How to (Hopefully) Get Out of In-Person Meetings with Your Boss

You’ll often hear about how our service does wonders for companies with employees working from home or from a remote office. All you need is an Internet connection; you can plug your phone in anywhere to have access to your OnSIP business phone system and all the features that come along with it.

Here at Junction Networks, some of our employees work from home or from our very, VERY remote office in New Jersey. (Please note: this is my biased opinion as I live and work in NYC amongst our engineering and support team.) As a few examples, we have Mike's working from Philadelphia, Tim's managing sales from the West Coast, Andy's signing agents in Chicago, and Corrie's handling ports from her home in New Jersey. In our “in-the-middle-of-nowhere” (IMO) New Jersey office, which sits next to the field where the game ‘Duck Hunt’ took place, you’ll find Rob, Nicole, Joe and Cheryl.

Although we’re all geographically separated, I hardly notice because I can reach all of my colleagues easily with extension dialing, and the high definition audio I get from my Polycom makes it sound like they are in the room with me. I can’t even count the number of times I thought Rob was here at our New York office because he was on the speakerphone in another room. It’s actually kind of creepy in its own little way.

Why am I telling you this? Let’s say a certain head of the company (*cough*Rob*cough*) was floating around the idea of having weekly in-person updates from his team out in the backwoods—I mean the- Jersey office. Let’s also say a certain member of the team (me) really didn’t want to go. The obvious thing for that person to do would be to try to get his company on a hosted phone system that enables remote office working while also offering HD voice support, right? Now, finally let’s say that the company is already on such a business phone system and they regularly enjoy crystal clear high definition audio on their Polycom, Aastra, Cisco and Counterpath phones. Their Counterpath Eyebeams even allow them to conduct extension to extension VIDEO calls for some 'face-to-face interaction.

Do you think he could then convince his boss that in-person updates were unnecessary, keeping in mind that he will also probably bring up the following points:

• The high price of gas and/or train tickets
• The unacceptable level of carbon emissions that come with unnecessary traveling
• The penguins and polar bears that lose their homes as a result of these said levels of carbon emissions
• The heavy toll that being grumpy has on worker productivity
• The heavy toll that working next to the set of ‘Duck Hunt’ has on worker morale

• So, what do you think my chances are? To be continued...