The recent weeks of teleworking controversy has been interesting to follow for anyone passionate about collaboration technologies. There is no doubt that teleworking offers significant work/life balance benefits, as exemplified by Cisco´s own Angie Mistretta in her recent blog post. On the other hand, it is equally evident that companies that do not invest in the right tools or training for effective remote collaboration aren’t realizing the true potential and benefits of teleworking.
Being part of a leadership team with people scattered from the Russian border, through Oslo, Boston, Texas and California has made it very clear to me that a lot of innovation, time and money would have been lost if we did not have the proper collaboration tools. Simply said, bringing all the right people into the same office is generally not an option in a global operation.
In my team, the primary tool for collaboration is the Cisco TelePresence EX series personal systems; we all have endpoints on our desks at the office and at home. This is essential to us because, be it late night or early morning, the number of overlapping hours when we are in our respective offices are just too few. Personal telepresence ensures in-person communications within the team whenever we need to meet, and it also allows us to attend other meetings over telepresence at any hour ensuring we’re able to capture all of the details and have maximum impact.
Tags: Cisco, EX Series, personal, telecommute, TelePresence, telework, video
