Making Use of Technology to Become More Efficient

Technology has become vital to every business. Every company depends on a level of technology to carry on their business processes. This has become the lifeblood of business in the information age. What the adoption of the Internet into business life has really done is open the doors to the global economy. More and more, we are finding ourselves in touch with clients, business partners, and suppliers located all over the globe. Technology has made it possible to conduct business in real time with each one of them.

In terms of conducting meetings, technology has increased the capability of running effective meetings with several tools. Many of these tools allow users to follow along in real time all over the globe while running through the agenda. They are able to respond live, just as they are in the same conference room. The technology has allowed members to attend by remote. This makes it extremely efficient when team members are away from the office.

"Limited Out"
Dave was frantically checking around the office for anyone who might be available for an emergency conference call with a supplier. All of a sudden, a major quality issue is detected at the manufacturing plant, and parts are being sent to the rework station. The entire station became flooded with defective parts from this suppler. A major emergency has broken out, and half of the staff is gone on vacation. Dave was in panic mode.

He had quickly contacted the supplier's quality manager, and they set up a meeting with the supplier to root out what caused the issue happening at the plant. The meeting is on schedule to start in the teleconference room in five minutes. Dave had little time to find high-ranking members who could make quick decisions -- now!

He finally reached the senior manager of engineering on the phone and explained the situation. Greg agreed to call into the meeting and link up. The conference was about to begin, so Dave rushed into the room and took his seat.

The project lead introduced everyone, until the phone chimed in with a new participant. It was Greg calling in. "Hello all, sorry I was not on time, I was preoccupied at the moment."

The meeting continued for a while, aggressively trying to find what was causing the issue. Then, in the middle of the meeting, Greg announced he would be right back. Unfortunately, Greg forgot to mute his cell phone; in the background of the conference, came the unintended announcement, "FISH ON!"

There was an outburst of laughter in the conference room, a perfect accidental icebreaker to relieve the tension surrounding this meeting. Greg returned to the conference call moments later to the project lead, asking the first question. "Did you catch a minnow, or something you will mount on the wall? "

Another large outburst of laughter erupted from both the phone and the conference room.

Greg laughed over the phone and said, "I hate to do this under the emergency, but ever since I have been on the conference, I've got two in the boat. I've limited out for the day."

8.1 Portable Audiovisual