Meetings are MORE seamless when done fully remotely, because everyone is responsible for their own setup. In my experience, the biggest friction is always getting a "room" in the office for people to sit, which often has issues.
We have been trying a different approach at work where everybody always just uses their own laptop camera and mic, whether they're in the office or remote. Sometimes it can seem a little silly talking into your laptop to the person sitting next to you also talking into their laptop. But the upside is everybody's dedicated audio and video is crystal clear; and when we share screens we can all see all of the detail up close rather than having to squint at a tv at the other end of a conference room.
Curious to know if anyone else has tried working this way? We've also been trying out https://team.video, which has some cool collaborative features that only really work if each person is joining from their own device.
“if any meeting attendee is remote, the entire meeting much be remote”
which sounds similar to your solution.
At first we did the meeting room plus remote thing. The best room we have for that has a ~60" tv and a Logitech Group camera/speaker/mic, and sits about 6-8 people. Plugs in with usb, and if the person plugging in does it right, you can get a decent view of all cameras and share a screen (trick is, the person plugging in can't be the one sharing). As a remote attendee the audio is good and the camera covers the room well.
What's happened over time though is we stopped using the room, and everyone joins from their desk (and people started working remote more). It puts everyone on a level playing field, and frankly, the meetings are better. I love being able to look things up or update a ticket on my second monitor with my full desk setup, and it's much less disruptive to the type of people who get offended if you're heads-down looking at your laptop while they're talking.
The only thing I really like better in person is standing around a whiteboard while designing or explaining something complex. Drawing on a touchscreen is the next closest thing I find works as a substitute but it's just not the same.
Tips:
Make it a requirement that every meeting invite gets an online session, even if everyone is in the same office. This helps shift things remote, if you don't or can't outright mandate the "one person remote means everyone is remote" rule, plus it avoids having to coordinate where anyone is.
Use video, and make it a habit to turn on your camera, as it prompts others to as well. Staying muted is good etiquette but makes it impossible to gauge reactions, so video lets you see people nodding, looking confused, laughing, etc.
Make sure everyone has a good audio setup (which basically means headset). For what it's worth, of non-headset users, maybe 20% have "passable but not great" audio, 2% have good audio (no feedback, echo, background noise), and the rest are garbage.
The only way to do it. Remote people will love it but there will probably be push back from in office people.
In order to enforce it there needs to be a champion at higher levels.
I don't remember the name of the solution, but working with a big SF company which has both many office and remote workers, they had a camera mounted atop a TV in the meeting room. The camera would focus on and follow the current speaker even if they moved around the room, and the audio was clear as long as only one person talked at a time. It worked surprisingly well.