successful call…

Video conferencing is more popular than audio-only solutions…

Technologies used in conferencing

Turning up the efficiency of audio conferencing meetings

Better sound quality would increase audio conferencing

Difficulty integrating with existing technologies holds back adoption of new conferencing technologies

Having good sound quality

4 countries 5 universityexperts

400 surveys 40 interviews

Being able to set up the meeting technology

Available training to use new conferencing technologies

Reliable conferencing technology

Being able to easily identify speakers

Circulating a clear agenda before the meetingHaving a good chairperson/hostHaving focused participantsHaving a Chairperson who regularly summarises pointsBeing able to mute microphonesTaking breaks in meetings lasting over an hourKeeping the meeting to an hour or lessSticking to an agenda, unless agreed by allTaking orderly turns to speakKnowing the other participants well

What else helps?

Video on computer, tablet or mobile phone

90%

Standard telephone (including mobile

phones)

42%

Other audio-only solutions

38%

Portable dedicated video conferencing

equipment

28%

When asked to identify the biggest problems in conferencing, one respondent from China said: “Speaker problems... sometimes there [is] still some noise there. We found that we [cannot] hear clearly.

Fixed dedicated video conferencing

suite

22%

54% 44%Document

sharing Computer screen sharing

41%

Better sound quality

57%

Difficulty integrating with existing technologies is the main barrier to take-up

34%

Find out more by reading our white paper Source: Conversations, Conferencing and Collaboration: An Asia-Pacific investigation of factors influencing the effectiveness of distributed meetings.

71%

72%

78%

70%

69%

Here’s what they found in China:

High quality sound