In 2026, Ascent Solutions found itself in a tough spot. The Atlanta-based management consulting firm had built its reputation on deep, in-person work with mid-market manufacturing companies, guiding them through digital transformation with whiteboards and face-to-face strategy sessions. But with 60% of their clients now split between the office and home, their old methods felt clumsy and slow. Project velocity was taking a hit. They had to figure out how to adapt their strategy, especially with tools like Zoom, to close the distance without losing the personal connection their clients paid for. The real question was if a few software updates could actually fix a deep-seated communication problem.
Key Takeaways
- Turn on Zoom’s Smart Gallery to give remote participants an equal visual presence in hybrid meetings.
- Use persistent Zoom Team Chat channels for every project to cut down on email and keep conversations organized.
- Integrate apps like Mural or Miro directly into Zoom meetings for real-time, collaborative brainstorming with distributed teams.
- Let Zoom’s AI Companion handle automated meeting summaries and generate action items to free up consultant time.
- Use Zoom Events to host virtual workshops and client seminars, reaching far more people than one-on-one meetings ever could.
The Initial Struggle: Disconnected Conversations and Fading Engagement
At first, Ascent Solutions, under senior partner David Chen, tried to tackle hybrid work with their existing toolkit. Standard Zoom meetings became the norm for remote check-ins, but David quickly saw engagement fall off a cliff compared to their old in-person sessions. “We’d have five people in a conference room with a single webcam pointing at them, while our client’s remote team members were just small squares on a screen,” David told us. “It felt like two separate meetings happening simultaneously. The energy was just gone.” This wasn’t just a feeling. The disconnect was real, showing up in project timelines that were starting to slip and client feedback that mentioned a “lack of intimacy,” which is a death knell for a trust-based consulting business.
Ascent wasn’t alone in this. A Statista report from 2025 found that “maintaining team cohesion” and “effective communication” were top worries for 45% of businesses around the world. For a firm like Ascent, whose entire model is built on deep relationships, this was a serious threat. They needed a platform that actively helped them connect and collaborate, not just show their faces on a screen.
Reimagining Client Touchpoints with Zoom Updates
We started our work with Ascent by breaking down their entire client engagement process, from the initial sales pitch to the final project report. We identified every single point of communication. Then we matched those points to specific Zoom features that could solve their biggest headaches. The objective was to use the new tools to fundamentally change how they interacted with clients in this new hybrid setup.
Enhancing Meeting Equity with Smart Gallery
The first and most dramatic change we made was to the meetings themselves. That problem of people in the room having presence while remote attendees were just tiny boxes was solved with Zoom’s Smart Gallery. This feature uses AI to find each person in a physical room and give them their own individual video feed. It completely changed Ascent’s hybrid presentations. Instead of seeing a wide, impersonal shot of a conference room, clients on the other end saw individual faces, making it much easier to make eye contact and read body language. “It leveled the playing field,” David said after they started using it. “Our remote clients felt seen, heard, and genuinely part of the conversation, not just observers. It’s a small detail, but psychologically, it’s huge for building rapport.” This also meant remote participants no longer had to strain to figure out who in the conference room was speaking. It just worked.
Persistent Collaboration with Team Chat Channels
Outside of live meetings, Ascent’s communication was a mess of unwieldy email chains where important information got lost. We got them to create dedicated Zoom Team Chat channels for each client project. These channels became the go-to place for everything: sharing documents, asking quick questions, and posting informal updates. For example, on one project with a manufacturer in Marietta, Georgia, they set up a channel called “#Project_Alpha_Marietta.” Consultants could drop in progress reports, ask for quick clarifications on a specific process, or even get fast feedback from client stakeholders. It immediately cut down on the email noise and created a searchable, chronological log of the entire project. This setup created much faster feedback loops, turning decisions that used to take days of back-and-forth emails into a quick chat exchange.
The best part of this was its simplicity. It was all about getting more out of the tool they already had and were familiar with. The key was a bit of discipline: we helped them establish clear rules for what goes in the chat versus what still needs a formal email or a full meeting. That simple bit of governance kept the channels from becoming another source of noise.
