Professionals Shifting to Video Conferencing for Business Communication

Video conferencing is set for growth as more businesses are using the technology today and expect to continue to use it more in the future, according to a survey conducted by Redshift Research.

The use of video conferencing at home, particularly among younger professionals, is setting the stage for the increased use in the office, the survey found. Approximately 83 percent of respondents – and almost 90 percent of those in their 20s and 30s –have used consumer video conferencing solutions at home.

“The growing popularity of video conferencing at home, especially by millennials entering the workforce, is a big driver of increased preference for and adoption of video collaboration in the workplace,” said Jim Kruger (News - Alert), EVP and chief marketing officer at Polycom, which commissioned the survey.

“Some key factors to making video as popular in the office as it is at home is ensuring it’s easy to use, providing a high quality connection, delivering enterprise-grade security, and participants’ willingness to accept and adapt to cultural differences as they communicate across borders,” Kruger continued. “We’re seeing businesses around the world defy distance every day using video collaboration, including increasing productivity, enhancing employee engagement, improving time to market and helping to save lives.”

Video conferencing is becoming increasingly pervasive in companies around the world. When ranking their preferred methods of communications today, respondents chose video conferencing third (47 percent) after e-mail (89 percent) and voice/conference calls (64 percent).

Additionally, those same business leaders and managers believe video will become their preferred collaboration tool in three years (52 percent), followed by e-mail (51 percent) and voice/conference calls (37 percent). 

Respondents who use video conferencing today identified the three biggest advantages as follows: better collaboration between globally dispersed colleagues (54 percent), greater clarity of topics being discussed (45 percent) and more efficient meetings (44 percent). Almost all the respondents (96 percent) believe video conferencing removes distance barriers and improves productivity between teams in different cities and countries.

Approximately 76 percent of respondents are now using video conferencing at work, with 56 percent using video calls at least once a week.  The survey found that in Brazil, India and Singapore that number jumps up significantly, with more than two-thirds of respondents in those countries using video conferencing at least once a week.

The study also found that laptops and desktops are the most popular devices for business video conferencing (75 percent of respondents), followed by conference rooms (48 percent) and mobile devices (42 percent).  As video conferencing becomes more pervasive, respondents expect laptops and desktops still to be the most preferred device (72 percent) in three years, while mobile devices and conference room usage will increase to 55 and 51 percent, respectively.

The survey, titled “Global View: Business Video Conferencing Usage and Trends,” measured responses from more than 1,200 business decision makers. It was conducted by Redshift Research and commissioned by Polycom (News - Alert).

Edited by Blaise McNamee