Let’s Talk: Face-to-Face Interaction Now

Abstract

We look at how Chapter 5’s ‘people ideas’ play out in practice; it is about real people talking about real jobs. Respondents described their interactions, how much was internal or external, the frequency and nature of contacts, and how much their social and work lives interpenetrated. Strongly evident in the responses is the role of different technologies in displacing face-to-face in specific contexts and settings. The trade-offs between on- and off-line encounters emerged, as did what that means for how firms conduct business and choose where to locate. A section titled Was This the Future? reports on a follow-up survey of our original interviewees in the midst of a global pandemic that tested our assumptions and arguments. With lockdowns, ‘social distancing’ and working from home as people’s ‘new normal’, was this the moment to discover that F2F wasn’t quite so important after all? The section reports both on immediate effects in their sectors, and their views on the likely longer-term impacts on how business would be done.