Virtual Conferencing

Virtual Conferencing Best practice how to obtain sufficient meeting efficiency in both a user and a business perspective M A R I A B E R G S T R Ö M S I L L É N Master of Science Thesis Stockholm, Sweden 2006

Virtual Conferencing Best practice how to obtain sufficient meeting efficiency in both a user and a business perspective M A R I A B E R G S T R Ö M S I L L É N Master s Thesis in Media Technology (20 credits) at the School of Media Technology Royal Institute of Technology year 2006 Supervisor at CSC was Leif Handberg Examiner was Nils Enlund TRITA-CSC-E 2006:021 ISRN-KTH/CSC/E--06/021--SE ISSN-1653-5715 Royal Institute of Technology School of Computer Science and Communication KTH CSC SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden URL: www.csc.kth.se

Abstract In times of company merges, acquisitions, outsourcing and globalisation, complex company structures and organisations emerge. The need for communication and cooperation within distributed organisations in combination with demand for cost efficiency to survive on the market put requirements on the personnel and the technology for information and communication within the companies. This master thesis describes the different parameters to be taken into account regarding virtual conferencing and provides the company with a guideline when choosing upon proper meeting format both from a user and a business perspective. The Master Project was initiated and hosted by the telecommunication company TeliaSonera in Sweden. The study was carried out by observations and interviews of selected co-workers at TeliaSonera Sweden. The result of the study shows among other things that face-to-face meetings still play an important role in distributed organisations and that you prefer simple and prompt tools over the most broad banded 1 virtual communication. 1 Broad band means virtual communication that allows many different ways of communicating, e.g. thru body language, orally and written, i.e. resembles a face-to-face meeting as much as possible.

Virtuella Konferenser Best Practice - Att uppnå tillräcklig möteseffektivitet både ur användarperspektiv och ur affärsperspektiv Sammanfattning I tider präglade av företagssammanslagningar, uppköp, outsourcing och globalisering uppstår komplexa företagsstrukturer och organisationer. Behovet av kommunikation och samarbete inom distribuerade organisationer i kombination med krav på kostnadseffektivitet för att överleva på marknaden ställer krav på företagets personal och teknologi för information och kommunikation. Denna rapport beskriver de olika parametrarna att ta hänsyn till gällande virtuella konferenser samt tillhandahåller en guide-line åt företaget för att kunna välja lämpligt mötesform både ur ett användarperspektiv och ett företagsperspektiv. Detta examensarbete initierades av och utfördes på telekommunikationsföretaget TeliaSonera i Sverige. Undersökningen utgjordes av observationer och intervjuer av utvalda medarbetare inom TeliaSonera Sverige. Resultatet av studien visar bland annat på att fysiska möten fortfarande spelar en viktig roll i distribuerade organisationer och att man föredrar enkla och snabba verktyg för kommunikation framför en så bredbandig 2 virtuell kommunikation som möjligt. 2 Med bredbandig menas virtuell kommunikation som tillåter många olika kommunikationssätt, bl. a genom kroppsspråk, muntligt och skriftligt dvs. som liknar ett fysiskt möte så mycket som möjligt

Preface This master thesis constitutes the final of my Master of Science programme in Media Technology at the Royal Institute of Technology. With this preface I would like to acknowledge those who have assisted and contributed in this work. In addition to my thanks to the academic supervisor Leif Handberg at KTH for his interest and input, I direct a big thank you to my mentor and supervisor Harriet Kullberg at TeliaSonera for her patience, trust and guidance. Big thanks to Michael Randén at TeliaSonera who has shown great commitment by taking time sharing his experience and ideas. I also want to thank Lars Qvist, Peter Fagerström and Liselotte Brännefors at TeliaSonera, for their helpfulness and contribution of important information. A special thank you goes to my friend and classmate Per Bergkvist who has been involved in the initial brainstorming activity and in the final review process of this report. Finally I would like to direct my thanks and gratitude to all that participated in the study and took time answering the questionnaire and the interview questions. Without you this work could never have been carried out! Maria Bergström Sillén Stockholm, January 2006

