The word "collaboration" can conjure contrasting associations, depending on who you are and on your life experiences. Some of us may think of collaboration as a positive thing — a process in which we work with others (hopefully harmoniously) and, by virtue of teamwork, create results that are better than we could have achieved on our own. Others may bristle at the word, because it brings up memories of forced committees and coalitions, often ending with results that are inferior to those we might have achieved on our own.

While I've experienced both, my feeling is that the more refined the processes and technologies involved, the better the chance that the outcomes will be positive. The bad news is that the above are often lacking.

Prysm is laser-focused on helping companies develop digital transformation initiatives because we understand that leaders in the digital space are also revenue leaders. Case in point: a McKinsey & Company study¹ found that companies that wholeheartedly embrace digital technology — strategically, not just tactically  — pull in, on average, five times more revenue than digital laggards. No small potatoes. 

Research* shows that today's employees can spend up to 80% of their workdays collaborating. As a result, meetings — our primary method of working together  — have become mere waypoints in an ongoing collaborative process. This is a major shift from the way we used to think about meetings, which we regarded as events with a beginning and an end.

Research* shows that approximately 65% of enterprise meetings now include remote participants. The reasons are obvious, including endeavoring to leverage a diverse global workforce, saving money on office overhead, and — in some cases — taking advantage of less expensive local labor.

When you think of the word "collaboration," you probably think of meetings (online or offline), messaging, screen sharing, file sharing, and maybe even video conferencing. These activities have become not only standard in most business environments, but also a critical part of getting work done.

Outperforming your competition in a rapidly changing business climate requires a trifecta of humility, adaptability, and agility.

Humility helps you realize that perfection is a moving target and that success requires continuous evaluation and adjustment. (Or, in the immortal words of the band Kansas, "If I claim to be a wise man, it surely means that I don't know.") This honest assessment clears the path for the next two key performance indicators.

There's a task that's universal in the vast majority of office work environments: reviewing documents, especially with a group. We do this all the time in marketing — with agencies, in team meetings, and when presenting mockups, brochures, and web pages to executives.  In most cases, the process is woefully inefficient.

I was talking to an "experience marketer" today (someone who designs flashy customer-experience centers for large companies, such as AT&T, Cisco, etc.) and he mentioned something about how strongly the environment influences a customer or prospect to buy. As a marketer myself, this is a phenomenon I'm well familiar with. The reason is simple: We don't just buy products or services. We buy the way they make us feel. 

The express lane to kicking off productive meetings and brainstorming sessions

This week we launched Prysm Go, a quick, easy, and elegant way to upgrade your physical meeting spaces to enable superior collaboration, creation, and presentation.

If you work for a company that has not yet embraced the work-at-home trend, don’t despair. By strategically demonstrating the benefits of remote work, you may be able to influence company policy.

When we talk about the gender/wage gap, we're most likely discussing how women and men with the same skills and experience should get paid the same salaries (inarguable). We usually attribute the gap to straight-up sexism, which is impossible to dispute. I know I've encountered plenty of that in the workplace. 

We had a great time with our April Fools' gag last week, in which we announced a futuristic (but fictional) creation called Prysm Avatar — a drone that would project your likeness as a 3D hologram, so you could make a virtual appearance in the office, while you worked from a remote location. 

Prysm has recently introduced some great new features, including live-source streaming, wireless screen sharing, and a Quick Start screen. With this new functionality, it's easier than ever to start a quick meeting, use Prysm's digital whiteboards and share content with colleagues. 

I was talking to one of our sales reps the other day, and he told me something very interesting: he frequently speaks with Prysm users who don’t know about some of our best features! (Reminds me of a guy I used to date, but that’s a story for another time.)

Because I’m passionate about our product, I thought I’d take a couple of minutes to highlight some of the cool features that you might not know about or that you might not be used to their fullest extent.

I had a chat the other day with an employee of a large, well-known tech company. She told me a story that really surprised me. She said that the meeting technology used at her company was so terrible that it was not only impacting productivity; it was actually making people hate their jobs.

“We picked Prysm, in part, because it reflected our brand in being very innovative.” —John Heiman, Director of Experiential Marketing, Sprint

Recently, Prysm published a case study about Sprint’s newly renovated executive-briefing center (EBC) at its headquarters in Overland, Kansas, featuring Prysm Visual Workplace. The telecom giant’s choice of technology was symbolic of a movement in today’s enterprise — the transformation of the traditional “dog-and-pony show” into a consultative sale requiring authentic collaboration.

It's interesting to observe the way technology trends come in waves, and how corporate culture echoes those waves. In the 1980s, the few businesses who were computerized had mainframes, where a central "brain" did all the functioning and workers were tethered to that resource via dumb terminals. The advent of the PC was revolutionary: at last, we were free to create on our own — at our desks and in our homes. As mobile devices infiltrated the enterprise, intelligence became even more distributed. Workers were finally able to take their work on the road and organizations were able to leverage a global workforce.

It’s still a few weeks away, but Prysm folks are already excited about the upcoming Integrated Systems Europe (ISE) 2017 show in Amsterdam, February 7–10. It’s a great opportunity to visit with systems integrators from around the world and chat about the latest trends in AV, smart buildings, customer-experience-center technology, and more.

While I love people, I can be downright curmudgeonly when it comes to meetings. After all, I'm a w-r-i-t-e-r. My work is typically solitary. In my mind, every moment I'm in a meeting is a moment I'm not writing. And considering the (lack of) value I've derived from and contributed to the meetings I've attended over the considerable length of my career, it's no wonder that each new invite has me scrambling for reasons not to attend. 

As a corporate blogger, I have had the privilege of spending time with many sales reps and execs, mining ideas and helping them put their own blogs together. It's great to hear about their thoughts, their vision, and their customer visits.

From those who are constantly on the road, I've also sometimes heard something less than wonderful — namely, that they are exhausted. They often spend way too much time away from their families, cooped up on airplanes, and sleeping in impersonal hotels.