In this prolonged period of remote work, video conferencing is having a real moment in the limelight. Zoom shares are up nearly 250%, and anyone with a job that can be done from their home office is utilizing some kind of video sharing to provide face to face engagement for their teams.
Makes sense, and it’s probably been a real lifesaver for your remote working reality since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. But the shift to a relentless slew of video-based meetings also comes with its own challenges, as we’ve seen as more and more people complain of what’s being called, ‘zoom fatigue’.
Understanding Why Zoom Fatigue Happens
According to the Harvard Business Review, “video calls make it easier than ever to lose focus. We’ve all done it: decided that, why yes, we absolutely can listen intently, check our email, text a friend, and post a smiley face on Slack within the same thirty seconds. Except, of course, we don’t end up doing much listening at all when we’re distracted.” Sitting passively listening is not always an engaging experience, especially when we have multiple zoom meetings throughout the day.
The constant gaze that we use during a zoom call, the reality of staring at our own micro-expressions, and the intense focus we need to keep on top of technical difficulties can be truly exhausting. But what can we do about it?
How Valuable is Screen-Sharing, Really?
Let’s be clear, we think Zoom is fantastic! We even encourage our own customers to integrate Zoom technology (or Skype, or Webex, or any other VoIP software for that matter), for the audio component of our virtual labs solution, to boost IT training or sales enablement. After all, we’re all about giving you the control and comfort you need to facilitate the best possible sessions, and we know that Zoom and its cousins can be an awesome fit.
However, have you ever thought about how you can enhance your work sessions and make them more valuable, either to combat ongoing zoom fatigue, or because of one of these other common goals that screen sharing alone can’t achieve?
Convenience: How many meetings have you had to shuffle or reject, simply because there aren’t enough hours in the day? Sharing your screen requires both parties to be there at the same time, which just isn’t always practical, especially when you’re expecting a large group of people to get together to learn something simultaneously.
Hands-on Learning Requirements: During a Zoom session, screen sharing is the best tool you have to hand, but it only allows attendees to watch. Studies have shown that when students sit passively and watch and listen only with audio/visual learning, they retain around 20% of the information that’s being presented. In contrast, when they have the opportunity to practice what they’ve learned with a hands-on component of the session, this number rises to 75%.
Feedback: Screen-sharing and traditional video conferencing don’t help the host to get any grasp as to whether the attendees have understood what’s going on, or even if they’re paying attention in the first place. A strong virtual training or sales solution will have real-time tracking capabilities, the ability to utilize active discussion between the host and the attendees throughout the meeting, and then analytics and metrics to measure success after the fact.
When Should I Look Further Than Zoom?
For meetings and catch ups, Zoom is a great piece of technology, which has made the remote working landscape so much easier over the past few months. However, for proof of concepts, sales demos, or software training, you need to be able to provide something hands-on; live, accessible, functioning software that can scale up to hundreds of attendees at a time, all independent of the rest of the network, and all identical replications of a real-world software environment.
Not only does this reduce the impact of zoom fatigue, but it also adds value in terms of convenience, feedback, and knowledge retention.
Our cloud-based, virtual labs enable hands-on training and onboarding sessions – for your own employees or external clients – no matter where they are in the world, and with only a browser and internet connection. You can run as many instances of your software as you need, scaling to hundreds or even thousands of users. Instead of the host crossing their fingers that they have the rapt attention of the attendees, we empower instructors with features like real-time visibility into each student’s progress, along with the ability to jump in and provide assistance when it’s needed most.
For a quick peek at how it works, click on any of these short videos:
Once you are ready to move ahead and try it yourself, contact us for a free demo!
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