I was working in Buffalo New York in a company back when IT teams were more or less silo'd and custom development was king. Now we are in a world were those decentralized teams have become historic artifacts of a once fun and exciting part of our job.
When the realization hit that IT was no longer going to be the business trusting IT to build things on their own in a time capsule I started to adopt the notion that we would become centralized, On the bright side, I thought, we would be able to work more closely with our colleagues in other countries which is something that always interested me.
Along came the ground breaking book The World Is Flat [Updated and Expanded]: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century
which made it seem that we were well on our way to being able to work from anywhere, at any time, with any one. His revelations of reporters being alone without a cameraman and only a mobile device doing video interviews. He talks about the advanced fiber optics that have effectively bridged any and all communication gaps between countries and cultures. It was really shocking to leaders in Western companies who wondered why they were no longer able to compete with the same advantages that they once had.
That book was written in 2005 so with the speed in which technology advances one would thing that on the brink of 2012 we would certainly be well on our way to a true flattening of the earth. Seemingly we are stuck in a black hole in the area of true globalization. While the technology is in place, the business and social communication framework is still sucking at the knee-caps of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs.
My current role requires frequent travel within Europe, US and Asia. Here are some personal real life examples of how far we have to go until we are truly a global world.
My phone bills over the first two months averaged in the area of €1.500 per month. Oh, I need to mention that the thousand separator is different depending on where you are. If the decimal mark is a point, the digit group separator is often a comma or a space. If the decimal mark is a comma, the digit group separator is often a point or a space. The problem with the point and the comma as either decimal mark or digit group separator is that, internationally, they have both often been used for both meanings, and their meaning is context-dependent (one must know which notational system is being used in order to interpret them) I digress. My phone bill is one and one half thousand dollars per month.
Global Schmobal Issue #1 - Shelling out the dough for mobility:
I use my mobile phone as my communication device when I am in airports, in hotels, in restaurants, or anywhere away from home. I also use it to check for email and to hook into our IM system within our company. I also use it as a tethering device to my laptop if I am at a location that does not have free wireless. Everything works wonderfully. Performance is good, minimal latency, and very few drop-outs. Tell me though how many sales managers will be willing to shell out €1.500 euro (around $2,000 dollars, or around £1300 British Pounds) per month for their global sales teams. I would say that number is around zero. So now I am left with only a few options. Scale back travel, be disconnected for the most part while I am travelling, or try to persuade networking companies to start to think globally when it comes to constructing their billing models.
Global Schmobal Issue #2 - Payment Option Madness:
Whenever you travel I'm sure that you use credit cards for most of your purchases. Some who are still old-fashioned carry cash. If your really old-fashioned you use traveler checks. If your more hip you may be using your ATM card for most purchases. (I am tempted to escalate this to using personal checks but I don't want the 60 somethings yelling at me when I go to the bingo parlor next week in Amsterdam).
So you think you can just waltz into any diner in Berlin and show your shiny new Master Card after having a delicious schnitzel with your family. Think again. You probably will need a new card that has a chip in it that guarantees that the card is yours and has not been stolen. Heck, with that they wouldn't even ask you to sign it. Don't bother taking out your ATM card as that wouldn't help you much unless it was from a European Union bank.
If you go to a cash machine you will be lucky to find one that give you the option of presenting the options in English. I would say you have a 30% chance of English being an option. (I have still yet to be able to change the password on my dutch credit card because I can't figure out how to do it.
On a side note, try waiting for the waiter to give you the check. It won't happen. In the US you get a check as soon as you say no to dessert. In Europe and Asia they will not give you the check until you ask for it or at least an hour has passed.
Global Schmobal Issue #3 - Driving:
Obviously everyone is familiar with the differences between countries in regard to which side you drive on when you are in different countries. The greater UK community drives on the left with the steering wheel being on the right. India also drives on the left. Most other countries drive on the right.
The difficulties here go deep.
Research in 1969 by J. J. Leeming showed countries driving on the left have a lower collision rate than countries driving on the right, although he acknowledged that the sample of left-hand rule countries he had to work with was small, and he was very careful not to claim that his results proved that the differences were due to the rule of the road. It has been suggested this is partly because humans are more commonly right-eye dominant than left-eye dominant.
In left-hand traffic, the predominantly better-performing right eye is used to monitor oncoming traffic and the driver's wing mirror. In right-hand traffic, oncoming traffic and the driver's wing mirror are handled by the predominantly weaker left eye. In addition, it has been argued that left sided driving is safer for elderly people given the likelihood of their having visual attention deficits on the left side and the need at intersections to watch out for vehicles approaching on the near-side lane. Furthermore, in an RHD car with manual transmission, the driver maintains his or her right (i.e. in the majority of people, dominant) hand on the steering wheel at all times and uses their left hand to change gear.
Cyclists and horse riders typically mount from the left hand side. This places them on the kerb when driving on the left.
The largest safety issue is the existence of two systems, right- and left-hand traffic. Visitors used to one system might forget that the other system is used where they are, for example, pedestrians looking the wrong way before crossing a street.
For me the worry in getting into an accident hurt my ability to focus on work. I would believe there are others out there like me who feel the same way.
