Historians looking back at 2022 might conclude that it is the year that the world went hybrid: the successful collaboration between workers in the boardroom and those in their cozy, comfortable home offices.
In a May 2021 study from Accenture, 83% of workers said that they would prefer a hybrid model going forward – where employees had the ability to work remotely between 25% and 75% of the time.
This leaves company leaders with a challenge – how do you create the conditions for hybrid success? As Rob Abbott, Vice President of Products at Nureva puts it, “How do you run a healthy business when half the people are not in the office – they’re somewhere else?”
Over the past couple of years, COVID-19 has made planning next to impossible. “There have been a lot of stops and starts – are we moving out of the pandemic or not?”
But while pandemic news may change day to day, we do know this – hybrid is here to stay. Abbott sees four clear hybrid collaboration trends that will dominate the conversation in 2022 and spark significant shifts in how we work and learn.
HyFlex learning will accelerate
For higher education, the pandemic brought with it the need to innovate in course delivery to maintain learning continuity while keeping students and faculty safe. Many institutions turned to HyFlex – an approach that gives students the choice to attend a given class in person or remotely.
Abbott sees no slow down on the adoption of this learning model in 2022. “For universities and colleges, HyFlex is becoming a core part of their business model, an accepted mode of teaching and learning,” he says. “It will become a standard expectation for higher education classrooms.”
Student demand has been a big driver of HyFlex adoption. “Students want the ability to go to class when it makes sense, attend remotely when it makes sense and then consume the content asynchronously,” Abbott says. They also expect a remote experience that’s just as high quality as the in-class version – including the ability to clearly hear both their instructor and all their classmates.
Abbott has already seen a rising need for easy, scalable solutions that can be implemented without causing disruption. “I talked to a reseller who deployed 60 of our audio systems. School ends and he has to get his installations done before the next morning, so he’s doing eight every night. I talked to another IT person who installed one of our HDL300 systems in a break between classes.” The demand for simple installation and maintenance will only grow in 2022.
Large rooms will be reimagined
In the corporate space, Abbott sees some big moves coming in 2022, mostly focused on large rooms.
“Businesses have been in a holding pattern, waiting to see what will happen post-pandemic. But I’ve heard from a growing number of customers that they’re now spending more time thinking about how to set up their larger shared spaces for better hybrid work”
As these spaces get reimagined, flexibility will be a priority.
“We’re going to see really creative uses of larger spaces,” Abbott says. “I’ve been hearing plans to equip open office spaces for hybrid meetings, develop new hybrid training rooms and set up meeting rooms that are divisible and reconfigurable.”
This shift will require more adaptable meeting room tech. For example, Nureva’s Microphone Mist™ technology enables full-room audio coverage without the need for a complicated, multicomponent installation.
“We’re using our patented technology to ensure that everyone in a large room can be heard, regardless of where they are. And we can pass on an easier experience to our customers because our technology is very flexible.”
Remote participant expectations will increase
During the pandemic, fully remote meetings became commonplace. Abbott sees this as having a significant impact on hybrid meetings going forward.
“The idea of a remote participant not being able to hear clearly what someone is saying – that’s no longer acceptable. We expect more now.”
Shared workspaces will be expected to deliver the same quality audio experience that people got used to in their home offices. And UC&C platforms, like Microsoft® Teams and Zoom, will lead the charge in adding functionality at a fast rate.
“There’s so much value coming in these UC&C platforms,” says Abbott. “Traditional, multicomponent conferencing systems will struggle to keep up, and their complexity and high price will become unnecessary and unsustainable in the vast majority of spaces.”
These advancements will drive the need for intelligent audio systems that can adapt, offering features such as the ability to set microphone pickup zones based on use case or continuous autocalibration so rooms don’t malfunction when they are reconfigured.
Data and insights will be essential
Abbott also sees a sharp increase in our expectations for room insights.
“We have all this rich data about how people are using their desktop clients,” says Abbott. “But we don’t know really what’s happening in meeting rooms or shared spaces.”
To give IT the tools to understand exactly how a room is functioning, we need to go beyond usage data into acoustic data and real insights. It’s why Nureva is focused on giving customers the information they need to get an accurate picture.
“We can tell you the acoustic properties of a room – such as if it has a high level of background noise. So if an HVAC system is cutting in at 3:30 every day and obscuring the clarity of voices in the room, IT teams will know that they need to make adjustments.”
As hybrid becomes more prevalent in 2022 – and more meetings and classes include remote participants – the need for timely data and insights will only increase.
“If people are going into these hybrid rooms and having bad experiences, you need to understand it,” says Abbott. “If no one ever uses room 2A, even though it has same equipment as room 2B, data can help you determine the issue and ensure that all your spaces are performing well.”
A year of growth
The past couple of years have taught us that there are no certainties. But looking at the year ahead, the necessity for hybrid spaces – whether meeting rooms or classrooms – seems likely to grow.
“This is the year that the enterprise and education sectors start to reinvest in their large spaces,” says Abbott. “Organizations will be looking for easy-to-use solutions that can be deployed at scale to make the transition to hybrid as smooth as possible.”
In the months to come, people working and learning in hybrid spaces will need solutions that deliver natural, rich audio experiences and support advanced functionality. “There is a shift underway, and we’re excited we offer the tools that organizations need to make hybrid a success.”
