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Table of contents
Executive summary 03

New normal, old audio 04

From rooms to Zooms 05

Contact centres 06
Remote working 09
Telehealth 12
Online learning 13

The forgotten half of the online experience 16

Customer experience 17
Productivity 20
Wellbeing 21
Professionalism and bias 24

Audio: the key to unlocking the digital revolution 25

About IRIS 26
References 28

IRIS is an audio technology company with a mission to enable the world to

Listen Well. We created IRIS Clarity, an AI-powered app that removes
background noise from your customer calls and online meetings, to bring
control to otherwise uncontrollable environments.

© IRIS Clarity LTD. All rights reserved. IRIS Clarity LTD and other associated
names and logos are trademarks of IRIS Clarity LTD.

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 Executive summary

Welcome to IRIS Audio Technologies’ exclusive report on the role of audio in

an increasingly digital world. Our business was built on the belief that the
human connection with audio is a lost sense. As we move into a world that
is ever more virtual, it has become apparent that the solutions we have to
enable great conversations are lacking.

IRIS Clarity was born out of genuine necessity, when the pandemic hit
and everyone was forced to work from home, we spent hours on Zoom,
Teams, and Meet calls. I’m sure we can all relate to that feeling of Zoom
fatigue, suffering through the frustrating “can you hear me now” dance. We
realised our voice isolation software — stress-tested in some of the harshest
conditions, including Formula 1 — could solve the problems everyone was
facing: broken communication, reduced productivity, declining wellbeing.

As we’ve introduced IRIS Clarity to the world, we’ve interrogated existing

and potential customers, surveyed 500 call centre agents in the UK and
US, and explored findings from over 50 industry reports. From these we’ve
extracted many insights into the changing digital world, the uncontrollable
environments it has introduced, and the ways people have adapted to
working in it.

This paper is particularly relevant for call and contact centres, which is one
of the heaviest affected industries by the global shift to remote working.
Other relevant industries are enterprise companies with hybrid teams, the
emergence of telehealth and virtual appointments, and online learning,
whether that is traditional college and university courses or more bite-sized
lectures. All these interactions require flowing audio without distractions in
order to reach the best possible outcomes, with all participants able to focus
on what matters most: the conversation.

We hope you find this report helpful and insightful, with clear solutions on
how audio can not only improve your results and KPIs, but also your customer
experience and employee wellbeing.

Tom Darnell, COO

IRIS Audio Technologies

3
 New normal, old audio
A proprietary eponym (or generic
trademark) is where a brand name
is used so interchangeably with
the product/service it provides
that it becomes a noun or verb
itself. Common examples include
Hoover, Jacuzzi, and Aspirin. The
behavioural shifts driven by the
COVID-19 pandemic added a new
example to this list, with Zoom
ousting Skype as the standard
term for jumping onto an online
call or meeting.
In fact, for the early lockdowns
of the pandemic, Zoom became
the generic trademark case
study of our age. In January
2020, global Google (another
generic trademark) searches for
Zoom were at around 4 million.
By April, as offices closed and
we moved to a more remote
working environment, searches
increased by 3675% to 151 million
worldwide. Meanwhile, searches
for more general terms like “video
conferencing” or “online calls”
didn’t even reach 1 million — Zoom
had well and truly become the
widespread word for an online
meeting.
What this shows is just how digital
our world has become since the
pandemic.
4
Office meetings, education,
healthcare, customer service,
recruitment, auditions, even
television shows still resort to
online meeting tools like Zoom —
despite the fact that government
lockdowns and restrictions
have long since eased in many
countries.
Whilst we’ve seen many
advancements in the visual
component of video calls —
many of us have received higher
resolution webcams from our
companies or use the ‘virtual
background’ feature to disguise our
working environments — the audio
component has been somewhat
left behind. In fact, a study on
people’s biggest challenges of
online communication showed
that poor audio quality ranked the
highest among their frustrations.1
Throughout this report, we’ll explore
just how digital our lives have
become, how effective these digital
alternatives are, and how audio
may be the key to unlocking further
improvements.
 From rooms to Zooms
As restrictions globally clamped
down, certain sectors adapted
better than others to the new
digital environment — whether by
necessity or capability. Whilst some
roles will always require human
contact, others have unlocked
an important digital future. These
changes have upended many
industries.
Four key areas of our lives that
went almost entirely digital were:
• contact centres
• remote office working
• telehealth
• online learning
5
Contact centre agents learned to
deal with customer issues from the
comfort of their home; employees
worldwide swapped their offices for
teleconferencing; doctors began
treating patients online whenever
possible; and teachers and
lecturers delved into a new world of
teaching through a screen.
Each of these sectors has had
mixed results in adapting. They’ve
faced different obstacles, which
have influenced their continued
adoption of virtual communication
solutions in the new digital
environment. Let’s examine them in
turn.
 Call centres
The contact centre industry was
certainly one of the heaviest
affected by the global shift
to remote working. In early
2020, almost all contact centre
operations were hit with the perfect
storm. First, they had to work out
how to shift their operations to
remote, turning a massive and
typically old-fashioned sector
upside down. Until then, working
onsite under strict control and
supervision was an imperative for
this almost $340 billion market at
the time, with more than 15 million
employed agents worldwide.2 In
addition, call centres were dealing
with historically high levels of
queries due to pandemic-related There’s been
disruptions. more change,
arguably, in the
An average of 30% last 18 months than
more claims were
recorded across there was in 18
industries, with some years prior to the
sectors such as retail pandemic.4
seeing queries increase
by over 7x standard Stephen Yap,
levels.3
Research Director, CCMA
IRIS Pod
The entire sector had to undergo
an unplanned, forced, and instant
transformation at a time when they
had never been busier.