Interactive Brainstorming with Integrated Zoom Apps
Consulting is built on collaborative work, and this was where Ascent was really struggling to adapt their physical whiteboard sessions to a hybrid world. The fix came from Zoom Apps, specifically integrations with virtual whiteboard tools like Miro and Mural. During a client strategy session, a consultant could just launch one of these apps right inside the Zoom meeting. Everyone, both in-person and remote, could suddenly grab a virtual sticky note, draw arrows, and add comments on the same board at the same time. “We ran a critical process mapping session for a client in Savannah entirely through Mural within Zoom,” David told me. “Everyone was drawing, moving elements, and commenting in real-time. It felt as dynamic as being in the same room. The client was genuinely impressed with how smooth it was.” Because the app runs inside the meeting, there’s no more clunky screen sharing or asking people to switch windows, which keeps everyone locked in on the problem.
Simplifying Post-Meeting Follow-Up with AI Companion
A huge, often invisible, time sink for any consultant is the admin work after a meeting: writing summaries, pulling out action items, and sending notes. Zoom’s AI Companion was a massive help here. By enabling it in their meetings, Ascent’s consultants could get an automated summary, a list of highlights, and even suggested action items with names attached. This didn’t replace them. It just gave them a running start. A consultant would take the AI’s summary, spend two minutes editing it for nuance, and fire it off. “It shaved off about 30 minutes of administrative work per meeting, easily,” David estimated. “Across a team of 20 consultants, that’s hundreds of hours reclaimed every month, allowing them to focus more on client strategy and less on transcription.” That’s a direct boost to both profitability and your team’s morale.
Expanding Reach with Zoom Events
Ascent Solutions also needed a way to generate new business and establish their expertise beyond their current clients. Their old playbook was hosting local seminars in downtown Atlanta. For their now-hybrid client base, they needed a digital version. Zoom Events gave them the perfect platform. They started hosting virtual workshops on topics like “Working through Supply Chain Disruptions in a Hybrid World” and “AI Integration for Mid-Market Manufacturing.” These events let them reach a much bigger audience, pulling in potential clients from well outside of Georgia, all without the cost and hassle of booking a physical venue. Features like registration management, virtual lobbies, and breakout rooms made the whole thing feel professional and slick. Their very first virtual seminar pulled in over 150 attendees, blowing their old in-person event numbers out of the water.
The Resolution: Reconnected Clients, Renewed Momentum
Six months after making these changes, the results at Ascent Solutions were clear. Client satisfaction surveys showed a 20% jump in scores related to communication. Project timelines which had been creeping longer, snapped back to their pre-hybrid averages. The consultants themselves were happier, feeling like they finally had the right tools for the job. David Chen put it best: “It wasn’t just about adopting new features. It was about shifting our mindset to truly embrace hybrid engagement. Zoom gave us the tools, but we had to consciously redesign our interactions. The result? We’re building stronger client relationships than ever, regardless of where anyone is physically located.” Their story is a perfect example of how the real win comes from using technology to support a smart, deliberate change in your process.
How does Smart Gallery actually make hybrid meetings better?
Smart Gallery uses AI to give each person in a conference room their own separate video tile. For remote attendees, this is a huge deal. Instead of staring at a wide shot of a room, they can see each person’s face clearly, making it easier to tell who’s talking and feel like they’re in a conversation with individuals, not a faceless group.
What are the real-world benefits of using Zoom Team Chat for projects?
Using a dedicated Zoom Team Chat channel for a project creates a single, searchable home for all the informal communication that clogs up email. It’s great for quick questions, sharing files, and getting fast feedback. This speeds up decision-making and gives everyone on the team (including the client) a clear, chronological record of the project’s progress.
Can you really replace a whiteboard session with Zoom Apps?
Yes, pretty much. When you integrate an app like Mural or Miro into a Zoom meeting, everyone can interact with the same virtual whiteboard at the same time. People can add sticky notes, draw diagrams, and leave comments in real-time, whether they’re in the office or at home. It creates a genuinely dynamic and collaborative session that gets very close to the energy of being in the same room.
How good is the AI Companion for meeting notes?
Zoom’s AI Companion is surprisingly accurate for a first draft. It does a solid job of generating a summary, pulling out key topics, and suggesting action items. You’ll still want a human to give it a quick review to add context or clarify ownership, but it automates about 80% of the work, which saves a ton of administrative time after each call.
Why use Zoom Events instead of just hosting an in-person workshop?
Zoom Events lets consultants reach a much wider, even global, audience without the high costs and logistical headaches of a physical event. Features like automated registration, virtual lobbies for networking, and breakout rooms create a professional experience that’s effective for generating leads and establishing thought leadership on a larger scale.