Table of content Introduction...9 Background...9 Purpose...9 Problem definition...9 Delimitation...9 Target group...10 Abbreviations...10 Definitions...10 Theoretical Perspective and Methodology...11 Field Study...11 Interviews...11 Questionnaire...12 Reliability...12 Validity...12 The case company TeliaSonera Sverige AB...13 Telephone conferences...14 Video conference technology...14 Internet conferencing solution...15 Web Board...16 Instant Messaging...16 Policies...16 Premises...17 Previous studies/literature Review...19 TeliaSonera...20 Description of Execution...21 Method of selection...21 Method of collection...22 Questionnaire...23 Observations...23 Partly structured interview...23 Open interview/directed open interview...23 Sample losses...24 Presentation and Analysis of Result...25 Motivation...25 Social aspects...26 Awareness & Presence...27 Trust...28 Status/Impact...29 Meeting-external implications...29 Cost and Business Case Analysis...30 Security...35 Availability...35 Flexibility/Mobility...36 Usability...37 Integrity...38 Quality...38

Other...39 Discussion...41 Proposals for improvement...43 Proposal for further studies...45 Conclusion...47 Bibliography...51 Appendix 1: Questionnaire...55 Appendix 2: Questionnaire result...67 Appendix 3: Interview plan...85 Appendix 4: Respondent statistics...87 Appendix 5: Observationsplan...89 Appendix 6: Short summary of interview results...91 Appendix 7: Travelling specification and calculation...93

Introduction Introduction Background TeliaSonera is a geographical distributed organisation which daily performs a large number of meetings with participants from different locations. TeliaSonera has a number of products and services for virtual conferencing which they offer to their customers and also use internally. In the aim to reduce travelling costs and environmental impact TeliaSonera has for the last years tried to increase the use of virtual conferencing for distributed communication. The question now is how the company TeliaSonera can support the employees in choosing the right tool and kind of meeting in a cost efficient way. Purpose The purpose of this master thesis is to give the employees at TeliaSonera Sweden a guideline on how to choose the proper form, technique and process for meetings with one or several participants from a different location. Problem Definition Evaluation of a variety of available virtual conferencing solutions with focus on usability aspects compared to physical meetings. A definition of typical use cases within TeliaSonera and an evaluation of results based on behaviour and experiences of participants, leaders and organisers. This report contains a brief business case analysis and usable tools for deciding on and applying best formats, tools and practices to all meetings. Delimitation The research has been performed within TeliaSonera Sweden. The research does not cover general meeting procedures, only routines and processes closely connected to or with impact on virtual meetings. The report only covers synchronic meetings and meetings with participants from different geographical locations. 9

Introduction Target Group This thesis is foremost targeted to TeliaSonera Sweden but can be of interest to other companies and organisations that have a geographical distributed organisation were meetings are a part of the work or management process. Abbreviations TS TSS TeliaSonera TeliaSonera Sweden Definitions Virtual Is the opposite of real in the meaning of not face-to-face, but mediated or transferred by some electronic media. Virtual is for example a team that is not located in the same space but works at a distance and uses information and communication technology to communicate, an environment that is electronically mediated where people don t meet face-to-face, but communicate via media (Jansson, 2005, p.10). 10

Theoretical Perspective and Methodology Theoretical Perspective and Methodology This chapter describes the scientific methods which compose the empirical base for this thesis, motivates why these has been chosen and states possible consequences related to the methods. Reliability and validity of the study is also discussed. Field Study Field studies are non-experimental scientific inquires aimed at discovering the relations and interactions among sociological, psychological and educational variables in real social structures. Katz (1953) has divided field studies into two broad types: exploratory and hypothesis testing. The exploratory type, used in this study, seeks what is rather than predicts relation to be found. Exploratory studies have three purposes: to discover significant variables in the field situation, to discover relations among variables, and to lay the groundwork for later, more systematic and rigorous testing of hypotheses. Interviews Data from a professionally held interview fulfils certain requirements regarding validity and reliability. It is required that the interview method provides reliable and valid results but also to make it possible for others to review the conclusions. One way of categorizing different types of interviews is to describe them based on level of structure. An interview can be totally open, which means that the interviewer ask a wide, open question that the respondent freely can associate to and talk about. The interview can also be totally structured. The interviewer then asks prepared questions in a predefined order and the respondent answers according to predefined options. Since the open forms of interviews gives different definitions of phenomenon and concepts it is difficult to compare between individuals. More structured interviews can be used as a base for conclusions about quantities because the reply options are the same for all respondents (Lantz, 1993). The following interview methods 3 have been used: Partly structured interviews to collect quantitative information about the individual s experience of concepts and relationships. 3 According to (Lantz, 1993) 11

