Skype if you like international business
I was on a painfully long international conference call earlier this week, attempting to negotiate a settlement in a tricky case. The problem was, while the opposing lawyer and client were together in a room somewhere out west, my client and I were thousands of miles apart, with me here on the US East Coast and him in Europe. When the opposing party wanted to confer, they put us on hold and simply talked. When we wanted to confer we had a bit of a problem. That’s where Skype enters the picture.
For those of you who don’t know what it is, Wikipedia describes Skype as follows:
Skype allows users to make telephone calls from their computer to other Skype users free of charge, or to landlines and cell phones for a fee. Additional features include instant messaging, file transfer, short message service, video conferencing and its ability to circumvent firewalls.
Now, the calling capability is fine for personal use, but I’ve not been thrilled with it for work. The instance messaging, on the other hand, is great! It meant that we could “confer” silently about our offer and compromise while the discussion continued. Frankly, without Skype I’m not sure we’d be done yet, and we certainly wouldn’t have gotten as far as we did.
Skype is also useful for short messages which aren’t worth an e-mail. It’s particularly useful for touching base with people you’ve been meaning to contact but haven’t - you can see if they are online, and Skype them if they are. As a Skype user, you can show your availability to other users, or not show your availability at all. You can even send a file if you want, and if you become a complete skype maven there are paid features as well.
As with all written communications, you have to remember that Skype sessions can be saved and printed, so you have to be mindful of what you say. They also may not be as confidential as other forms of communication, although e-mail has plenty of issues on that score as well. You also have to remember to set your availability if you don’t want to be disturbed, lest someone to whom you don’t want to talk instant messages you when you’re ostensibly available.
On a more personal note, it’s been a godsend on my regular trips to Europe, because I can video chat with my wife and children every night before they go to bed. The quality’s not great, and there are interruptions, but the kids are more settled knowing they can see Daddy at the end of the day, and I enjoy seeing their faces light up when the screen goes on. That may not apply to teenagers, but for business travelers with younger children it’s great.
Now if I can just persuade Jean to get a Skype account …
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2 opinions for Skype if you like international business
Jean Mercedes
Dec 13, 2007 at 6:18 pm
I use instant messaging at work and it is great for all of the reasons Chris has listed. I just don’t have an account at home. I just don’t know that many people that want to chat on-line with me.
Chris
Dec 14, 2007 at 5:22 pm
That’s a good point - there are alternatives to Skype, some of which use less well-known (and probably more secure) closed networks. My wife and I used Apple’s iChat for a while, until I became a Skype junkie, and there are others as well.
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