A common theme in the modern workplace is that meetings aren’t always necessary, and other tools can be just as important. Popular video conferencing app Zoom has taken advantage of this idea, and expanded into a collaboration platform. With its AI companion, shared documents, and third-party app integrations, the platform can take productivity to the next level.
Using Zoom Workplace’s AI Companion
One of the most notable productivity tools released with the launch of Zoom Workplace in April 2024 was its AI companion, a virtual assistant with the ability to summarize chats and help schedule meetings. Months later, the company upgraded to Zoom AI Companion 2.0.
Conveniently located in a side panel, the companion can now synthesize information across the entire collaboration platform, including Zoom Meetings, Zoom Team Chat, Zoom Docs, Zoom Mail, and connected third-party applications (Google, Microsoft).
Zoom’s AI feature has extensive functionality, but there are a few key highlights that are essential to my workflow.
Live Meeting Assistance
Zoom’s AI companion (or should I say side-panel-kick?) provides live assistance during meetings. For example, when your colleague brings up a term you don’t recognize, you can ask the AI companion to define it for you instead of interrupting the meeting flow.
The virtual assistant leverages Perplexity’s impressive AI-powered search engine to access the web, and it can include quotes to instill more confidence in its answers.
Additionally, the AI tool can recap what was discussed in the meeting. This can be useful if you’re arriving late to a meeting and the team doesn’t have time to catch you up, or if you have to leave early and need to understand later what you missed.
Action item generation
Zoom’s AI Companion also comes in handy after a meeting, particularly with its ability to generate action items for you or your team. You can ask the virtual assistant for clarity during the call, or receive a post-meeting email that recaps the discussion and generates a bulleted list of next steps for each participant.
Synthesizing documents
Zoom’s AI Companion is also a great reader, with the ability to review documents uploaded via Zoom Docs, Google Docs, or Microsoft Word. Not only can the virtual assistant summarize a complex document for you, but you can also ask it specific questions, such as “What are the three main design elements discussed in this lesson?”.
Similarly, you can use the AI Companion to help you start a document. You’ve probably had to rely on your own talents to craft a productive meeting agenda on Google Calendar until now, but now, Zoom’s AI Companion will do it for you. Of course, AI writing isn’t perfect, but it can be a solid template and a useful way to get the creative juices flowing.
Attaching meeting resources
Zoom Workplace offers tools beyond artificial intelligence to make a day at the office run smoothly. Just like other calendar programs, you have the option with Zoom Workplace to attach relevant files to a meeting. You can do this by choosing Schedule > More Options, where you’ll see the option to + Add attachment. This dialog will let you add documents from multiple sources, including your local files, Zoom Docs, Google Drive, and Dropbox.
Assets
Attaching a file, such as a presentation or deck, to a meeting event means you don’t have to waste time searching for it on your desktop at the top of the call. Plus, it allows your participants to review the content beforehand and prepare questions, follow up during the meeting, or easily find resources later.
Document Collaboration
Sometimes it makes sense to attach a collaborative document that meeting participants can work on together during the meeting. This is possible with Zoom Workplace, through Zoom Docs or even Google Docs. You can attach a collaborative document the same way you would attach any asset.