Publication Type

Conference Proceeding Article

Version

publishedVersion

Publication Date

4-2026

Abstract

AI-mediated facilitation has emerged as a scalable approach to supporting onboarding and coordination in newly formed remote teams, yet existing systems are predominantly text-based. To explore how video-based, virtually embodied AI facilitators shape team experiences, we present TeamWise, which joins video-based onboarding meetings as an on-screen avatar. TeamWise guides teams through a structured facilitation flow of low-stakes activities to foster rapport, mutual awareness, and shared identity. While the overall sequence of activities and facilitation goals is predefined, the facilitator’s turn-by-turn utterances are generated dynamically by an LLM in response to participant input. We conducted a formative study of TeamWise to refine the facilitator’s design and interaction flow. We outline the design and protocol of a planned full-scale study comparing visual and voice-based AI onboarding that focuses on how and when embodiment influences early team interactions.

Keywords

online meetings, group conversational agents, embodied AI, AIfacilitation, participation equity, collaborative work

Discipline

Graphics and Human Computer Interfaces

Research Areas

Software and Cyber-Physical Systems

Areas of Excellence

Digital transformation

Publication

CHI EA '26: Proceedings of the Extended Abstracts of the 2026 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Barcelona, Spain, April 13-17

First Page

1

Last Page

5

Identifier

10.1145/3772363.3798791

Publisher

ACM

City or Country

New York

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1145/3772363.3798791

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