Theoretical Perspective and Methodology Open interview/directed open interview to collect qualitative information about the individual s experience of a phenomenon and its impact. Questionnaire An alternative method of querying the user is by a questionnaire. It is less flexible than interviews but can be used to reach a wider group, it also takes less time to administer and it can be analyzed more rigorously (Dix et al. 1998). One questionnaire with mainly multi-choice questions was used in this study. Reliability High reliability has been obtained by standardized and structured observations, interviews and questionnaire. The interviews were sound recorded as a part of the documentation process in order to support the handwritten notes in the following analysis phase. The fact that the respondents were assured to be anonymous and their answers confidential also gives high reliability to the result. Validity The interview questions and the questionnaire were reviewed by impartial parties to guarantee the validity of this research. Method triangulation (Stensmo, 2002) has also been used to secure the validity of the conclusions. Method triangulation is the use of several different methods to collect data on the same topic. Four different methods have been used: Observations, Interviews, Questionnaire and written sources. 12

The Case Company TeliaSonera Sverige AB The Case Company TeliaSonera Sverige AB This chapter will provide an introduction to the case company, describing the aspects of the organisation that is relevant for the problem addressed in the study, namely: organisational structure, polices and meeting infrastructure. Figure 1: TeliaSoneras goegraphical distribution ( TeliaSonera 2005) TeliaSonera (TS) is the leading telecommunications company in the Nordic and Baltic region and also holds a strong position in mobile communications in Eurasia, Turkey and Russia (Figure 1: TeliaSoneras goegraphical distribution ( TeliaSonera 2005). TS offer a wide range of services in mobile and fixed communication, Internet and broadband. During the period for this study (May 2005 to Jan 2006) TS has been going through a major cut down of employees and a reorganisation. According to TS s home page the total number of employees in April 2005 was about 29,000 and in Sweden about 11,000. TS are represented in 27 countries including presence by partnership in local telecom companies. TSS has co-workers in 28 different geographical locations 4. 4 Figures from TS intranet sep 2005 13

The Case Company TeliaSonera Sverige AB The current infrastructure at TS offers the employees a range of different systems supporting virtual meetings: Telephone Conferences Each employee has either a mobile phone or a fixed phone and most of the conference rooms are equipped with a stationary speaker phone. TS provide meeting services for their customers and these services are also available for internal use within the company: Telemöte Direkt: A solution for those who always want to be able to start a telephone meeting, without having to book. Telemöte Kod: For telephone meetings booked from occasion to occasion. The participants connect themselves to a telephone meeting with a special code. Telemöte Telefonist: The participants are phoned up by a telephone operator who connects them to the meeting. Telemöte Event: A solution for special needs such as a big information meeting. Additional functions can be included e.g. Questions & Answers. Video Conference Technology TS have chosen Tandberg as the solution provider for video conferencing. The table below presents the geographical sites in Sweden that have video conferencing facilities and also all types of Tandberg models that exist within TSS. An example of Tandberg equipment is shown in figure 2. Figure 1 Equipment example: Tandberg 6000 TANDBERG 14

