Bringing Outlook into the Internet age

Until recently, I had only used Outlook for a short period in 1998-99. It was okay, but I only used it inside a corporate context. The feature I most enjoyed was the calendaring and appointments function. I've tried several email clients since then and settled on Gnus as the most useful I've found.

Over the years, I've participated in a number of mailing lists, and I've noticed that some people struggle with what others regard as basic courtesy: failing to trim excess quotations out of replies and top posting are things many seem to get complaints on. I've wondered why that was so hard to get right. (If you're wondering what's the problem with top posting, see the example at the bottom of the Top Posting section on Wikipedia, starting with "A: Because it messes up the order....")

Now I'm back using Outlook in one part of my professional life, even as I continue with Gnus in another. I begin to see why people struggle with some of the basics. It's quite hard to do the basics well in Outlook, including trimming quotes and bottom posting. Seeing real email addresses involves extra work, and the Outlook text editor is limited in its power. After using Gnus for years, I get the impression of Outlook as a tool with limited capability even compared to simpler tools such as Thunderbird. The only advantage I see to Outlook is its appointment tracking, and one can do that in multiple ways today including with the free Google Calendar.

Yet I realize most Outlook users have little say in which client they use. I recently found a tool that seems reliable and does help offset Outlook's weaknesses: Outlook QuoteFix (there's also a version for Outlook Express, although I've never used it nor OE). If you use Outlook and communicate with people on mailing lists or with people who don't use Outlook, check it out. It's been quite unobtrusive so far and lets me treat email either in the Outlook fashion or in ways I've grown comfortable with over the past 20+ years of using Internet email.

PS: Gmail didn't do it so well, either, the last time I tried it; it put the cursor at the top of replies. In researching this article, At least it's not too hard to do it manually in Gmail. I found Gmail bottom posting in replies, which seems to promise help.

Nancy White on Sharepoint

I've long said one can work online successfully in almost any environment; it's the approach, not the tool, that makes the difference. Yes, I have my preferences, but they vary a bit by the need of a group, and I've only rarely encountered a tool that just didn't seem to work anywhere I wanted to be.

If you don't know her, Nancy White is one of the leaders in the online facilitation space (she started and still moderates the onlinefacilitation yahoogroup, and she teaches an excellent and very intensive course in online work) as well as a number of other fields. I've known her for about a decade, enjoyed working with her a number of times, and come to trust her judgment highly.

She recently posted Tom Vander Wall Nails My Sharepoint Experience, which claims "SharePoint is a silo builder, not buster." I've never even seen Sharepoint, but I do sense that her words are worth considering when you're considering a tool to foster community.

Check out other parts of her blog, too; you might find you like it.

Incidentally, David Woolley's Thinkofit Web Conferencing Review has long been a classic place to see what online tools exist.

Secret tool for online meetings

Have you ever sat in an informal (no slides) Web-based meeting and tried to keep up with what's going on? When the meeting was over, have you wondered what was decided?

Here's a small secret: I've found it helpful to use FreeMind, a free mind-mapping tool, to take notes during meetings. I often share Freemind through the Web-based meeting tool so that it works as a virtual flip-chart: everyone can see what I'm recording, people can suggest corrections, and I can hide parts easily when we're addressing other issues. When the meeting is over, I can convert it to PDF or HTML or any of a number of other formats and distribute meeting minutes with no additional work.

That's very related to Bernie DeKoven's technography (be sure to watch the video to understand how this works).

Try it sometime; you might find you like it.

Staying in touch

On a lighter note, I've been using Twitter for a while now, and I've even installed the light-weight Twitux to make it easier (trivial to do on Linux, but you can also just use your Web browser). I'm beginning to see Twitter's benefits: for one, it enables the casual sharing of ideas one has in an office without the interruptions of an office, for you can always ignore a tweet for a while.

If you'd like to stay in touch more informally, follow me on Twitter. I'm not an overly frequent tweeter, but it's yet another way to maintain contact in a distributed world.

