Author Archives: Lisa Avvocato

AV Innovation: A Bridgeless Video Bridge

August 15th, 2012 | Posted by Lisa Avvocato in Audio Visual Integration | Telepresence - (0 Comments)

Video conferencing solutions are quickly replacing the frequent high-level meetings that are standard in most organizations. Executive teams typically meet with the managers of different business units or locations to discuss business strategy, profitability and other key deliverables. However, many times these managers are scattered across the globe making frequent in-person meetings costly and time consuming. While video is great for meetings with two to three sites it can be difficult to hold a group meeting with several worldwide sites over a video bridge.

In many instances, the active speaker view limits the continuous presence of the remote sites. When the CEO speaks he cannot gauge the reaction of the site he is addressing until they speak and the view shifts. Even more frustrating is when a member of the Executive team is speaking but the view keeps shifting between sites where participants are rustling papers or murmuring agreements. Despite all of the audio visual components, these meetings just don’t provide the same experience of having the meeting in-person at headquarters.

A global Real Estate firm faced similar challenges and wanted a solution that simulated their quarterly management meetings; from eye contact to speaker priority. They wanted the ability to customize the way remote sites were displayed in continuous presence views plus a concurrent view of the active speaker. Additionally, they wanted to give the CEO and other Executives speaker priority; whenever they spoke the active speaker would switch to them regardless of whichever site may be speaking.

Since a standard video bridge did not provide the flexible windowing capabilities, the ability to place sites in a specific location on screen, our engineering team created a bridgeless video bridge.

With the help of three displays, three Cisco C90s, an array of audio visual equipment and a lot of programming; a new Executive Boardroom was created. The left and right displays featured continuous presence of each site, unless content was being displayed, while the center display switched with the active speaker. Additional programming gave headquarters speaker priority; anytime the CEO spoke the active speaker would automatically revert back to him.

Since most of the remote sites did not have three displays, the continuous and active presence capabilities needed to be condensed into one video feed. A little extra programming created the layout below. This allowed remote sites to continuously and easily view the headquarters location while still having a larger view of the active speaker and the presence of all sites.

Watch the video below for a quick demonstration on how this amazing technology works!

, ,

Embrace Conflict for High Performance Teams

August 13th, 2012 | Posted by Lisa Avvocato in Collaboration - (0 Comments)

Conflict is a part of everyday life; whether it’s someone cutting you in line at Starbucks, an argument with your spouse about what to eat for dinner, or a disagreement with a co-worker about how to prepare for a zombie attack. In these instances, the conflict isn’t really that big of problem. But, what about disagreements over pricing for a new product or departmental funding? These situations can have major ramifications among team members and some organizations will try to avoid conflict at all costs. But is that healthy? Should conflict be eliminated?

In many cases the answer is no, opposing opinions and ideas are crucial to the success of an organization. Continually questioning what is right allows organizations to stay ahead of trends and adapt to market changes. In fact, in his recent HBR blog article Mark de Rond states that “rivalry within a team helps weed out inefficiencies and – however uncomfortable it may feel at times – also keeps people at the top of their game.”

If Isaac Newton had not questioned gravity or Steve Jobs not questioned the use for a personal computer where would we be today? The highest performing teams are usually composed of a diverse group of people; different backgrounds, different specialties, different ways of thinking. With so many differences, conflict is bound to happen. The difference between a high-performance team and a low-performance team is how the conflict is handled.

According to Donald Brown in An Experiential Approach to Organizational Development there are five different ways to deal with conflict. These are based on two dimensions; the desire to satisfy others and the desire to satisfy self.

  • Avoiding: people who have a low desire to satisfy themselves and others and are passive aggressive or draw away from conflict.
  • Obliging: people who like to satisfy others and smooth over conflict despite their opposing views.
  • Dominating: people who care more about their personal objectives and ignore the needs of others.
  • Compromising: people who seek out a compromise between all parties leaving everyone only partially satisfied.
  • Integrating: people who seek to examine differences in opinion by sharing information to reach a consensus or win-win situation.

