Psychological Affect of Travel or Commuting Time

The longer the trip the longer the stay. If you are traveling to the other end of the world, you stay longer to make it worth it. Same thing for a work meeting— you wouldn’t travel cross town in traffic for a 5 minute meeting. We recently had a meeting that was scheduled for an hour, take 9 minutes over Zoom. And we covered the entire agenda.

People are reporting shorter virtual work meetings which are just as productive as in person meetings. In fact, in person meetings may have been artificially lengthened due to the psychological affect of travel or commuting time.

Some people are reporting feeling MORE connected to their colleagues than when they were working side by side, while having more efficient meetings. Many HR professionals are sharing that they are working closer with their teams than ever, because people are asking questions. Interestingly, the type of questions are the same, “What do I do if….” although the backdrop is different. The questions are the type which should have been asked all along.

These are some take always from the new way of doing things. In our recent webinar “Coffee and Tea with EPT: Virtual Leadership” we summarized what worked for some now that many workplaces have been replaced with “workbases.”