Victoria Chung at 8×8 explores how built-in AI is transforming meetings and everyday calls.
Meetings are where work should move forward, yet too often they’re what hold it back. Most employees spend nearly a third of their week in them, and too much of that time goes to rehashing old conversations or taking manual notes.
Ineffective meetings have been shown to cost companies roughly $25,000 per employee per year in lost time and resources. That is a massive drain on focus and productivity, and it adds up fast. It’s not that we meet too much. It’s that meetings often fail to produce what teams need most: clarity and momentum.
The same friction shows up in everyday calls too. Quick check-ins, project handoffs, and those “can you hop on for five minutes?” moments that turn into thirty. When the conversation matters, relying on memory isn’t a system.
No wonder so many people leave with more questions than answers.
The Conversation Paradox: Always On, Rarely Effective
We have never had more ways to connect, and we use them constantly. A meeting invite takes seconds, a quick call takes one click, and suddenly calendars are stacked wall to wall.
Inside them, focus gets stretched thin. People are juggling screens, side chats, and real life around them, so small but important details slip. Then the call or meeting ends and the shared understanding fades fast. Notes are incomplete, and the next one starts with a recap instead of a runway.
The truth is simple. Conversations aren’t broken. They’ve just been designed for talking, not outcomes. What teams actually need is straightforward: less repetition, fewer details falling through the cracks, clear next steps, and time back in the day.
AI Is Redefining What “Productive” Looks Like
AI is quietly transforming meetings and calls into moments that actually move work forward. With intelligence built directly into it, clarity shows up automatically, in the background, right where teams already work.
Here’s what that looks like when AI is built in:
- Keep everyone in focus: Smart framing and speaker tracking keep meeting views balanced, so every participant stays visible and involved, wherever they join from.
- Remove distractions: Background noise fades away in real time, whether it’s a scheduled session or a quick check-in, so people stay present.
- Capture what counts: After every meeting or call, accurate transcripts handle the way your team really speaks, including custom terms and clean language controls, so the AI stays grounded in the real conversation.
- Turn talk into action: Automatically generated summaries and action items follow every meeting or call, so no one leaves guessing what happens next or who owns it.
- Get everyone up to speed: Joined a meeting late? Catch-up recaps surface the key points and next steps fast, so you’re never out of the loop.
Together, these capabilities give your teams something most meetings and calls don’t: a clear record of what happened, what matters, and what needs to happen next.
From Discussion to Direction
The best conversations don’t end when the screen goes dark. They create momentum that moves work forward.
AI helps your teams keep that direction without extra effort. It reduces the friction around meetings and calls so your people can stay focused, move faster, and spend their energy on outcomes, not on untangling what just happened.
This blog post has been re-published by kind permission of 8x8 – View the Original Article
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About 8x8
8x8 is transforming the future of business communications as a leading Software-as-a-Service provider of voice, video, chat, contact centre, and enterprise-class API solutions, powered by one global cloud communications platform. Find out more about 8x8
Call Centre Helper is not responsible for the content of these guest blog posts. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect those of Call Centre Helper.
Author: 8x8
Reviewed by: Megan Jones
Published On: 26th Feb 2026
Read more about - Guest Blogs, 8x8
