Working in an office might never be the same as it was since the coronavirus pandemic swept across the U.S. and around the world starting last spring—and that’s a good thing for AV integrators who work in the corporate space because it means business leaders will need a lot of help meeting employee needs.
“Corporate AV has changed dramatically and it may never go back to what it was,” said Almo’s Eric Olson in an NSCA roundtable discussion during the recent Almo E4 Evolution virtual spring event. “Employees are just as productive as they always were. It just took a period of adjustment.”
How They Got There: Warren Chaiken, Almo
Legrand’s Joseph Cornwall “didn’t see everything I’m doing being focused on a camera in my space” when he first started working from home years ago but that’s been what he’s experienced with the entire workforce now doing the same. He added better lighting and rearranged his office furniture.
“We see our coworkers living as people now,” said Cornwall. “It creates a very different environment. I see nothing but opportunity arising from this.”
More About Corporate AV’s Evolution
IVCi’s Dan Abrams noted the companies that had better plans around transforming their technological infrastructure and reacted quickly to the COVID-19 outbreak “fared better than those who didn’t.”
“We learned a lot of lessons when we were put in a position where we had to learn them,” he said. Many companies didn’t have AV as a priority pre-pandemic but it’s become one for them today.
The downturn in volume of work created what Olson called “an opportunity to learn” for both AV integrators and their customers, who better understood why technology is so crucial to their day-to-day operations and how the systems they had couldn’t deliver the results they wanted in today’s world.
“There’s a tremendous growth opportunity here,” said Cornwall, noting AV as a Service is “hypercritical going forward.” “We just have to keep our eyes open.”
Abrams advocated for diversification of offerings by integrators, saying “the bulk of integrators spent most of their time in the presentation space. Show your value.”
