We live in an informational and technological age. Teenagers are growing up texting, instant messaging and VOIP chatting with their siblings in the next room. We don’t go to book shops anymore, we shop at Amazon, and even that’s getting old hat. If it’s not blogged or Facebook’ed, nobody knows what’s going on in the terribly important minutiae of our lives. People do not interact with each other face to face anymore.

Thank the stars for the good old fashioned meeting - real people, meeting in a real place and discussing real things. Sure, the internet has revolutionised our lives; sure, it’s given us opportunities to share valuable data and keep in touch with each other; but it’s not a panacea.

Many of us will remember the hype about video conferencing and how it was going to revolutionise the way we do business. It was no longer going to be necessary to travel long distances and lose valuable time out of your schedule to meet in the same office.
Well in video conferencing terms the picture quality and camera technology is improving, the bandwidth is better than ever, the audio capability is sharp as a pin.

But still colleagues and potential business partners travel all across the country and across the globe to meet and greet. They press the flesh, they look into each others eyes and they get a sense of character. The old sales training course adage is that ‘people buy from people’. In meetings, people meet with people; it’s what makes us human.