6
 The result of this transformation
has been massive. 90% of call
centre agents globally were
forced to work remotely during
the pandemic, which for most
companies damaged the
customer experience.5 In terms
of standard KPIs, Average Handle
Time (AHT) increased from
3-6 minutes to 10+ minutes;5
Customer Satisfaction Score
(CSAT) plunged, with
75%
of consumers
saying customer
service worsened;6
and the number of touchpoints
increased with 78% of customers
complaining they had to contact
companies multiple times for a
single issue.7
A drop in quality isn’t surprising
considering many organisations
and agents were ill-prepared for
the shift. One contact centre found
that 22% of their agents were using
ironing boards and window sills
as workstations due to the lack
of a suitable desk.8 The centres
themselves fared just as poorly,
with security and supervision
proving difficult in the early days.
Two years on, the challenge
remains. 88% of CX experts
believe customers have higher
expectations than they did in
previous years.9 Does this new
standard allow for continued
use of remote agents? Agents
clearly think so; trends indicate
that customer service agents are
enjoying the shift to remote and
want to keep doing it.
7
Gartner found that:10
70% of customer service
agents wish to
continue working from
home long-term
81% of service leaders
believe between
30% - 80% of their
workforce will
primarily be working
from home two years
from now
Our latest research already
indicates progress in that direction:
20% of agents are able to work
remotely full-time (up from 15%
pre-pandemic), and 23% are still
not allowed to work remotely at all
(down from 39% pre-pandemic).11
In the Philippines this demand
for hybrid working in the
sector has gone further, with
20% of the country’s Business
Process Outsourcing (BPO) staff
threatening to quit if forced back
to their pre-pandemic work
environments.12 Our research
confirmed this: 20% of respondents
who were forced to work from the
office full-time felt it was unfair
and were considering leaving
their current roles as a result.11
Much like employees in other
verticals, contact centre agents
have enjoyed the flexibility that
remote working gives them,
and organisations will need to
find solutions to remote working
obstacles such as security,
equipment, and uncontrolled
working environments.
 It is very clear to me that hybrid is absolutely
here to stay. What we’ve learned from the last
20 months is that it’s entirely possible to offer
hybrid working and deliver both a reasonable
customer experience and a reasonable colleague
experience in a hybrid environment.4

