Managing conference rooms - creating success at your office

Conference room management is an essential tool to minimize unnecessary hurdles and make the office experience smooth and frictionless. It is estimated that employees spend 15 minutes a day finding office resources, a number that looks small at a glance, but quickly adds up to many lost hours during a year. It’s also a source of frustration - troubles finding, booking, or even inviting colleagues to conference room meetings have the potential to greatly reduce the employee experience at your office. In this blog post, we will cover to most important conference room booking solutions you need to take your office to the next level.  

The best conference room booking solutions are comprised by both software, hardware and calendar plug-ins, all integrated to one system.  

Conference Room Booking Software

Conference room booking can be managed effectively by adapting a software system that is accessible via a mobile app or web application. A virtual 3D map is the best tool to give employees a clear overview of the office, displaying all conference rooms and resources. The conference rooms availability status is indicated by color – green for accessible and red for booked.

By using a virtual 3D map, Conference rooms can be booked directly or in advance with just a few clicks. Employees can use a mobile app or web application to easily book a desk that fit their needs. Our conference room booking wizard selects the most suitable room after the criteria given. When a conference room booking is made, a reminder is sent to participants and the wayfinder in the mobile app and Kiosk screen can be used to locate the booked conference room.

Conference Room Outlook plug-in

Even though the app can greatly enhance the booking experience, most employees book their meetings via their outlook or google calendar. A Plug-in for conference room booking is therefore essential to master the art of conference room management. An Outlook plug-in not only enables you to book a conference room directly from your calendar, but it can also guide you to select the optimum room using a scoring system, which prioritizes conference rooms from the best to the least suited. You just choose when you need the room and which equipment you require, the solution will then find a meeting room which matches your preferences, as it knows the number of seats needed and your preferred floor and building.

The location and time for the meeting is then directly communicated to the virtual 3D map, so employees can find the conference room by using wayfinding when the meeting is about to start.

Conference Room Display

Conference Room Displays are often viewed as something additional and sometimes unnecessary, but they play an important role in bridging the gap between our software environment and real-life environment. Conference Room Displays shows the rooms schedule for the day right outside each meeting room, making it easy to determine if the conference room can be used for a quick meeting. It also shows the rooms availability status from a distance, making it even easier to determine if a room is occupied or free to use.

But the most important function of a conference room display is its check-in capabilities. Ghost meetings can be easily avoided by having meeting participants “check-in” to the meeting via the conference room display. As a result, you can be absolutely certain that the employees who check-in to a meeting room are actually using it. The conference room display turns yellow when a meeting is about to start, and check-in can be made with just one click.

Conference Room Presence sensor

Conference Room Presence sensors have both statistical and practical advantages. Presence sensors produce statistics on how often meeting rooms are actually utilized independently on bookings. This enables you to see if meeting rooms are used without any bookings made, or if meetings are "drawn-out" or terminated in advance. The presence sensor also indicates availability on the virtual 3D map. By sensing if someone is in the room, it directly communicates to the system that the conference room is occupied, turning it red on the map. This is a necessary hardware to have in place if you have non-bookable rooms at your office. Without it, it’s impossible to know if a room is used or not, which defeats the purpose of effective conference room management.

Conference room presence sensors can be easily installed and are considered one of the most price effective options to show both conference room availability – and to produce valuable statistics.

Conference Room Busy Lights

Just like the conference room display, Busy lights can show conference room availability from a distance. Busy lights are most beneficial when you have non-bookable rooms, and therefore don't have a need for a conference room display.

Our Busy Light is perfect if you want a visual indicator of a room's availability. The lights glow green when a resource is available and red when it’s booked or in use.

Want to know more? Contact our experts for a free consultation.