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Physical proximity has big effects in the workplace

Seeing people in person matters. Information pours off them: not just what they say, but how they say it and whether they listen. Relationships form more naturally. It’s much harder to look a person straight in the pixels.

Seeing people in person matters. Information pours off them: not just what they say, but how they say it and whether they listen. Relationships form more naturally. It’s much harder to look a person straight in the pixels. An array of studies have demonstrated how much proximity matters in the workplace. One paper published in 2020 by Assistant Professor Diego Battiston of Stockholm University and his co-authors looked at how the police force in Manchester fields emergency calls. Their process involves two people. A handler takes the call and writes up the incident. An operator then allocates police officers.