Genesys can tell you if it's good enough for you

I've written a lot recently about the benefits of working without travel or commuting; I think this will be my last for a while. Genesys Conferencing has a calculator that can tell you how much you save by holding a remote, synchronous meeting instead of traveling to one place to meet. This fits nicely in the sequence of "It's good enough for ..." postings.

Naturally, this calculator is an ad for Genesys; I'll let them own the responsibility for the accuracy of their calculator. I do regularly work with their operators in meetings I moderate, and I will say that I've been pleased with their professionalism and friendliness.

How can I help you make your next meeting more productive, less expensive, and greener?

It's good enough for the whole Chorus

First it was Kate Lister, then it was Phil Woolas, then it was Fast Company, and now it's a whole Chorus. See how a small software company has become totally virtual.

It's good enough for Fast Company

I wasn't planning on continuing this thread, but Fast Company sent me a pertinent link this morning, predicting that "Within five years, technology will obliterate the need for business travel."

While I can conceive of video offering certain benefits, I wouldn't suggest waiting for technological solutions. Perhaps one of the most engaging and effective courses I've ever attended was the all-text-based email AREOL, put on by Bob Dick at Southern Cross University twice a year since 1995 (the year I took it). The key lies in the people and the process, not necessarily the advanced technology.

How can I help you today?

It's good enough for Phil Woolas

Yesterday I wrote about working without travel or commuting. Apparently Phil Woolas, UK Minister of State for the Environment, sees things the same way; he delivered a keynote speech at the Annual Climate Change Summit in Sydney while remaining in London.

What have you been doing to reduce GHG emissions, reduce fuel usage, and thereby improve productivity? I'm curious, and I'd welcome your comments.

By the way, it's my experience that you don't need a lot of technology to make working remotely successful; you just need to think and plan carefully how you'll be effective.

Why go to work today?

Why go, indeed?

Some time ago, I described why I think most of you have had me work remotely over the last eight and a half years and how that has helped you and society. Now Kate Lister makes similar points on The Oil Drum.

Finding a consultant - remotely

In less than a month, Facilitated Systems will have been in business for eight years. I've worked with people in Asia-Pacific, Europe, and the Americas, and yet I've rarely seen a client, for I work mostly from my office.

In today's world, that has distinct advantages. For those of you not used to working remotely with a consultant, I'll list a few:

Responsiveness

If I came to your site to work, I'd likely save up tasks until I had half a day, a full day, or perhaps several days of work at once (depending upon how far away you are), because it's more economical. That's a delay for you.

If I work remotely, you can get my attention in the size chunks you need: minutes, hours, days, weeks, or months. The delay from asking a question to getting an answer drops; if I'm available when you call, you'll start getting help immediately. If you do have to wait, the wait will likely be shorter.

Speed

You can get my help now, without waiting for me to fly, drive, or take a train. If I'm working on someone else's tasks, you need to wait for me to finish those. That's where responsiveness kicks in: if it's appropriate, you may well get some of my time starting today, rather than having to wait until I have full days available.

Lean

If I'm traveling, I'm not working for you. Sure, I try to work on planes when I can, but there is much to the travel experience that represents pure muda. Moving me to you is the essence of transportation and waiting waste.

Cost

If there's no travel, you don't pay for travel. Simple.

Carbon friendly

If I'm not traveling, I'm not generating as much CO₂.

Petroleum friendly

If I'm not traveling, I'm using less petroleum.

Congestion friendly

If I'm not traveling, I don't add to traffic congestion.

Resources

If you need a team, assembling a remote, distributed team from my contacts world-wide to help you brings all these benefits in spades.

How did I discover this? You folks taught me. When I started out, I expected to spend significant time in a car or on a plane, even as I expected to do some of my work remotely using the phone, email, and other online tools. With rare exceptions, you who hired me were quite happy to have me sit here and work there. As times have changed over the last eight years, your insights seem wisely prescient.

Some tasks do require a consultant at your site. I've done that, I will do it again, and I do enjoy working together with you in person. So call if you think that's what you need.

