>With modern communication systems, flying in airplanes to lunch meetings and flying back that night is such an absurd waste of resources it qualifies as obscene.
Sounds good, but doesn't always work in reality. (and I say this just coming back from a meeting with an architect who flew in for a day to check on a million dollar school renovation we're working on).
I've done meetings via teleconference, conference calls and face-to-face, and the face-to-face meetings have always been the most productive, especially when needing to review engineering documents. Things move faster because we're not all trying to talk over one another and we can observe body language to see who is paying attention or to confirm than someone understands what it being discussed.
Remote meetings have their place, but when the cost of a face-to-face day meeting can pale in comparison to screwing up a capital project, it's worth doing.
Sounds good, but doesn't always work in reality. (and I say this just coming back from a meeting with an architect who flew in for a day to check on a million dollar school renovation we're working on).
I've done meetings via teleconference, conference calls and face-to-face, and the face-to-face meetings have always been the most productive, especially when needing to review engineering documents. Things move faster because we're not all trying to talk over one another and we can observe body language to see who is paying attention or to confirm than someone understands what it being discussed.
Remote meetings have their place, but when the cost of a face-to-face day meeting can pale in comparison to screwing up a capital project, it's worth doing.