Have you noticed that we’ve started waving to end video calls? As someone said to me yesterday, “I’d never wave when I left an in-person meeting; what is that about?”
My guess is that it’s closely related to this post from last week, about rituals. When you’re meeting in person and the meeting ends, people stand up, gather their things, and chat as they filter out of the room and disperse. There’s not a hard “button,” like a curtain falling or the lights coming up.
On a phone call, the participants say good bye and hang up. Hard button.
A video call is a hybrid we’re not sure how to manage yet. In some ways it’s like a phone call; there’s a button to disconnect us from the people we’ve been speaking to. But there’s a funky interim between when we conclude the business of the meeting and when we stop seeing others.
Imagine if an in-person meeting were like a video call. You’re sitting with other people around a conference table, highly engaged. At the end of the meeting, someone says, “Okay, everyone, thanks. See you here next week!,” concluding the business of the meeting. Now imagine you have to stand up and walk out of the room, and you’re not going to talk to anyone while you do it. That’s the situation we’re finding ourselves in.
In the four seconds while we’re finding the “end meeting” button and clicking it, the faces of the people we’ve been talking to are still looking back at us. It feels rude to do nothing, so we’ve taken to waving with one hand while we poke around for the red button with the other.
A way to begin and a way to end. They help us to structure our time together. We don’t have to wave, but it feels to me like we do need something to smooth our way out of our video meetings. Let me know what you’re seeing and experimenting with!