In the end working from wherever, with whoever, and whenever is far from becoming a reality. We have a ways to go but it is not from a lack of technology, it is from the people who chose when and how to make that technology available.
When the realization hit that IT was no longer going to be the business trusting IT to build things on their own in a time capsule I started to adopt the notion that we would become centralized, On the bright side, I thought, we would be able to work more closely with our colleagues in other countries which is something that always interested me.
Along came the ground breaking book The World Is Flat [Updated and Expanded]: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century
which made it seem that we were well on our way to being able to work from anywhere, at any time, with any one. His revelations of reporters being alone without a cameraman and only a mobile device doing video interviews. He talks about the advanced fiber optics that have effectively bridged any and all communication gaps between countries and cultures. It was really shocking to leaders in Western companies who wondered why they were no longer able to compete with the same advantages that they once had.That book was written in 2005 so with the speed in which technology advances one would thing that on the brink of 2012 we would certainly be well on our way to a true flattening of the earth. Seemingly we are stuck in a black hole in the area of true globalization. While the technology is in place, the business and social communication framework is still sucking at the knee-caps of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs.
My current role requires frequent travel within Europe, US and Asia. Here are some personal real life examples of how far we have to go until we are truly a global world.
My phone bills over the first two months averaged in the area of €1.500 per month. Oh, I need to mention that the thousand separator is different depending on where you are. If the decimal mark is a point, the digit group separator is often a comma or a space. If the decimal mark is a comma, the digit group separator is often a point or a space. The problem with the point and the comma as either decimal mark or digit group separator is that, internationally, they have both often been used for both meanings, and their meaning is context-dependent (one must know which notational system is being used in order to interpret them) I digress. My phone bill is one and one half thousand dollars per month.
Global Schmobal Issue #1 - Shelling out the dough for mobility:
I use my mobile phone as my communication device when I am in airports, in hotels, in restaurants, or anywhere away from home. I also use it to check for email and to hook into our IM system within our company. I also use it as a tethering device to my laptop if I am at a location that does not have free wireless. Everything works wonderfully. Performance is good, minimal latency, and very few drop-outs. Tell me though how many sales managers will be willing to shell out €1.500 euro (around $2,000 dollars, or around £1300 British Pounds) per month for their global sales teams. I would say that number is around zero. So now I am left with only a few options. Scale back travel, be disconnected for the most part while I am travelling, or try to persuade networking companies to start to think globally when it comes to constructing their billing models.
Global Schmobal Issue #2 - Payment Option Madness:
Whenever you travel I'm sure that you use credit cards for most of your purchases. Some who are still old-fashioned carry cash. If your really old-fashioned you use traveler checks. If your more hip you may be using your ATM card for most purchases. (I am tempted to escalate this to using personal checks but I don't want the 60 somethings yelling at me when I go to the bingo parlor next week in Amsterdam).
So you think you can just waltz into any diner in Berlin and show your shiny new Master Card after having a delicious schnitzel with your family. Think again. You probably will need a new card that has a chip in it that guarantees that the card is yours and has not been stolen. Heck, with that they wouldn't even ask you to sign it. Don't bother taking out your ATM card as that wouldn't help you much unless it was from a European Union bank.
If you go to a cash machine you will be lucky to find one that give you the option of presenting the options in English. I would say you have a 30% chance of English being an option. (I have still yet to be able to change the password on my dutch credit card because I can't figure out how to do it.
On a side note, try waiting for the waiter to give you the check. It won't happen. In the US you get a check as soon as you say no to dessert. In Europe and Asia they will not give you the check until you ask for it or at least an hour has passed.
Global Schmobal Issue #3 - Driving:
Obviously everyone is familiar with the differences between countries in regard to which side you drive on when you are in different countries. The greater UK community drives on the left with the steering wheel being on the right. India also drives on the left. Most other countries drive on the right.
The difficulties here go deep.
Research in 1969 by J. J. Leeming showed countries driving on the left have a lower collision rate than countries driving on the right, although he acknowledged that the sample of left-hand rule countries he had to work with was small, and he was very careful not to claim that his results proved that the differences were due to the rule of the road. It has been suggested this is partly because humans are more commonly right-eye dominant than left-eye dominant.
In left-hand traffic, the predominantly better-performing right eye is used to monitor oncoming traffic and the driver's wing mirror. In right-hand traffic, oncoming traffic and the driver's wing mirror are handled by the predominantly weaker left eye. In addition, it has been argued that left sided driving is safer for elderly people given the likelihood of their having visual attention deficits on the left side and the need at intersections to watch out for vehicles approaching on the near-side lane. Furthermore, in an RHD car with manual transmission, the driver maintains his or her right (i.e. in the majority of people, dominant) hand on the steering wheel at all times and uses their left hand to change gear.
Cyclists and horse riders typically mount from the left hand side. This places them on the kerb when driving on the left.
The largest safety issue is the existence of two systems, right- and left-hand traffic. Visitors used to one system might forget that the other system is used where they are, for example, pedestrians looking the wrong way before crossing a street.
For me the worry in getting into an accident hurt my ability to focus on work. I would believe there are others out there like me who feel the same way.
In the end working from wherever, with whoever, and whenever is far from becoming a reality. We have a ways to go but it is not from a lack of technology, it is from the people who chose when and how to make that technology available.
