If I utter the words “I love dropbox” one more time today, my coworkers may fire me, so I’m going to blog about it instead. Actually, I think I’d like to rank my top 5 life enhancing technologies, with a new #5 entering the picture… think ala sound of music … “these are a few of my favorite things” …
My current top five are, in order:
- My iPhone, and its applications that do everything a type A person needs to manage their life (except talk on the phone without dropped calls)
- My Mac, especially for its ability to store practically everything important – pictures, data, music, etc – and then search my file and email archives to answer my questions immediately
- The Nav system in my car, because I no longer have to follow directions, it continually adjusts as I choose (read: accidentally miss exits) to go a different way
- Dropbox, because I feel completely connected to my coworkers file-lives; I’ve basically made a fundamental shift from local to cloud work
This week, I have added a new technology to the list … Web Presence by Cisco, for its ability to truly connect with people in other locations. The last time I tried video conferencing, other than skype-ing and web-exing from my computer, was in 1999, to conduct interviews on one of my early IT strategy projects. When my new client suggested this week we do interviews over Web Presence, I figured it was better: it had been 10 years. But I was blown away by the engagement I felt in these interviews. It was so lifelike, I could catch every eyebrow raise, every subtle sigh, every eye-sparkle of an idea. And while it might have only been 90% as effective as meeting in person, it was 200% more efficient than typical interviewing, which at least involves shuttling between offices if not traveling all around the nation or globe. We interviewed back to back, just pressing the button to connect to the next location. 1 PM: POW, we were connected to Philly. 2 PM: POW, we were connected to Denver (which kind of threw me since I live there and hadn’t been there in two weeks). 3 PM: POW, connected to Ann Arbor. I know it is not the same, but I really felt like I met these people. I can’t wait to see how this technology changes and also impacts our business lives in another 10 years…