Stephen Yap,
Research Director, CCMA
IRIS Pod

8
 Remote working
The most prominent shift the
majority of people experienced
during the COVID-19 pandemic was
working from home rather than
from an office. This change was
unlike any work trend in history, and
is reported to have accelerated the
transformation to digital by three
to four years, at least.13
Two years after the start of the
pandemic, these trends still remain.
At the time of writing, Adobe,
Amazon, Apple, Deloitte, Disney,
eBay, Google, Microsoft, Salesforce,
and Twitter are just some examples
of major organisations that have
become either permanently hybrid
or remote-first.
In fact, 55% of businesses
globally now offer at least
some capacity for remote
work 14 — a considerable
jump from pre-COVID
times when only 6% of
employees worked
primarily from home and
about three-quarters of
workers had never worked
from home.15
While these changes were initially
driven by the requirement for social
distancing, evidence suggests they
are here to stay.
9
87%
of those who
were able to
work from home
during the pandemic want to be
able to continue to do so in some
form going forward.16
People’s eyes have opened to a
new way of working and more and
more employees are demanding
hybrid working from their
employers (52% of men and 60% of
women).17
Common reasons for wanting
to stay remote are increased
flexibility, savings in time and
money, and space to concentrate.18
Organisations are heeding these
requests, with many offering at
least some form of hybrid work
— it’s actually the most common
addition to job descriptions in the
midst of ‘The Great Resignation’
we’re currently experiencing.
From an organisation’s perspective,
remote working also offers multiple
advantages. Cost-saving is a big
one, in particular savings in travel
costs and office space rental. It’s
estimated that companies could
save around $11,000 annually
for each employee who works
remotely half the time.19 The other
big driver is a newfound access to
a wider talent pool.
 Removing geographical barriers
from recruitment searches
provides access to a slew of
qualified candidates, many of
whom don’t cost employers as
much because they don’t have the
same living costs as those living in
expensive urban centres.
It’s clear that whilst remote working
was already on the rise pre-COVID,
the pandemic has accelerated
the trend and it’s here to stay. As a
result, we’ve seen a huge increase
in online meetings: it’s now
estimated that we average over
3.3 trillion Zoom meeting minutes
annually, with the average person
spending 8 hours a week in online
meetings.20
Gartner predicts that by
2024, only 25% of enterprise
meetings will be in person.21
Internal meetings aren’t the only
ones that have been swept by this
digital revolution. The recruitment
industry has been completely
altered, with 79% of companies now
conducting employee interviews
over video calls compared to 22%
pre-pandemic. More than half say
this will be a permanent change.22
It’s easy to see why these changes
will stick. Recruitment processes
average 2-3 interviews, with the
average job offer only arriving after
interviewing 6-10 people.23
10
From the candidate’s perspective,
that could translate into several
costly and time-consuming
journeys for nothing. From the
employer’s side, making at least
the first couple of rounds virtual
could save time, by avoiding
delays and scheduling conflicts
with meeting rooms; money,
particularly if some employers are
already remote and would need
to commute in themselves; and
potentially awkward situations,
with candidates crossing paths in
between interviews.
Another key and seldom talked
about perk of remote working
is you no longer need to find a
physical room every time you want
to have a meeting or interview.
With office space scarce and
expensive, many companies often
lack enough dedicated rooms to
handle the number of staff they
have.
The average number of meetings
rose by 69.7% during COVID.24
Whilst a big portion of those are to
compensate for the loss of physical
conversations in the office, not
having to worry about booking
an in-demand room will have
certainly contributed here.
 We’ve had a chance to reflect, pause, reassess,
reevaluate what’s important to us, and what we need
and want out of [our working lives]. That’s given people
an opportunity [to ask] what we want moving forward
and what we want to leave behind. Is it sustainable? I
think that’s here to stay, even if it’s in a hybrid approach
that a lot of businesses are now taking.25

Louise Goss,
Founder of The Homeworker Magazine
IRIS Pod

11
 Telehealth
When hospitals struggled to
deal with the surge in COVID
cases and GPs stopped all but
the most critical appointments,
the telehealth industry soared
overnight. The sector rose to 38x
its pre-COVID levels, unlocking
a quarter of a trillion dollar
opportunity.26 The reasons for the
initial move to online healthcare
are obvious, but is it here to stay
the same way remote working is?
Early indications suggest a
long-term trend, with 40% of
patients anticipating to continue
with it after the pandemic ends.26
This is further backed up
by investments expected
to reach $185.6 billion
by 2026,27 temporary
regulatory changes which
facilitated telehealth being
made permanent, and
healthcare providers being
more favourable to (57%)
and comfortable (64%)
using telehealth services.26
Why is this the case? The two
biggest drivers seem to be
convenience and safety. Logging
into an online meeting room from
the comfort of your own home and
12
being able to do other things as
you wait for your doctor is much
more convenient than making your
way to the surgery before having
to sit in a waiting room for a long
time. The proof is in the research:
23% of patients have delayed
talking to a doctor simply because
it takes too long. Meanwhile, online
appointments require on average
100 minutes less than an in-person
appointment, which significantly
reduces this obstacle.28
This convenience works both ways.
Online healthcare solves the issue
of space as well as time. Patients
can be seen by experts in their field,
regardless of where those experts
are located. Where in the past
you’d be limited to the healthcare
professionals in close proximity to
you, telehealth allows you to be
evaluated by any specialist from
around the world. While this may
be less of an issue with common
ailments, rarer medical issues have
fewer specialists, and therefore less
geographical coverage.
In addition to this, whether GP
surgeries serve busy metropolitan
areas or extremely sparse rural
areas, in-person appointments can
lead to long or difficult commutes.
When you consider that those with
mobility issues are often much
more likely to need medical

