People slip away
But on Spiegel Online you could read (see link at the end of the text):
"Niels Annen, Minister of State at the German Foreign Office, says that diplomacy has now adapted to the Corona conditions. Nevertheless, the exchange via video or telephone does not achieve a comparable political effect as the personal meeting, which is accompanied by the media."
Once again we have to realize that the world is not black or white, there are many nuances in between. As pleasing as the sight of Lufthansa planes on the ground is for the climate, the economic and social effects are catastrophic.
Thousands of jobs depend on the aviation industry, and "transportation" services are needed and desired by millions of people.
Using the Libyan conflict as an example, Spiegel Online demonstrates that not every challenge can be solved by Microsoft Teams, Facebook, Zoom, a private Whatsapp group or Twitter:
"The Libya talks are already suffering from the phenomenon. [...] Technical means are limited in their ability to replace real negotiations. 'Unlike usual, we can't say, we're going to stay in this room and argue this out until we have an agreement'"
Jens Plötner, the political director of the German Foreign Office, told Spiegel Online.
"You can't do that in a video or telephone conference, because people slip away. Especially in dossiers where positions are far apart, where different cultures clash, from Iran to Ukraine, that makes things difficult for us."
Even in the SAP community, there are politically complex negotiation scenarios. A team meeting to determine where things are going wrong with SolMan is probably no problem via video conference and remote app via VPN.
The discussion after a license measurement regarding sublicensing over a video switch should already be a much bigger challenge.
"I am sure that some of these new working methods will still be used after the pandemic"
Spiegel quotes Minister of State Niels Annen. The clear time limits for video conferences, for example, have the advantage of forcing participants to concentrate on the essentials.
"But the face-to-face encounter is hard to replace"
Annen says.
Webinars are currently a megatrend in the SAP community. Print and online media are ideal for educational work. Price negotiations, emotional kick-off meetings and congresses with a lot of need for conversation over cake and coffee are still needed, otherwise people will slip away from the SAP community.
