Business calls

The world of business is constantly changing, and it can be a bit tricky to keep up with all the changes taking place at the same time. The modern office is so much more than what it used to be. In the old days, it was all about the people and the interaction between them. Bookkeeping meant keeping actual books in order, spreadsheets were huge and were actually spread across tables and spelling corrector was a little bit of white out on top of a word, that had to be left to dry and then typed over with a typewriter. I still remember when I saw the first electric typewriter; I thought progress had done remarkable things.

Of course by then a lot of business was already conducted by telephone. And I’m not just talking about phone sales, but real hardcore transactions. Wall Street, for example, suffered many revolutions in its time, and the incorporation of dedicated phone lines was just one of them. But there’s a certain impersonal side of doing business by the telephone.

Nothing really beats direct, face to face contact. Not even a teleconference is an adequate substitution for a handshake, but sometimes it is, undoubtedly, the best of two worlds. A teleconference used to be nothing but a glorified speaker phone in the center of the table with someone on the other side of the line trying hard to chime in and listen to whatever was being discussed. But now, with the information age going hand with hand with better technology, it’s all very different. Increased quality of both microphone and speaker systems allow for much clearer sound, while high speed internet makes it possible not only to do it all for a much cheaper price, but also to resort to images, turning a teleconference into a virtual meeting room with people from all over the world.

I had some clients that work for a Czech company, and there no business is done without someone’s physical presence. There’s no getting away with conference calling. A person’s word and handshake is still worth a lot back there. But strangely enough, even in inter-company meetings, a person’s presence is still worth a lot – perhaps a little too much. Too often do people drive miles between two major cities only to spend an hour in a meeting and put their signature on a piece of paper. But that’s just a part of taking care of business.