I have also discovered that it's possible to share ideas, build trust, work on problems, and make a joint contribution without being there in person. If that's what you seek, call me, too.

Which serves you best?

Working together at a distance and across platforms

Solveig Haugland recently asked what tools she might use to share her desktop with others. One constraint: it had to work on a Linux platform.

Some of you might benefit from the answers. Even if you don't use Linux, perhaps some of those with whom you work (or want to work) do.

If you've got other suggestions, I suggest you post them on Solveig's blog; then we'll all have one spot to reference. Of course, if you want to comment here, too, you're always welcome to.

Tech stewardship

What is tech stewardship? If you're dealing with distributed work groups that use technology to stay in touch, it's a subject you should care about. From Nancy White's posting KM4Dev Journal Out - Tech Stewardship: "This practice of working the relationship between technology and social practices is called ‘technology stewardship’."

Nancy just posted information about the latest Knowledge Management for Development Journal, which addresses just that subject. While I haven't read it yet (another 133 pages now on my reading list!), I've found that most anything Nancy is involved with turns out thoughtful, insightful, readable, and ultimately useful. I recommend that you head over to her posting and check it out. (I'm blogging about it partially so I'll remember to go back and read it.)

We must be doing something right!

For the last seven and a half years, I've rarely seen a client. That doesn't mean I've been sitting idle in my office; it means we've been finding other ways to work together than getting into a car or onto a plane so we can sit in the same room.

I did that because I saw a need: companies who were spread out geographically, who needed to work together in groups, and who didn't have the funds or the time to get on a plane every time they needed to collaborate wanted alternatives. I also saw an opportunity: I could help more organizations more quickly and at less cost, because I could implement quick changeover in consulting and facilitating processes. Besides, when I'm working in my office, I have all my resources available to me, including any that aren't sufficiently portable to be carried to meetings.

Now WebEx is running a free promotion, focused on the amount of carbon dioxide emissions such an approach can eliminate. Sure, it's designed to sell more of their services, but they do seem to have a point (and they do plant trees!). Now if we only had an unbiased evaluation of the cost of, say, meeting, including the cost of running IT services in all the different alternatives. Their assessment may be fairly accurate, though; it's likely many of us would bring our laptops to meetings, and so travel would provide incremental, not substitute, emissions.

Give it a try, or look for another tool that meets your needs.

Thanks to Chief Learning Officer for making me aware of this promotion.

What else can we do to speed up our work and improve the environment at the same time?

Where do you live?

... on this map?

Thanks to Mar Ruiz Solanes of Intermón Oxfam for the tip.

What is an online facilitator, anyway?

Friend and colleague Nancy White of Full Circle Associates says it more coherently and cohesively than most, and yet she's asking for help in revising it. Ideas, anyone?

Great deal on a great course

Some of you know I do the majority remotely from the clients I serve, using email, phone, and various Web-based tools to communicate. One of the first people I met in that field is Nancy White of Full Circle Associates. She's the founder and moderator of the onlinefacilitation Yahoogroup and an all-around expert in the field of online work and communities of practice. In addition, she's a good person to know and work with.

She's having an upcoming session of her intense Online Facilitation Workshop. If you've wanted a top-notch education in how to work effectively online, this is definitely a course for you. Read her description of the course, check out the testimonials from past participants, and be sure to read the workshop requirements.

Nancy has made a special offer to course alumni, which I'll pass along here. If you sign up and say Bill Harris recommended you, she'll give you a 10% discount!

More effective teleconferences

Many of us spend significant time in phone conferences. Sometimes we're responsible for organizing and leading them. Can we do better?

I don't know the answer, because I don't know what each of us does. I do know there are resources for improving them. The TP! Wire Service recently pointed to 27 Tips for Teleconferencing from Web Worker Daily. Full Circle Associates' Nancy White blogged about More Synchronous Facilitation Resources. Between the two, you might find suggestions that would help you.

For some years, I've found it effective to use any of a number of shared desktop systems such as WebHuddle to add a visual component. In essence, that adds a virtual flipchart and projector to an audio meeting, and it adds a back channel chat tool for those who may not share common IM platforms.