Teams that consist of mainly avoiding, obliging or dominating members will typically have a lower performance because one or two people will dominate the ideas within a group. Important points may be overlooked because members who like to avoid conflict or smooth things over are afraid to upset the harmony of the group.

On the other hand, teams that consist of members who approach conflict with an open mind are more likely to come up with a well-rounded and sustainable solution. Potential holes or flaws are openly discussed and the solution is adapted to address many of these points.

Constantly challenging one another forces everyone to stay at the top of their game. Team members will research and educate themselves more before putting forth an idea in order to answer the team’s constructive criticism. More importantly, if everyone is working towards a common goal, that zombie attack will be a lot easier to fend off at the end of the day. For example, Kim’s idea of commandeering an Army tank sounds great, but when you run out of ammunition and the gas tank is empty, you will be glad that Barry insisted on also bringing a samurai sword.

, ,

Audio Feedback vs. Echo – What’s the Difference?

August 9th, 2012 | Posted by Lisa Avvocato in Audio Visual Integration - (0 Comments)

There it is again, that unbelievably annoying high pitched sound. What is it? One person says it’s an echo, another person says it’s a reverberation and yet someone else is saying it’s feedback. All I know is it’s driving me absolutely crazy and somebody just needs to make it stop!

If you video conference on a regular basis, chances are you’ve been in a similar situation. People are throwing around different terms left and right then arguing over whose side is at fault. With all of this going on it can be difficult to determine exactly what the problem is let alone how to fix it.

Here’s a quick overview to help distinguish between echo, reverberation and feedback along with some tips to help reduce each one. 

Echo, also known as reverberation, is almost always a problem on the far end of a video conference and is the result of a reflection of sound. When a participant speaks into a microphone, the audio gets transmitted to the other side through their speakers. Then, their microphone picks up the audio and sends it back to the speakers in the local room. Participants in the local room hear what was just said again since the speakers on the far end are not cancelling out the audio properly.

To minimize reverberations, an echo canceller or acoustical ceiling tiles can be installed. Additionally, minor adjustments to the type and placement of room furniture along with the installation of shades or a heavy rug can help improve acoustics in the room.

Audio feedback, on the other hand, is almost always an issue with the local room. It occurs when a sound loop exists between an audio input (microphone) and an audio output (speaker). Essentially, when a participant speaks the audio passes through a microphone to the speakers and gets amplified. The process continues to repeat as the microphone picks up the noise, amplifies it further, and passes it through the speaker. Eventually a sound, ranging from a low pitch to an extremely high pitch, is emitted which can disrupt the conference in addition to be extremely annoying.

To minimize feedback, microphones and speakers should be spaced appropriately and positioned so the speaker output isn’t feeding directly into the microphone. Additionally a digital feedback eliminator or noise filter can be installed to reduce feedback.

Audio quality plays a significant role in the video conferencing experience and should not be taken lightly. Poor audio can detract from the effectiveness of the meeting as participants are focused more on trying to hear speakers and tune out background noises than on the topics being discussed.

Similar Articles:
Can You Hear Me Now?

, ,

Sound Masking Your Way to Medicare Reimbursement

August 6th, 2012 | Posted by Lisa Avvocato in Healthcare - (0 Comments)

Centers for Medicare and Medicaid now base a portion of hospital reimbursement on how well a hospital performs along with clinical and patient satisfaction measures. The Hospital Value-Based Purchasing (VBP) Program metrics are based on metrics from Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) metrics which are publicly available. In order to receive full Medicare funding, hospitals need to score in at least the 50th percentile in patient satisfaction scores.

One key area is ensuring the area around patient rooms is always quite at night which is challenge for most hospitals. Doctors and nurses who are constantly milling around, responding to calls or checking in on patients can easily disrupt neighboring patients at night. Not only is a lack of sleep frustrating for patients, it can actually prolong recuperation. According to Niklas Moeller, studies have shown that sleep deprivation can “weaken the immune system, impede the body’s ability to generate new cells, and decrease pain tolerance – all of which can lengthen hospital stays.”