assistance, these issues are
compounded, with many patients
requiring community-based
transport that runs to fixed
schedules.
From a health perspective, both
doctors’ waiting rooms and long
commutes are undesirable if you’re
medically vulnerable. In fact,
41%–42% of U.S. adults reported
they delayed or avoided seeking
in-person care during the
pandemic because of concerns
about COVID-19.29 This isn’t a
COVID-specific issue either,
medical waiting rooms were a
contagious place long before the
pandemic hit.
Whilst there will always be a place
for in-person appointments for
those that don’t have access to the
correct technology, for issues that
can’t be accurately diagnosed over
a call, or for people who simply
prefer direct human contact,
it’s clear that telehealth has
opened the door to a much more
convenient form of healthcare.
13
Online learning
188 countries closed the doors
to their schools during the early
stages of the COVID-19 pandemic,
with over 90% adopting online
learning as the alternative.30 In
most countries, only those whose
parents were key workers were
allowed to continue attending,
leaving a peak number of almost
1.3 billion children reliant on online
learning worldwide — a staggering
statistic.31
This change was just as
prevalent in higher education,
where students’ age meant that
supervision was no longer a factor.
With that, most institutions —
85% in Europe — stopped all
in-person educational activities.
This led to 220 million students
globally having to switch to an
online setting.32
 The effectiveness of remote
learning compared to online
working and telehealth is
considerably less optimistic,
however. From both the students’
and teachers’ perspective, the
outlook is consistently negative.
With primary and secondary
education, one report found that
98% of teachers believed their
students to be behind after the
2019/2020 school year had finished,
with the average estimate being
a full 3 months of education lost.33
It wasn’t just the students who
suffered; 86% of teachers believe
that online working has increased
their workload either ‘somewhat’ or
‘greatly’.34
Higher education seems to have
fared better with the ‘new normal’,
especially amongst Erasmus
students who had already adopted
this way of working.
According to a Times
Higher Education study:35
85% of institutions believe
the transition was a
success
40% believe that online
teaching is as good
as on-site teaching
19% believe there to be
a drop in quality
14
Students themselves seemed to
be similarly mixed about online
learning — half reported that
they were either satisfied or very
satisfied with their academic
experience.36 Of the 29% who
reported being dissatisfied or very
dissatisfied with their academic
experience, two-thirds claimed
this was because of the quality
of learning and learning delivery.
Understandably, the main sources
of dissatisfaction for students were
less about the impact COVID had
on their learning delivery and more
about the effect it had on their
social lives, as well as the fact that
they were still paying full-price for
what felt like a partial service.
Despite mixed reactions and
results, it seems remote learning is
a trend that is likely to grow, though
probably more as an edge case
rather than a mainstream appeal.
The advantages of online learning
for higher education are quite
clear: greater access to a university
education, a cheaper and more
flexible living arrangement that
doesn’t require being on campus,
reduced real estate costs for
campus buildings, and less need
for supervision, as the students
are now independent and self-
motivated.
 The advantages for lower
education institutions are a lot less
obvious, however, and drawbacks
have been far more damaging.
One of the biggest concerns
about continued remote
learning in the younger
generation is the expansion
of a new ‘digital divide,’
where students from
more disadvantaged
backgrounds get further
held back by poor access to
adequate internet speeds
and tech devices.
In addition, the level of supervision
required paired with the potential
threat to developing important
social skills mean that high uptake
of remote learning at these lower
ages will always be unlikely.
Regardless, investment in digital
learning is definitely on the rise,
and educational institutions are
15
keenly aware that they need to
future-proof themselves against
further potentially forced remote
learning situations (another COVID
strain for example). In addition,
it accommodates the needs of
people in special circumstances.
The number of schools prioritising
investment in digital learning has
risen from 24% pre-pandemic to
84% after COVID,34
with the global market
estimated to grow from $11.5bn
in 2021 to $46.7bn in 2026.37
Whilst there are still significant
barriers to widespread online
education, the sector clearly
acknowledges the need — and
potential — for it to grow.
 The forgotten half of
the online experience