The Case Company TeliaSonera Sverige AB Models Tandberg 5000 Tandberg 6000 Tandberg 2500 Tandberg 6000 Portable Tandberg 7000 Tandberg 4000 Tandberg 8000 Tandberg 880, MS Tandberg 8000, MS Tandberg 880 Sites Falun Farsta Göteborg Haninge Luleå Malmö Nacka Strand Sundsvall Uddevalla Västerås Örebro Internet Conferencing Solution Internet conferencing is used to hold group meetings or live presentations over the Internet. In a web conference, each participant sits at their own computer, and is connected to other participants via the internet. Internet conferences may include one or all of these features: audio, data and/or video conferencing solutions, depending on the needs of the users. The most basic feature of a web conference is screen sharing, whereby conference participants see whatever is on the presenter's screen. Users can communicate over a network with real-time voice, either through a traditional telephone conference or through VoIP, and video technology. Sometimes text chat is used in place of voice. Users can work together on a program, exchange or mark up graphics on an electronic whiteboard, transfer files, desktop sharing or use the text-based Chat program. An example of the web-cam interface in NetMeeting is shown in figure 3. Figure 2: The NetMeeting web-cam interface Microsoft Cooperation 15

The Case Company TeliaSonera Sverige AB The following two applications are used within TSS: NetMeeting, provided by Microsoft Cooperation. It's built into Microsoft's Internet Explorer Web browser. TeleMöte Webb, Commercial meeting service provided by TS Figure 3: Comparison between the interfaces of NetMeeting (left) and TeleMöte Webb (right) The two applications are much the same but with slightly different layout as shown in Figure 3. Within TSS both MetMeeting and TeleMöte Webb are commonly used together with traditional telephone conference for voice communication. Web Board A Web Board is a web application which provides for discussion, document sharing, and progress status. For example project areas/web sites on the intranet. Can be used either for unsynchronised or synchronised communication. Instant Messaging Instant messaging is the act of communicating between two or more people in real-time over a network such as the Internet. Most services offer a presence information feature, indicating whether people on one's list of contacts are currently online and available to chat for example Windows Messenger. Policies TSS has both a travelling policy and a meeting policy. The travelling policy states that business travel shall be planed and carried out as cost efficient as possible and with respect for the environment. The existing guideline for meetings within TSS states that 16

The Case Company TeliaSonera Sverige AB face-to-face meetings shall be located at a place that generates the least cost for travelling and premises. The meeting policy declares the moderators/organisers responsibility for choosing proper meeting form with regard to content/purpose and the participants geographical location and social situation. It states that meeting virtually reduces cost, maintains efficiency, contributes to increased quality of life and decreases the impact on the environment. The meeting guideline contains information to the moderator/organiser on how to conduct an efficient and creative meeting. Premises Many of the personnel at TSS are situated in office landscapes and therefore so called silent rooms has been established at some location. The layout of a typical silent room at TSS in Farsta is shown in Figure 4. It is a small room, approximately 2x1.2m, without windows and the room is equipped with a desk, chair, fixed phone and network connection. Figure 4: Layout of a typical silent room at TSS in Farsta 17

Description of Execution Previous studies/literature Review This chapter presents both theories and empirical research in the area of virtual conferencing or from adjacent areas relevant for the discussion. The literature study covered documents, reports, articles and books within the subject (Search Strings: video conferences/meetings, telephone conferences/meetings, meeting processes, virtual conferences/meetings, communication, distance). The literature study includes literature produced within TS, studies as well as reports from KTH and commercial and non-commercial publications world wide. Several studies related to the topic virtual conferencing has been performed within the last decades and one of the most recent is the doctoral thesis Working Together when Being Apart by Eva Jansson (2005). In her thesis Eva Jansson states that working in distributed teams, without regular face-to-face meetings, will always be different and that the big danger is to believe that it won t. Further more she observed that if distributed projects will be successful depends on: If people are willing and capable to learn how to communicate with the available information and communication technology. If people are willing and capable to learn how to deal with the new set of problems that might arise. If the participants get enough guidance and support to keep them on track and motivated, help them to avoid preventable conflicts and misunderstanding and clearing out the problems that couldn t be avoided. Knudsen (2004, p 13) presents the common result from empirical studies reported by Olsson et al. (1995) as a base for theoretical models to build on, such as: When people who know each other are cooperating in a complex task, video does not seem to add much over audio to the quality of the end product. If there are any delays in the audio, quality suffers. All remote work, no matter how high the bandwidth and how small the delay, still makes people behave differently. They often either explain more or need to 19

