Thoughts on VR meetings

VR meetings? Do they work? Is it a gimmick? (Also, where are my legs?)

At Nabu Casa, all meetings (except for 1 to 1) are conducted in VR.
I've been in the company for a bit more than a month, so I decided to reflect on this unusual practice.

What works well?

VR meetings have had the sharpest focus I ever experienced. No side discussion, no phone checking. Meetings tend to be shorter, and straight to the point. This is a good thing in this day and age where companies tend to suffer from the too-many-meetings-not-enough-outcomes syndrome

I also noticed that we tend to cut each other less compared to a regular Zoom-style meeting.

I cannot really put my finger on the reasons, but the mix of spatial awareness and body language cues is clearly helping.

You see people facing you before they talk, you see who's looking at the shared screen, who's quickly searching for something on his/her computer.

Sound is spatialized so you have no issue understanding who's talking and where he/she is located. This is a definite improvement if you compare it to the flat 2D wall of sound coming out of a regular Zoom-style meeting.

You're in a room. It just happens that the room is virtual.

What does not work well?

Well for a start typing is harder, but it's a good opportunity to perfect your touch typing 😊

The biggest problem is that VR meetings work well until they don't.

The software used to conduct these meetings (Meta Horizon Workrooms) cannot be considered stable as of today. Connecting to a room is long and tedious, sometimes people get stuck trying to join or drop off unexpectedly.

The meeting size is limited to 16 to reduce lag. Past this threshold, later joiners are able to join a "zoom-style" version of the VR meeting.

They see the VR room, and people in the VR room see their faces on a floating screen. Just like a regular hybrid setup. This negates, in my own opinion, the whole point of VR meetings

Is it for everyone?

Absolutely not.

But this is something that I believe is worth exploring if you fit these two requirements:

• Small teams (less than 20 people)
• Full remote