Make it mandatory to turn camera on in video meetings at work?

Question

I am between junior and mid level in my team and new to my company. Everyone works from home all the time and our meetings are on video chat due to the covid pandemic. I often feel that some teammates are hardly attentive or not fully involved during important meetings with me. So, I often have to repeat simple things. Its not always due to mic and bandwidth problems!

Sometimes, it appears that they are far away from the mic, possibly doing something else during the meeting. Sometimes, I hear sounds of chores quite loud in the background. So, they are either doing their chores or are working very close to the area of chores. For example, one time, I heard frying pan noises and the other person was asking me to repeat things too many times. Moreover, their volume went up and down a lot. I repeatedly asked them if they are away from the mic and they said no. But, next moment they sounded like they came closer. Anyway, I don't have a problem with kids coming in occasionally and talking in the background. They are kids after all.

Unfortunately, my current company does not require the camera to be turned on during meetings. So, people NEVER turn it on. In my previous company, camera was mandatory in video meetings, unless there were obvious network bandwidth issues during the meeting or if too many people were present.

How do I ask my manager to make camera mandatory in video meetings without making it look like a complaint? I don't want to be direct and take names, but I'd like to say that videos might make people more disciplined. But, it seems pragmatic to be indirect and use excuses like team bonding etc. to justify video meetings.

PS - I am okay with reasonable exceptions, for example, mothers who need to nurse a needy baby during meetings etc. But, I'd like my team and maybe even the whole company to have their cameras on in meetings.

Answer 1

You would focus on your difficulty. "Hey manager, I feel like I'm having trouble communicating without visuals, and am feeling kinda isolated from the team since we're all remote. At my last place we used the cams and it helped with that." That should be enough for him to start a conversation with the team about it, ask if others are having the same problems, and possibly encourage camera use to help with it.

I'm a pro-camera user myself. In other contexts everyone knows that face-to-face communication is better and more bonding than a call, which is better than chat, which is better than an email... And in a pandemic+remote environment where now no one gets any face to face interaction at all it’s a major hindrance to teams working together effectively. Video calls are the next most engaging type of communication so many find themselves leaning on them heavily so their work team has more coherence and teamwork than that of a random stack exchange site.

At my last job I convinced my boss that camera use was beneficial; he didn't order everyone to use it but he and I both would turn our cameras on all the time to show leadership and eventually it peer pressured most of the rest of the team to do so as well. “Encouraging” is better than “making mandatory” especially in the pandemic as there are legitimate pressures (lack of child care, close quarters) that mean it’s not appropriate to expect office levels of total engagement all day.

At my current workplace we all use cams most of the time to facilitate more effective conversation and build bonds within the team, but we have set a culture that is very understanding of need to handle other things. We do say if you’re present you should be engaged and if you can’t be engaged just take some of our unlimited time off - so if someone’s like “During the calls tomorrow I’ll have my kids because of whatnot and will be distracted” we’ll usually say “just take that off then, we’ll catch you up later.” If you are forcing meeting attendance when people have other mandatory needs then you’ll get this kind if dynamic.

Obviously if you're having pointless meetings that's a different issue, but there's no hint in the OP that's the case. When working from home it can be easy to be distracted and part of the new remote by default workforce is finding ways to manage that.

Answer 2

How do I ask my manager to make camera mandatory in video meetings without making it look like a complaint?

Don't. Some/Many people aren't comfortable being on camera. This is their personal space. Don't invade it. I don't mean that their home is their personal space (even though it is), I mean that making the choice to be on video or not is a personal choice about their personal being.

I don't like being on camera. I find it to be profoundly intrusive and upsetting.

From where I sit, there's nothing positive to be gained by mandating this, and it may in turn have a negative impact if employees become resentful of what they perceive to be "over-reach" or an invasion of privacy on the company's part.

Find other ways to address these issues, with the understanding that WFH is a new paradigm for everyone and that everyone needs to find ways to navigate it that work for everyone, employers and employees alike.

Answer 3

Make it mandatory to turn camera on in video meetings at work?

There is a big difference between strongly encouraging or discouraging a given behavior, and requiring or banning that behavior.

In the US for example, people and organizations have communicated the harms and dangers of smoking for a long time, but cigarettes themselves were never made illegal. What has been most effective in reducing cigarette use is the change in societal norms over that period.

I think you'd be better off demonstrating the benefits of being on camera yourself, sharing your ideas with others, and talking to your manager about ways to communicate those benefits to the larger group.

Once you require that people be on camera, then someone has to enforce that rule. Will that be people reporting each other? Or will someone need to record or observe each meeting? What if a person's camera isn't working? Will they have to prove that somehow? What will be the punishment or consequences? If you can't or don't enforce a rule, it's the same as not having the rule in the first place. You also take away individual judgement as to when to appear on camera.

The voice-only conference call has been a standard method of communication for many years. Unless there is a specific reason someone needs to be seen, perhaps to physically demonstrate something visual, it seems more reasonable to allow each person to use their own standards that still benefit the meeting overall. If someone is making noise or being too loud to the point of distraction, then that's the real problem, and not whether they are on camera.

Ultimately the standard should be: is a given meeting participant being a responsible member of the team, and providing the best possible input to the work? I'm not sure that a camera is always part of that equation.

Answer 4

Is this question about seeing people you're having a meeting with, or about hoping that being forced to sit on their chair will magically make them care more about your meeting? Because it sounds like it's the latter, and I don't think forcing people to have their butt in a seat is going to make them more engaged with your meeting.

