Day 18 in the Virtual Office
Total Time in VR: 4 hours and 55 minutes (across 10 VR sessions)
Use Cases: Focus Time (1 hour 27 min), 1:1 Meetings (1 hour 3 min), Community Time (59 min), OssoVR Platform (32 min), MiniMindfulness (34 min), Evening Work (19 min)
Today’s banner pic highlights our weekly Community Time at OssoVR, on the new Myst course!! It’s been a while since I’ve done the full hour and with a group of 5 (who all gave permission to share photos). While this VR Office Experiment is mostly about the productivity to be found in focus work and collaborative team work, the value of building community at a remote company shouldn’t be minimized. Without such tools, burnout and turnover are much more likely. Productivity relies on good mental health.
Today was a very balanced day in VR. I spent similar amounts of time in Focus Time, 1:1 Meetings, and Community Time. That balance meant that I got a bunch of solo work done, I got collaborative work done, and I had some social time with my remote co-workers. On top of that I spent some time in the OssoVR platform helping assist with another surgical training promo video, AND the day started in MiniMindfulness where I wasn’t alone for the first time this week (and we had our session on the brand new Myst course!)
Cup Half Empty: The issues of latency continue. Screens lag a little in Workrooms. The cursor problem also continues. I find that I just have to let the cursor run around for a bit on it’s own, and when it stops I can keep going. If I try to start clicking to stop it, that only makes it worse. Sound was also a little choppy/sped up when the cursor went crazy. That’s DAY 2 of those issues, and not a good thing at all.
Cup Half Full: I had several good connections in VR today, and what is interesting is I was paying close attention to my 1:1 Zoom calls today compared to VR. The simple answer is “VR is better”. I am going to try and give a solid reason that isn’t just a “in my experience” type answer, but that won’t come until I can tabulate my data. Community Time was with a larger group than normal, and on a brand new course. So there was lots of new discovery as a group, and a bit of goofing around, which is sometimes exactly what a Wednesday calls for!
#TLDR
The hours increased today, but this experiment isn’t just about the hours. The hours need to be productive, and today I can clearly say that I was more productive in VR during all of those hours. The massive monitors that are often minimized in tech reviews, truly make things easier for me. All of the important screens are just a glance away. Clicks are minimized. Window management is drastically reduced. That saves me time, and keeps me in FLOW state. Today was a good day to work in virtual reality!
Till Tomorrow…
Carrier Pigeon XR 