The pandemic’s acceleration of this

shift from the physical to the digital
has come with many benefits —
hence people’s desire to maintain
certain elements of remote work
even as governmental restrictions
have been lifted. It also comes with
many obstacles.

The last few years have brought

a world of innovation in the visual
space, removing ever more barriers
in our digital experience. Examples
for the last two years. So why is
include AI virtual backgrounds to
undisrupted audio important for
hide your messy house, crystal
online conversations?
clear 8K resolution monitors, and
webcams that autofocus on the
relevant speaker with a 60 FPS
frame rate.

Audio, however, has been largely

neglected. Developments in
speakers and headphones are
always happening, but this is
where the innovation ends. Whilst
the visual aspect to a conversation
is undeniably important — with
body language and visual prompts
often conveying huge amounts
of information — so is the audio,
which affects engagement,
productivity, and wellbeing in
measurable ways. It’s strange
how little audio progress we’ve
seen, particularly in the online
communication tools that have
underpinned our conversations

16
 Customer experience
More than 50% of customers across
all age groups prioritise a phone
call over other channels when
looking for customer service.38 This
makes it the most popular method
of customer service, even with the
rise of digital channels, and is an
obvious reason why audio is so key
to customer experience.
As it seems remote working is here
to stay even in the contact centre
industry, the issue of ambient noise
takes a fresh form. Background
noise is not a new obstacle in the
industry — in fact, even pre-COVID,
64% of contact centres found
background noise to be an issue.39
Our research further proved
this with background noise
around themselves and the
customer being the biggest
(52%) and second biggest
(37%) obstacles for agents
working from the office
and the largest (39%) and
third largest (27%) working
remotely.11
17
What we’re
seeing is momentum
growing. An understanding
that the traditional audio
environment which we’ve
all become accustomed to
— the average phone call
— is pretty noisy.4
Stephen Yap,
Research Director, CCMA
IRIS Pod
This is a significant issue for
contact centres, where KPIs are
forensically measured and metrics
such as customer satisfaction
and time-to-resolution are easily
affected by loud noises — whether
these come from the customer’s
side or the agent’s side. Every
minute wasted by repetition,
waiting for noise to die down, and
correcting misheard phrases is
worth considerable money for call
centres where margins are already
tight.
 An astounding 85% of our
surveyed agents said that
background noise causes
them to repeat themselves on
customer calls,11 and audio-
related issues like these are
estimated to costs the industry In a nutshell, solving the problem
up to £143m a year.39 of poor audio could save contact
centres both time and money by
increasing productivity and driving
Meanwhile, from the customer’s real business results.
point of view, loud, annoying
background noises severely affect
their experience, especially when
they’re likely already aggravated
with whatever issue they’re
trying to fix. If it’s a sales call —
particularly an unsolicited one —
even the slightest annoyance can
lead a prospect to end the call
early. The agents agree.

89% of the call centre

workers we surveyed
say poor sound quality
or background noise
impacts the quality
of calls, ability to
communicate, and
time to resolution

84% believe noise and

distractions have a
negative effect on
customer service and
prevent them from
achieving positive
outcomes

18
 Some of the more common emotions that people
experience in any industry are frustration and
irritability. So if a salesperson is looking to convert a
qualified lead or they’re having a conversation that
needs to be really rich, those slight audio issues, those
noises, those distractions, those interruptions, they
all heighten their frustration levels, which becomes
very obvious in their tone of voice. The other person
inevitably picks up on it and it all contributes to
employees and customers alike getting tired, losing
their motivation, losing their morale.40

