A communication system is described herein which provides an indicator that helps hub participants of a meeting (or other environmental setting) determine a direction of attention of a satellite participant (who is not physically present at the meeting). The indicator can be implemented as a mechanical pointer, a solid-state display mechanism, a rotating display mechanism, a display mechanism which presents visual information that reflects directionality, and so on. The communication system can assess the directionality of the satellite participant based on any combination of control inputs from explicit input mechanism(s) and/or implicit input mechanism(s). The communication system can also choose between explicit and/or implicit control of the indicator based on at least one selection criterion.