Virtual meetings and wellbeing: insights from the COVID-19 pandemic

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between virtual meeting participation and wellbeing. Based on the conservation of resources theory, we hypothesize that participation in more virtual meetings is associated with both negative and positive wellbeing indicators. Design/methodology/approach – An online survey was sent to 3,530 employees across five Belgian universities in April 2020. Useful data from 814 respondents was collected and analyzed to test the hypothesized relationships. Findings – The authors find support for their hypotheses, namely that participating in more virtual meetings is associated not only with negative wellbeing indicators (workload, stress and fatigue) but also with a positive wellbeing indicator, namely work influence. Research limitations/implications – Given the unique work-from-home context during the pandemic, the generalizability of our findings may be limited. Nevertheless, this study contributes to the literature on Meeting Science and Virtual Work, as it is the first study to empirically relate virtual meetings to wellbeing indicators, including a positive one. Practical implications – As virtual meetings and work-from-home are expected to remain prevalent, understanding wellbeing implications is of high managerial importance. Their findings can be useful for (HR) managers who develop flexible work policies for a post-pandemic world. Social implications – The findings draw attention to the importance of maintaining a healthy balance between productivity and wellbeing in creating a sustainable work(-from-home) context. Originality/value – The COVID-19 lockdown provided a unique opportunity to obtain insight on the relationship between virtual meetings and wellbeing at an unprecedented scale.