So how do hospitals reduce noise in patient rooms and, more importantly, in the Emergency Room and Intensive Care Unit? Forbidding doctors and nurses to talk during “quiet hours” is out of the question and noise-cancelling headphones are uncomfortable to sleep in plus present additional sanitary concerns.

Enter speech privacy, also known as sound masking, solutions for healthcare environments.

Essentially, a background noise similar to airflow is disseminated through ceiling mounted speakers which drowns out human speech and other distracting noises. So, when a patient has a revolving door of visitors; neighbors can easily relax, watch television or read without continued distractions. When a patient is screaming for the nurse, the nurse is paging the doctor and the doctor is running down the hall; neighbors can continue their restful sleep instead of being rudely awoken.

Day or night, the soothing noise allows patients to fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer due to a quieter environment increasing patient recovery and hospital efficiency in addition to the VBP program benefits.  Additionally, speech privacy solutions also help doctors and nurses maintain patient confidentiality by masking their conversations from other patients.

We are nosy by nature and patients are curious as to what landed their neighboring counterparts in the hospital. Sometimes it’s casually overhearing the doctor speak in the hallway, other times it’s pressing an ear against the wall to hear what’s going on. Speech privacy solutions mask the intelligibility of speech so even the nosiest patient can’t distinguish exactly what is being said – unless of course they creep into the room and hide under the bed but that seems highly unlikely.

Additional Articles & Resources:
Sound Masking Solutions 
Telemedicine Reimbursement - The Time is Now!

, , ,

Stop Being a Video-phobe Part Deux

August 3rd, 2012 | Posted by Lisa Avvocato in Tips & Tricks | Video Conferencing - (0 Comments)

Video has become a staple in both my professional and personal lives. I find it so much easier to have a conversation face-to-face and simply get annoyed when I have to pick up the phone. Unfortunately, I still meet a lot of people who just don’t seem to love video as much as I do. We’ve already discussed a few excuses in a previous post; including people can spy on me, I cannot multitask and video is creepy. Here are a few more of my favorites:

Video is too difficult to use
Half of the time I can hear the other person but not see them and the other half I can see them but not hear them. That’s assuming I connect of course which is maybe only about quarter of the time. On the off chance that I can connect smoothly, the video image keeps breaking up and I can barely hear my colleague let alone see them. Yes, we’ve all heard the woes of unfamiliar video users and if video equipment and networks are not set up properly these inconveniences are probably true.

However, in most instances video is as easy to use as the telephone. UC solutions such as Microsoft Lync and Cisco Jabber make video conferencing as easy as typing in a name and clicking connect. There is no need to look up or remember a phone number, let alone an IP address. Similarly, cloud based bridging services not only remove most interoperability barriers but allow enterprise video solutions to connect with consumer desktop and mobile solutions such as Skype and iPads.

I sit in a public area and have little privacy
Conversations over video can be quite public if you are using computer speakers. Not only can people hear what you’re saying, they can hear what your counterpart is saying removing every ounce of privacy. Not to mention we all have that one coworker who’s a little loud or a little nosy and can be rather distracting when on a video call.

Try substituting a headset or pair of headphones for your computer speakers. Not only will this keep the conversation slightly more private, it will reduce some of the background noise allowing your colleague to hear you better.

I don’t like the way I look on camera
I look too fat, too pale, too old, too young for that matter – the list goes on and on. Newsflash: no one likes the way they look on camera because we are overly critical of ourselves. I mean everyone hates how they sound over audio but that doesn’t keep them from making telephone calls does it? So why then does it keep them from video conferencing?

Besides, there are few little things you can do to enhance your appearance – starting with the position of the camera. Make sure it is not right in front of you or zoomed up all the way; the closer the camera is, the bigger your face looks. You don’t need to prepare for the nightly news but a little foundation and bronzer goes a long way. Finally, make sure the area around you is tidy, although if you want people looking at your mess rather than your face, this is the way to go.

Getting over the hurdle of being afraid or making excuses not to be on video can be challenging. But do it, because in the end the advantages of using it far outweigh any negative feelings you may have!

Related Articles
Stop Being A Video-Phobe Part One

, ,