Sadie Restorick,
COO, Wellity
IRIS Pod

19
 Productivity
A lot of research has been
conducted around online
meetings and learning after the
pandemic. Whether it’s based on
the productivity of online meetings
and calls or retention from online
lessons, the key question is: do we
absorb information and convey
it back as well online as we do in
person?
The research shows that audio
plays a huge part in answering this.
One study of 2,800 US
workers showed that
audio problems were
the biggest pain point of
virtual meetings, with over
50% putting issues such
as background noise,
mic echo, or forgetting to
mute and unmute as their
top annoyance.41
This is backed up by another study
which asked respondents what
their biggest video conferencing
struggles were.42 Background
distractions from other participants
and audio quality were the
second and fourth biggest issues,
respectively — ranked above video
quality and affecting around 60%
of respondents.
20
This isn’t just the case for the
corporate world either; the
education sector also struggles
with the issue of poor audio.
A University of London study
investigated the impact of noise on
adolescents during the pandemic
and found that higher levels of
background noise resulted in
increased annoyance in students
that negatively affected their
performance in tasks.43 This
threatens to have long-term
effects on students’ executive
function, and particularly hindered
the learning of students in larger,
noisier households.
The telehealth industry reports
similar findings.
The main obstacle keeping
people from adopting
telehealth (57%) is ensuring
the quality of the conversation
is good enough to deliver the
appropriate amount of care.44
If you consider that a misheard
symptom or diagnosis could have
grave consequences on someone’s
health, it’s not surprising that high-
quality audio is deemed critical to
both doctors and patients looking
to continue with their online care.
 The common thread in these
studies around productivity in
digital meetings / customer calls
/ lessons / appointments is the
critical need for high-quality,
flowing conversations without
interruptions.

71% of Zoom users told

somebody they were
on mute in 2021

59% stated that clear

communication is
what makes an online
meeting engaging

The first of these stats suggests
organisations have a long way to
go in order to achieve the second.
As long as background noise
continues to be a problem, people
will need to continue to mute, tell
others to mute, miss important
information, and ultimately fall
short of peak performance.
Wellbeing
Multiple studies have proven that
bad audio can be detrimental
to your health, whether it be
the damage caused by loud or
unexpected noises, or the stress
caused by struggling to hear
interrupted sound.

The US Environmental Protection

Agency advises that average
exposure to noise should not
exceed 70 dB in order to prevent
hearing loss.45 Yet, a whole range
of office, call centre, school, home,
and GP-based noises often exceed
these levels, such as barking dogs,
ringing phones, washing machines,
kettles, and even general ambient
office noise.

21

Background noise in your online
communications — whether
they be lessons, meetings, or
appointments — can disrupt your
wellbeing. In fact, a 2011 study
found that households in ambient
noise-heavy areas such as flight
paths and traffic were considerably
more likely to take medication used
The call centre industry has a
particularly unhealthy relationship
with background noise and staff
wellbeing. In an environment where
noise is constant on both sides of a
call — whether it’s in a crowded call
centre, in an uncontrollable remote
working environment, or wherever
the customer is calling in from —
it’s evident that poor audio is a
source of stress and annoyance for
customer service agents with tight
deadlines and aggressive targets.
In fact, 74% of call centre agents
are at risk of burnout,48 and the call
centre industry has the highest
turnover rate of all, at 30-45%.49
Our research suggests background
noise plays an important part in
this:

69%
to treat hypertension (high blood of agents
pressure).46 claim noise
had a negative
A study by Remark Group found impact on their wellbeing. 11
that 57% of UK office workers
consider noise to negatively
impact their workplace wellbeing —
telephone conversations, personal
conversations, and sudden
laughter were the biggest culprits.47

With 61% of workers

interrupted at least five
times a day by noise, and
respondents noting it took
them on average 11 minutes
to regain their focus, it’s
easy to see how stress
levels can build up if you’re
falling behind on your work.