Description of Execution clarify their ideas to their remote group members. But clearly, through these studies, it can be seen that people prefer video connectivity over audio only. To make distributed projects work well it is necessary to look beyond technological issues and also take humans into consideration (Jansson, 2005). TeliaSonera In 2004 TSS performed a short survey where all employees were asked to fill in a questionnaire consisting of five questions regarding internal meeting behavioural with focus on telephone conference vs. face-to-face meeting. 570 co-workers within TSS answered and the result was presented in a report (Dahlquist, 2004). The conclusion from the survey was that telephone conference are chosen over face-to-face meeting because it is more efficient, saves time and money and that you get higher degree of attendants in the meeting. Face-to-face meetings are chosen for start-up meetings to get to know the participants, for bounding and creation of relations, in a delicate situation where you want to read body language, when you have a lot of material to go through or for very long meetings. The above survey results can be considered valid for this study since it is just over a year old. But neither was video conferencing nor any other virtual conferencing system besides telephone covered in that survey. Two more extensive reports which are a bit older is one master thesis, Optimal Meetings, by Beatrice Kogg from 2000 and one report by Kogg and Arnfalk from Lunds University, within the project Optimala Möten II at Telia, Nära Målet En undersökning av möten, resande och attityder på Telia Nära. The reports have the same angel of approach; how to support virtual communication within Telia to minimize travelling with the aim to reduce costs and environmental effect. The project Optimala Möten has among other things resulted in decreased travelling cost and increased use of telephone meeting. Between 2001 and 2004 the travelling cost has been decreased and the CO 2 pollution has been reduced with 50 percent due to less travelling, increased use of Telephone meeting services within TS together with the decreased total office area (Herrström et al. 2004). 20

Description of Execution Description of Execution This chapter describes how the study has been planned and performed. Method of Selection Since the result of the research primarily will be used within TSS the respondents were selected within TSs organisation in Sweden. Due to the reorganisation and employee cut down during this period all organisation charts, address lists and employee catalogues were out of synch and out of date. The goal was to reach about one percent of the employees in TSS with the questionnaire. The fact that a large amount of the laid off personnel still was listed in the employee catalogue on the intranet and that that list contained about 14,800 people (Oct. 2005) while the official number on the home page stated about 11,000 employees by April 2005 made it difficult to decide how much one percent really was. A decision was taken based on a mean value of both sums, 13,000, and the questionnaire was sent out to 130 persons. The respondents were then selected from the employee catalogue on the intranet by picking out the first listed person in a block of 114 names. The list had first been sorted by organisation to guarantee that there were respondents representing each organisational department. The presence of laid of personnel in the list demanded an extra check of the stated form of employment and when the picked out person was stated as Not employed the next person on the list were chosen. This random choice method also resulted in a good geographical distribution with representatives at 25 different locations and in 53 percent male and 47 percent female potential respondents. The total relation of female and male personnel within TSS in 2004 was 52 percent men and 48 percent women (Herrström et al. 2004). The selection of meetings for observation and directed interviews was made by picking out a meeting in the conference booking system, appropriate for the observer, and contacting the moderator or organiser. The location and meeting form came to be of great importance in choosing a meeting due to the lack of a large travelling budget. For example, meetings that demanded physical presence of the observer needed to be situated in the Stockholm area. 21

