Teleconferencing, such as with Zoom or Microsoft Teams, has spread throughout business spheres greatly over the past two years due to COVID-19 and the lock downs that the pandemic mandated. Before that happened I was already on the path of adopting teleconferencing for my job in information technology.
Occasionally, when myself or one or more of my co-workers were unable to make it to the office for our weekly meeting we would use Microsoft Teams to enable them to attend. Back then I was able to see that such tools would be useful in the future, but I didn’t foresee the world being pushed to adopt them as fast as they did. I certainly see myself and society as a whole in the confirmation stage of diffusion for teleconferencing, mainly because the persuasion and decision stages essentially completed themselves. People’s lives were and are at risk and teleconferencing helps keep us safer.
I see myself as holding somewhere between an early adopter or early majority role in the diffusion of teleconferencing, mainly due to the fact that I already got use of it before COVID-19 almost mandated it’s use. On the other end of the spectrum, I see myself as a laggard on the adoption of social media. I see and understand the advantages of it, but I still don’t maintain an active presence on any social media, mainly due to a lack of time and interest.
Teleconferencing has definitely changed the way that people work now. There are quite a few businesses that realized not everyone had to be in the office after or during the covid pandemic. I think that most college students would be in the early adopter category because they were using zoom even before the pandemic happened. There are many possibilities with teleconferencing that we might not even know yet. I know that teleconferencing helped me complete a few jobs that would have taken days or months to complete without it.
I’ve recently been forced to telecommute and have become familiar with teleconferencing. There are some aspects of it I enjoy and some not so much. To me it feels a lot less personal than being able to meet in person and shake someone’s hand. I am definitely a a laggard when it comes to teleconferencing!
I believe with COVID-19 that teleconferencing has become more common. Many companies have considered the benefits of teleconferencing in terms of working remotely. Teams are able to meet even if they are not in the same room, and it saves on travel expenses for the employees. I would see myself in the late majority, because I adopted the technology later than others. I did not even consider the benefits of Zoom until I moved to virtual classes. I have the perk of being able to take classes without having to commute to campus and all I need is a computer to participate in Zoom sessions.