22
 When there is background noise, I can hear other things
and I’m concerned and distracted. I wonder if that’s
something they can hear or if it’s affecting the quality of
my message. So it does have an impact on my energy
and my wellbeing because I’m becoming preoccupied
with what’s happening around me and the impact of
that noise against my delivery.40

Sadie Restorick,
COO, Wellity
IRIS Pod

23
 Professionalism and bias
Another consequence of poor
audio is the way it reflects on
your image when speaking to
others. Where offices and schools
are somewhat of an equaliser —
everybody shares the same rooms
— remote working and learning
can unwittingly create bias. In a
perfect world, we could all appear
in the best light when talking to
colleagues, clients, or teachers —
be it from a dedicated work space
on camera, or in a controlled sound
environment.
Unfortunately, not everyone
enjoys these luxuries, and your
background — visual and audio
— is often highlighted by etiquette
consultants as a large factor of
professionalism.50 Meanwhile,
diversity and inclusion consultants
are worried that work environments
shown through video calls could
lead to conscious and unconscious
bias.51 A real-life example of this
in action was when actor Lukas
Gage had his apartment criticised
when auditioning for a role during
lockdown — a completely separate
factor to his acting ability.52
With online meetings, clients and
colleagues could think less of your
abilities, and your self-confidence
could take a hit.
24
With remote learning, it can
intensify the digital divide between
those who have access to more
advanced technology and
those who don’t. Ultimately, it
affects business outcomes and
productivity.
At the start of the
pandemic we were all
sympathetic to each other
with things like an Amazon
delivery interrupting
calls, but I think we’re
moving towards a point
where you know what
time they’re delivering
it, so people become a
little less sympathetic
and demand a bit more
professionalism.40
Simon Scott-Nelson,
Founder, Wellity
IRIS Pod
 Audio: the key to unlocking
the digital revolution
The plethora of research on this
subject shows a clear conclusion:
almost all aspects of our lives
will be considerably more digital
going forward. Whether it’s through
choice or necessity, digital is here
to stay.
The main casualty of digital
conversations as opposed to in-
person interactions is that live,
organic dimension — and the audio
pays the price for it. How many
online conversations have we had
with the insufferable ‘can you go on
mute’, ‘you’re on mute’, ‘or can you
hear me now’? How many times
have we stressed about finding the
mute button as the person behind
us made an unexpected noise?
Whilst our first reaction to this issue
might be to brush it off as a minor
inconvenience, the research shows
that these interruptions have a
massive impact on our ability to
communicate effectively, which
in turn hinders our ability to both
take in information and convey it.
This can lead to lower productivity,
more mistakes, lost income, and
even damage to our mental
wellbeing.
The digital revolution we’ve
witnessed driven by national
lockdowns was almost a ‘V1’ of our
new reality. It was clunky, had a lot
of bugs and issues, but just about
25
got by and opened people’s eyes
to the idea of online conversations.
As the pandemic continued, we
saw improvements — a ‘V2’ digital
environment — but these all
centred around the visual medium.
The final element to truly unlocking
the power of digital for remote
working, online learning, and
telehealth is audio-based. This
is clear from all the pain points
and obstacles we’re witnessing
across these industries and
beyond. We believe this ‘V3’ of
the digital revolution will involve
significant improvements to the
audio components of online
conversations. At the forefront of
this will be voice isolation tools
such as our own — IRIS Clarity.
These tools use AI in order to
remove background noise like
barking dogs, noisy colleagues,
busy traffic, other students, and
everything else from both sides
of an online call. This preserves
the flow of the conversation and
improves focus, engagement, and
wellbeing for all.
Much like AI-driven virtual
backgrounds, we believe
voice isolation will allow video
conferencing attendees to take
control of their environment in
order to deliver the best possible
outcomes from every conversation.
 IRIS
IRIS is an audio technology
company with a mission to enable
the world to Listen Well. Our suite
of patented products leverages
decades of research into the
effects of sound on the brain,
prioritising focus, productivity, and
wellness for all. By harnessing the
science of sound, IRIS dramatically
improves how people experience
audio across all digital platforms,
from video meetings to streaming,
podcasts to audiobooks.

iris.audio/clarity-enterprise

Contact: info@iris.audio

IRIS Clarity
IRIS Clarity is an AI-powered
app that removes distracting
background noise from your
customer calls and video meetings.
Real-time and bi-directional, IRIS
Clarity allows participants on both
sides of a call to immediately enjoy
clearer sound, no matter where
they are. IRIS Clarity improves
focus, engagement, and wellbeing,
bringing control to otherwise
uncontrollable environments.

26
 We thank Stephen Yap, Louise Goss, Sadie Restorick, and Simon
Scott-Nelson for their contributions.

This paper was researched and written by Scott Drayton; edited

by Tom Darnell and Diana Geman-Wollach; and designed by
Tiana Raft.

27
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 29
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29
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