Session on Virtual Workspaces
The Life Skills Committee of the College organized an Online Life Skills Session as a part of the 30 Hours 21st Century Life Skills Certificate Course for the First Year B.Com and First Year BBA(Financial Services) students on 15th February 2022 from 9.45 to 11.45 am using the Google Meet platform. The topic of the session was ‘Virtual Workspaces. The main objective of the session was to familiarize the students with the pros and cons of virtual workspaces, virtual meeting etiquette and understanding the future of virtual work-spaces.
The Resource Person for the session was Ms. Manika Costa Pereira, Co-Founder, Enrich Service Solutions and Fit for Life. Asst. Prof. Sheryl Sanches welcomed the Speaker and the students. Ms. Brionna Noronha, student of FY B.Com C introduced the Guest Speaker. Ms. Manika Pereira commenced the session with an introduction to virtual workspaces and discussed that working virtually was first initiated by Google much before the pandemic began. Ms. Pereira questioned the students about the benefits of working virtually. The students could relate with the situation and various pros were discussed such as autonomy and flexibility, recruitment and retention, tracking company performance and employee accountability, saves money, office space and its costs and fuel and energy costs.
The downsides of a virtual workspace were then discussed i.e. lack of human contact could cause decreased team spirit, trust and productivity, increased sensitivity to communication, interpersonal and cultural factors, lack of social interaction and creativity and potential employee burnout.
Ms. Pereira discussed how to manage a virtual workspace. Various factors that are conducive to working virtually were emphasized such as communication, transparency, training, inclusion, time zones and team culture. Certain etiquette to be kept in mind while working virtually were explained such as join early, cut noise, dress right, tidy workspace, clean wrap up and stay focused.
She then discussed about the future of working virtually. A video about metaverse was displayed to give a better understanding about the future of working virtually. The resource person also cited the example of the couple who got married in metaverse and the wedding was attended by over 3000 guests.
The session ended with the Vote of Thanks proposed by Ms. Ekta Parmekar, student of FY B.Com C.