People don't cook dinner while in a meeting they care about. There's something else going on here that's making people disengage with these meetings and their work, and you're better off figuring out what it is. It could be the time, the subject, their surroundings, it could be anything. But until you ask people what's going on, forcing their behavior into something you think will work better for you is just going to counter-productive.

We're going through some weird times, and people are having a lot of things on their mind right now. If you want them to be actively engaged with what you're doing, try to work with them to find out how that will work, don't just force things on them. (I mean that should be general advice anyway, but it's even more relevant now)

Answer 5

You're trying to fix a problem before you fully understand it. As such, your solution is unlikely to succeed.

The question you need to ask to gain that additional understanding is: why are coworkers not paying attention in meetings? The simplest, and therefore most likely correct, answer is that there are too many meetings and "meeting fatigue" has set in.

But ultimately, the only way you can know this is by asking. Start by discussing with your manager if there is any feedback from your coworkers to him/her about the meetings you're in - perhaps your team members feel that you are scheduling too many meetings, or making them too long, or asking too many questions; but are too polite to say so to you personally. If that doesn't give you enough insight, you can move on to asking your coworkers these same questions individually and directly.

At the end of this exercise, you'll better understand your coworkers' positions, and can then work with them to find an outcome that will work well for all of you going forward.

Answer 6

Actually I think that making it mandatory/strongly encouraged to have people turn on their cameras during online meetings is a good way to help keep everybody engaged during the meeting. I personally also think it's nice to actually see the faces of your colleagues sometimes during this period.

However I also think that having a lot of people clearly doing other stuff during an online meeting indicates that maybe their presence and their input are not really important for that meeting. So I think it is a good idea to accompany such a camera-on rule with some serious culling of the amount and length of meetings.

Answer 7

You don't. There's no way to request this without sounding whiney. It would be a career limiting move if it came out that you were the cause. These people are all adults. Treat them as such- they can judge whether its best for them to turn on the camera or not.

And quite truthfully, cameras on won't have any effect on people paying attention. I'm more likely to be paying attention while I get up to grab a glass of water (the sink is 4 feet to my left and I'm on speakers) than I am when on the computer- the computer has a web browser, my email, and my slack. The distractions are far greater.

Answer 8

It's not your job to police this.

Instead of getting annoyed about it why not take a leaf out of their books and try improving your own work/life balance a bit? As long as the work gets done a good boss probably doesn't mind exactly how people choose to manage their work.

Answer 9

How many people are in on these meetings? Is all of their input or attention required?

How do I ask my manager to make camera mandatory in video meetings...

sounds a lot like an XY Problem (asking about your attempted solution rather than your actual problem). Your solution is akin to "beatings will continue until morale improves". If your start requiring cameras then prepare to be amazed at how many peoples' microphones work but the camera doesn't want to do video.

Your problem is:

I often have to repeat simple things. Its not always due to mic and bandwidth problems!

There. Tackle that issue.

Quite frankly, you sound too nice. Repeating yourself several times without making them feel uncomfortable makes you a doormat.

• Repeat it once if you feel the request is genuine
• Upon second request, single that person out and ask if they're having technical issues. Suggest they get in touch with IT about their "connectivity" issues
• If your talking point wasn't directed at them then let them know and move along
• They're not dumb, they know their actions are distracting and so does everyone else in the meeting
• There's probably more than one person that wishes you didn't have to repeat yourself and for the meeting to finish sooner

You need to set the tone when you're speaking. If you expect undivided attention then act like it.

One good route to explore is ask your manager about your experience with meetings. Ask them if they put up with that crap too or if things go differently for them.

Answer 10

The real problem here is not solvable by you watching them

The real problem is that they don't take the meetings seriously

Set a few ground rules

• If you have noise in the background use a decent headset
• mute yourself when you don't speak
• If you are addressed in a meeting, stop other things you are doing
• if the meeting contains information relevant for you, don't do other things
• Decline beforehand if it's not relevant to you.

For the organizer:

• Keep meetings small and short
• Have an agenda that people know if things are relevant for them
• Take a protocol

Answer 11

You are asking a question that will not solve your problem.

Your problem:

People are inattentive at meetings.

But people don't pay attention at in-person meetings anyway.

some teammates are hardly attentive or not fully involved during important meetings with me

Are those meetings important to them? I don't know you but I can almost guarantee you the answer will be NO in 90% of cases. That meeting could've been an email. Or just a meeting between you and the 3 others that it actually affects (who will also be far more likely to be attentive). The rest isnt involved because it literally does not involve them. They're just there because they have to be. So they're not really there.

Meetings are a modern office plague and nobody wants to be there. So, to fix your problem, minimize meetings. Put stuff in an Email, Sharepoint post etc. if it can be. And if you want/need meetings (which some things do): Make them as small as possible.

It seems you're already known for meetings that don't really matter. So people assume that. But if you always only do meetings with exactly the few people that actually matter for the topic AND involve them they will start to catch on. People will eventually know that when you schedule a meeting with them, the other dude on the project and you that it'll be important and they will be mentally fully there.

Also our companys solution to your

I hear sounds of chores quite loud in the background

is the absolut opposite of what you demand. It's having their mic muted. It's company policy to be muted unless actively speaking (or wanting to speak), and its WONDERFUL. No more breathing into the mic, dogs barking in the background, NOTHING. And if people don't care about the meeting they don't listen, but they wouldn't have either otherwise.