SprintPCS has partnered with etiquette expert Jacqueline Whitmore to compile an excellent list of 10 mobile phone etiquette tips
Number 1…
Let your voicemail take your calls when you’re in meetings, courtrooms, restaurants and other busy areas. If you must speak to the caller, excuse yourself and find a secluded area where you can talk
Thank you SprintPCS for publishing this list. It should be distributed with every mobile phone sold.
The Work Better Weblog is back up and better than ever after a quick Holiday rebuild. Thanks to all the loyal readers for standing by during the past few days.
To create a to-do list reflecting your ultimate goal, we highly recommend taking the advice descibed in Recipes Instead of Lists from Nerdherding for Beginners:
“A recipe will include infrastructure work and ‘planned re-work’ that might otherwise be forgotten the alternative is simpliy a list of ingredients.”
Conventional wisdom states that websites and other new products should be evaluated with non-tech savvy participants. With 63% of American adults accessing the Internet regularly, 83% of teens, and 20% of adults actively avoiding the online world we are a nation of tech-savvy or tech-avoidant. Conventional recruiting strategies not longer apply.
Rather than pursue an audience that is actively avoiding technology, we recommend iteratively evaluating new products with the expert customers – the professional amateurs. Professional Amateurs have done the competitve research, they know what works for them, and best of all – they’re passionate and articulate.
Benchmarking and evaluting with a novice customer-base provide a rear-view mirror description of where your competitors were. The key to surpassing the competition in the technically sophisticated landscape described above is listening to the needs of your professional amateurs – those customers engaging with your products on a daily basis. By paying close attention to their needs, opportunities will be obvious. As an added benefit, it will only strengthen your relationship with them.
Help us defeat George Bush.
or
Do you have a moment for Greenpeace?
You’re running late for a meeting, which of these lines stops you?
Political activist recruiters are on the Nicollet Avenue street corners this summer . Last week it was the Democratic National Committee and this week – Greenpeace.
One of the volunteer coordination tips I learned from Camp Wellstone:
Get potential volunteers to say ‘Yes’.
The another is be specific and compelling. The Greenpeace representatives are doing neither. They’re offering me – and everyone else an early out.
On the other hand, I congratulated the DNC rep on his compelling sidewalk pitch.
Engagement at meetings and excitement about projects is down. A number of key people are leaving. The passion that sparked our initial conversations is waning. One of our clients is at a turning point with their organization.
A number of never-been-tried-by-us suggestions were thrown around in a recent strategy session. Most of them immediately dismissed with a quick “that may work for some organizations, but not us.”
We talked about a number of approaches that could provide more value to their customers and more energy to their organization – from repositioning their offering to bringing on some lower-level individuals to assist management to really fulfilling on their unique selling propsition.
The resistance to change – when survival is most in question – is not unique to organizations. BusinessPundit struggles with the issue of a resistance manager and Seth Godin discovers the same issue when offering suggestions on improving presentations .
We at Working Pathways offer 2 suggestions for approaching a new strategy:
We’re working with a number of clients to make their days more effective. One of the smallest, yet most profound changes is making each meeting a working meeting. Though powerful and effective, this technique does go against more than 96 years of conventional wisdom
This technique works especially well for document review meetings – have an attendee, you?, make the changes discussed as they’re decided upon. At the end of the meeting, the document is updated – no longer hanging over anyone’s head.
Another tip – before scheduling an in-person meeting, ask yourself what the quickest, easiest way to accomplish the purpose of the meeting. Can the 1o-member project kick-off meeting be handled through email? Probably. Can a decision be reached by a couple of phone calls? Probably.
Over at Worthwhile Magazine, Anita Sharpe highlights a couple other tips for getting time back on your side.
Starting this week and running through Sept. 20, guests can check out the cameras, take pictures and print them using an HP Photosmart 245 photo printer installed at the hotels
Following up on the original Hotel Room as Showroom article, Yahoo Reports that Fairmont Hotels and HP are partnering to offer guests digital camera rental and printing during their hotel stay.
Thanks to Perception Analyzer and Peter Davidson.
Clients, customers, collegues don’t care why there’s a problem. They just want it fixed and to move on. To do that, each person approached with a client issue needs to take ownership of problem and feel they have the authority to deliver a satisfactory solution quickly.
Take this Ritz Carlton experience for example:
At exactly 7:00 p.m. I returned. I was there, but dinner wasn’t. At 7:11 I called Gloria…she immediately apologized and said a rush would be placed on my order. At 7:22 there was a knock at the door….”Mr. Blackman, Gloria and I once again apologize that your dinner has arrived late. Tonight, your meal is compliments of the Ritz.”
Gloria didn’t need to check with her manager – the Ritz trusts each and every employee to solve their guests issues effectively. All organizations need to trust their employees to take this level of ownership.
The last place for wireless to penetrate may actually be where the money is – according to this Forbes article:
Boeing plans to charge $30 for flights longer than six hours, $19.95 for flights of four to six hours, $14.95 for shorter flights and $9.95 for a 30-minute trial.
Continuous access from Munich to LA for $30? Definitely.
How about Munich to Tokyo? Definitely.
Wi-Fi is a valuable amenity and airlines should use this offering as a stepping stone to more specific and valuable customer offerings.
This may just be what carriers like United need to cruise into the black.
In a related story, Two Apple managers videoconference at 35k feet
In what might have been the first in-air commercial videoconference, Apple product manager Kurt Knight, on the ground in Cupertino, hooked up over iChat AV with product line manager Eric Zelenka, returning to San Francisco from Munich, by leveraging Lufthansa’s new wireless high-speed broadband connection service.