INTRODUCTION
The internal video conferencing system at Google is called GVC, and is in every meeting room. Rooms come in different sizes, users can log on from their computers, and the experience is relatively the same.
I had worked on this product off and on, there wasn’t a dedicated UX team or headcount to staff the projects.
PROCESS
A lot of my work was around exploration. Try ideas around maximizing 16x9 ratios, improve the sharing/presentation experience. The experience of walking into a meeting room and starting a meeting was explored.
I was exploring this space in a time when most meetings happened in a room, with another room. Few people logged in remotely or from a laptop.
OUTPUT/OUTCOME
My work never launched, similar or better versions are available today. At the time I worked on this, there was a strong dependency on existing systems and Google Meet, the external version.
Due to the above, the visually simple suggestions weren’t easy to implement and my engineering team struggled with some of the front end change needs.
LEARNINGS
Being part-time on a product has drawbacks. It was fun to work on and I am convinced that these changes would have had a positive impact, but hindsight is 20/20.