What sometimes works well for me is to open a Google Docs and Spreadsheets file and share that using the desktop sharing tool. In the spirit of technography, I can take and edit notes in a text file. After the call is over, I can share the document with those who were present without having to email copies to everyone. I can even enable document collaboration so that we can continue to work together on the issue after the call is over.

What works well for you?

Does your company work online?

Perhaps you do Webcasts, or perhaps you use a Wiki.

Did you know that companies like IBM and ABN-AMRO use Second Life?

Now IBM is announcing new social software for business. Thanks to the TP! Wire Service for the tip.

A commuting fantasy

Yesterday, I had occasion to drive to the airport and back. That's at least a 40-mile trip each way. With local traffic, the trip can take quite a while, no matter what time of day (except, perhaps, around 3-4 in the morning).

Two nights ago, though, we had a snowstorm that wreaked havoc with the evening commute, and we were being told yesterday that we should stay home unless we had to venture out. People seemed to listen, traffic was light, and driving to the airport, even with occasional slick spots in the roadway, was a dream. It was if we had turned the clock back 20 years as far as traffic goes.

As someone who does most of his work remotely, using phone, email, Web conferencing, and the like, I had a fantasy. What if people really didn't need to drive to work each and every day? What if we could keep the roads available for the times we really need them? We wouldn't have to spend as much on roads. Companies wouldn't have to spend as much on office buildings. We wouldn't have to spend as much on fuel. We wouldn't have to spend as much on cars. We wouldn't emit as much in the way of greenhouse gases. When we did drive, we'd have a more pleasant experience. When we didn't drive, we'd have more time for family, friends, and leisure. We'd injure or kill fewer people on the roads.

Could we do it? Really?

Why fly?

Why, indeed? Those two words were the first in a recent New York Times headline. As someone who has rarely met any of my clients face-to-face in the almost seven years Facilitated Systems has been in existence, it's a good question. While I enjoy being in the same room with people I'm working with, the efficiency and effectiveness of face-to-face and virtual work can be as different as night and day. I think my old article on the subject still largely stands valid, and you might pick up useful ideas from an old decision matrix I once posted.

I know large organizations who seem to work this way: project teams spread around the country, seeing each other only if they need to come together to work on common hardware and saving much time and money in the process. Seen from the client's side, they don't have to pay for a day or half-day at a time of my services; I can afford to give them five minutes, five hours, or five days, whatever they need. And I suspect we all have some work we do best in our own offices, surrounded by reference materials and the like. When you're working remotely, those materials are always there, hopefully reducing the number of "I'll get back to you on that" statements.

The next time you're tempted to pack a suitcase, drive to the airport to arrive two hours early, check your bag, wait in security lines, fly, get a rental car, and go to your meeting, think about those of us who might have had that meeting already and be off to other things before you even arrived at the airport. If you're not comfortable moving yourself or your team to virtual work, find one of us who is, and get some assistance.

Going Bedouin

A mailing list colleague passed along links to Going Bedouin in Regina Miller's blog and Greg Olsen's original posting on the subject. A bit of Googling turned up Ted Leung's take on the issue, as well as Greg's update. Following a bit of links even gets you to Ismael Ghalimi's "saddlebag."

Any of you looking to become more nimble, to give a name to what you already do, or to get inspiration on reducing fixed costs might enjoy contemplating or, better, trying this idea. In the almost seven years that Facilitated Systems has been in business, it's been a rare occurence that I've even met any of my clients face-to-face, let alone traveled to work with them. I'd be curious to hear what you think and what you're learning, if you're progressing down this path.

Free phone calls and a good information source

One of the information services I watch on a semi-regular basis comes from Robin Good in Italy. His Kolabora News focuses on "Online Collaboration, Web Conferencing and Live Presentation Technologies from a User Viewpoint," according to its tag line. If you're involved in such work, check it out.

Today he announced a new development at Gizmo Project: free phone calls! I've appreciated that Gizmo uses open standards, and I've appreciated that Gizmo lets me communicate quickly and easily by SIPphone.

