Meeting a new normal

Rob Jardine, chief marketing officer of LoopUp, explains why the legal profession deserves remote-meeting technology designed with its specific needs in mind.

The remote meeting has become symbolic of life under the coronavirus lockdown for many. For legal professionals, conference calls may already have been commonplace, but they have become more frequent, more important, and used for more things.

The potential for remote meetings to replace many face-to-face meetings has been highlighted, but the shortcomings of much of today’s technology has been exposed. Use of VoIP over the public internet has led to audio quality issues, while new users have struggled to get to grips with the technology. And security issues with some widely-used conferencing solutions have been widely reported.

Even before coronavirus, analysts were forecasting rapid growth in the use of remote meetings. Changing workplace demographics, increased remote working, and pressure to reduce business travel as a response to climate change as well as efficiency, are all driving demand; as are improvements in conferencing technology itself. And as social-distancing rules are eventually relaxed, and workers return to their offices, we think the shift from face-to-face to remote meetings will continue to accelerate.

This potential benefit to law firms is considerable – meeting remotely can improve productivity and reduce costs by eliminating the need for business travel, as well as increasing the frequency of client engagement. But in order to do this effectively, law firms need remote-meeting technology that meets their specific needs.

Read the full feature in Briefing May – It’s the screen team, here.