Working Anywhere

Find Me When I'm Anywhere

I love being out of the office, but for those who want to find me, and are more traditional, letting them think I'm there has become almost an art form for me.

Mostly I use the Locate Me feature of AT&T's CallVantage VoIP service or the mother of all virtual assistants Webley, which is now called Communikate. Of late even Gizmo Project and Skype have added some rudimentary follow me features to their soft phone based services, while PhoneGnome has made enabled real find me/follow me that works with your landline, VoIP service and even softclient that rivals both AT&T and Communikate and costs much less (i.e. it's free). Basically they all do the same thing. They put the calls where I want them to go and then I decide to answer, or not answer, the call.

While AT&T's Locate Me and Communikate both route calls to designated numbers the way you want, CommuniKate has rules and also offers a Start Following Me mode that makes any number I check in from my current number to send calls in real time. Kate also takes voice instructions, much like a faithful and trusted assistant, who rarely talks back unless she (or he) doesn't hear me clearly.

On the horizon is iotum's Relevance Engine. Already available to PhoneGnome and Asterisk users, iotum's developers have taken the elements of relevance (i.e. Artificial Intelligence), context (your appointment book and contact manager) plus your real time status (presence) as set by an IM (instant messaging client) and puts them all together to make sense of out who's calling and if the call needs to reach you. In many ways this is follow me, but maybe find me, maybe not, a state we hope to be in as our lives become more complicated in the always on, always reachable environment that we're really starting to live in.

Working Away From The Office

As I roll out Working Anywhere, I figured the best way to start informing you on how to work anywhere and feel like you're home should start with making travel less stressful in this era of always connected, always on, and always reachable.

I just got off the Jet Blue red eye from San Diego to JFK to make a 9 AM client meeting that will run into a 1030 conference call which will butt right up to lunch and then run into a four hour meeting.

While I'm doing all this part of my mantra is to never be out of touch too long, but not be so wigged out by the deluge of phone calls, emails and instant messages that seem to define the very connected, always reachable type "A" performers.

Why Jet Blue to NYC versus another airline? Simple. They have WiFi in their terminals. Free WiFi. That lets you log on, and get lots of emails and reading out of the way while you wait the usual 30-60 minutes at the gate.

To get into town you have a few choices. Cab. Shared rides. The AirTrain or a town car. While the cabs are a fixed rate @ 45.00, the town car is my choice. For years I always have taken a town car, not a cab into New York City simply because the extra $5.00 or so is really worth it. You get a clean car, a polite driver and more importantly extra leg room. As a 6 foot tall long legged guy, after flying all night the ability to comfortably stretch out for the 25-30 minutes it takes to get in the city sure makes a world of difference. You also get access if you have an auto power cord for your laptop or cell phone the opportunity to recharge yoour batteries. But most of all the added room makes it easier to work, and if you have an EvDO card from Sprint or Verizon. They work great in the USA or you can opt for an EDGE or UMTS card from Cingular, but for now have less cities to use it in, though now that they are merging with AT&T (again) that will change quickly.

Of course no road warrior would be worth his salt without another key tool in their kit. WiFi access plans. For me the dual combination of T-Mobile and Boingo makes access pretty much attainable just about anywhere. T-Mobile is in many hotels, airports and clubs, but most of all they are in Starbucks which seem to be everywhere. What's best is T-Mobile is in Starbucks in other countries too, like the UK, Germany and Austria. That sure makes logging on easy.

Coming soon...The clubs that save your bacon when you need to be on the road, but want to feel like you're at home.