Now they've gone one step further. As I understand it, you can now call other Gizmo users in many countries on their land lines or mobile phones for free—no more charges to connect to the regular phone network. I'm curious about this business model, and I'm interested in this service!

Dunbar's number

Nancy White recently blogged about Dunbar's number as it applies to online communities and workgroups (Full Circle Online Interaction Blog: Dunbar's Number and More on Group Sizes Online). If you're working with communities of any sort, whether virtual or collocated, you might benefit from reading those articles and the links that Nancy provided.

Towards a theory of online communities

Online communities (distributed workgroups) are relatively new, at least in the ways we're seeing them today, and there's not as much research about them as we might wish. That's why I was glad to see Rosanna Tarsiero's posting on Dunbar Numbers in her blog Scrapbook of My Life.

Questions about teams in a distributed world

Perhaps your work groups are like the ones I'm part of—spread around the globe, with people you'll never see. Someone posted a question about the nature of teams on the odnet mailing list. Here are some issues I see as important from a business and organization development perspective; what do you see?

The teams I've been involved in for the last, oh, 7+ years inside my last company and now in my own business have almost all been distributed. I think many of the same principles still apply, but I think we need to address them more quickly.

Here are some sample issues (all solvable, I think, at least as well as f2f):

• How do you form a team quickly, because the people were assigned last week, we've got to work today, and we're finished next month?
  
  
• How do you do team and people development, when time frames are so compressed? (For some of us, the model of a "local team" with occasional work done across geographical boundaries hasn't been around in years, so it's not obvious one can fall back to the "matrixed team" organizational model. Often each team member is sitting in geographical isolation from everyone else.)
  
  
• How do you form a team effectively when the people will never see each other and may never engage in real-time (synchronous) interaction?
  
  
• What skills and tools do you really need to foster effective communications in this sort of environment, as compared to a f2f workplace? What are the gaps, and how can you overcome them? (For example, writing and verbal speaking skills may increase in importance, when communication that involves talk and gestures is limited.)
  
  
• How do you manage business and personal needs when some are normally sleeping when others are normally working (and vice versa)?
  
  
• What human needs go unaddressed in such a work society, and how can we help people address them in other suitable ways?
  
  

Meeting better, asynchronously

If you attend meetings at work, try an experiment over the next work week. Log how much time is given over to the discussion of scheduling the next meeting ("Can we meet Tuesday at 10?" "No, I've got a staff meeting then. What about 11:30?" "No, I've got a lunch meeting with a customer. What about Wednesday?"). Also, log what delay, if any, occurs between when you'd naturally like to hold the meeting (say, Tuesday morning at 10) and when it actually occurs (say, Wednesday afternoon at 3). Divide the first number by the total length of the meeting to get the fraction of meeting time spent on meeting scheduling. Sum the total delay for all meetings and divide by the number of meetings to get the average delay per meeting.

I find it interesting that most business people I encounter aren't familiar with the concept of asynchronous meetings. We're used to synchronous meetings, in which we're all in the same conference room or on the same phone bridge. We're used to email, but many seem to think of that as work we do between meetings.

I think we're missing out on a great productivity enhancer when we ignore asynchronous meetings, and I think the time spent doing scheduling is just part of the problem. I've outlined a few more ideas in Online Facilitation for Inperson Facilitators, and I've put together a little matrix to help differentiate types of meetings and when you might choose which. You can find a wealth of additional information at my friend and colleague Nancy White's site (check out her blog, too). If you try moving some of your meetings to an asynchronous mode, I encourage you to plan the meeting thoughtfully. All meetings could benefit from thoughtful planning (and, judging by what people often say about meetings, they don't always receive such planning attention), but asynchronous meetings, because they're not familiar to most of us, especially benefit from careful planning and facilitation.

Oh, if you do the experiment and are willing to share, post a response to this note next week with your results. If you'd prefer not to publish your name and company, just email me the numbers, let me know you'd like me not to publish your name or company, and I'll simply publish the statistics. Thanks!