Description of Execution Method of Collection The method of collection has been the use of questionnaire as well as directed interviews. The purpose of the questionnaire was to find out about opinions and usage, in general terms, of the different conferencing solutions within TSS. The interviews were both directed interviews with meeting participants and moderators concerning a specific meeting and the method and technique used in that specific case, and open interviews with people in the organisation with great deal of experience of working in distributed organisations. The questionnaire represented the more quantitative part of the research and the interviews had a more qualitative nature. In TSSs conference booking system on the intranet there are 16 conference rooms (TS Headquarter not included) with video conference equipment available. Since the video conference rooms at TS can be used for other kind of meetings except video it was of interest to examine to which extent the video facility were used. This were made by choosing a day in the conference booking system and contacting each meeting responsible that had booked a video conference room that particular day. The persons were asked whether they had used the available video facility or not. This procedure was repeated each day for one week, i.e. five different days (Monday Friday) were chosen with a total of 76 meetings. The result is shown in Figure 5. 100% 90% 80% 49,0 55,0 70% 76,0 67,0 60% 108,0 50% Not booked Other meeting Video conference 40% 30% 62,0 79,0 75,0 54,0 20% 10% 27,0 0% 5,0 6,0 7,0 5,0 0,0 Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Figure 5: Usage of the video conference rooms within TSS (percentage) 22

Description of Execution Questionnaire The questionnaire was both produced as an electronic version in TS support tool for questionnaires and as a physical paper version. The respondents received an email containing a presentation of the project and a direct link to the electronic version of the questionnaire. The questionnaire was also distributed to each respondent as a paper version and the respondent could choose which way to fill in the questionnaire. By ordinary internal mail service the respondents received a letter containing the questionnaire and an addressed reply envelope. All physical paper questionnaires were marked with a control number in order to tick of the respondents in a cross reference list. In the electronic version of the questionnaire the respondents were for the same reason instead asked to fill in their mail address. This way all who had not answered in time, and only those, could be reached by a reminder. Observations Observation of meeting behaviour was performed by participating in 22 meetings within TSS. Notes were taken based on an observation plan (Appendix 5). Partly Structured Interview 17 of the meeting sessions were directly followed by email interviews to the participants and the meeting moderator and/or organiser. The respondents were asked to answer a number of predefined questions connected to the prior meeting. The questions were both of open character which was to be answered with free text and questions with reply options. The purpose of the questions was to identify problems and methods related to specific meetings. The result from the interviews was often compared to the observation notes. Open Interview/Directed Open Interview Open and direct open personal interviews were conducted with experts and subject specialists to get a pre-understanding of the subject and to collect specific expert s report and facts. Interview plans were used to obtain high reliability. 23

Description of Execution Sample Losses Today you can count on a response rate on questionnaires between 50 and 70 percent (Trost, 2001). The response rate on the questionnaire here was 66 percent and can be considered good enough. The response rate on the email interviews were 88 percent and this is higher than the expected 75 to 85 percent also stated by Jan Trost. All organisation departments were represented among those who answered the questionnaire. The response rate per department varied between 32 and 100 percent. Only four of the selected 25 geographical locations were not represented among the final respondents. 24

Presentation and Analysis of Result Presentation and Analysis of Result This chapter summarizes the results from the questionnaire, interviews and observations. To illustrate the respondents attitudes and opinions quotation is sometimes used (free translation from Swedish to English have been made by the author). The respondents of the questionnaire were 48 percent females and 52 percent males and they represented 18 different locations in Sweden. The complete result from the questionnaire are to be found in appendix 2 where it is presented in a chart format and a comprised summary of the interviews are presented in appendix 6. Below the results from the questionnaire, interviews and observations are analysed in relation to the different stated topics. Motivation There is a high motivation within TS to use the available meeting services for virtual conferences. As many as 98 percent of the questionnaire respondents stated that it is important that we ourselves use the services we offer to our customers and it has a positive effect on TS s business. No one thought that it was unimportant and that it has no impact on TS s business or that the quality of the meeting services is so low that it does not contribute to internal effectiveness. TS as the leading operator shall of course unyielding use and push for virtual conferences. Think about the PR we can make considering the environment! We shall use all services ourselves to take the lead as ambassadors and this is done by using these services in our daily WORK. Only three percent could not consider reserving time for education in tools and aids for virtual meetings. The rest were willing to take time to learn how to use new tools and aids but many stated that it is important with an easy user interface. 25