By Dax Hamman
Most of the UK is blanketed in snow this morning, and I dont know if we are all more suprised that it's sticking, or that the forecasters actually called this one right a week ago!
I digress.
Despite the snow many of you will make it in to work today, many of you won't. Personally, I am writing this on the train to Paddington waiting for the inevitable calls from those colleagues who's trains are cancelled and that they will be working from home.
And there it is, that simple phrase that we so easily take for granted, 'working from home'; this is the reminder to all of us what the Internet has always been about.
It is a communications tool, a device for connecting remote individuals, for sharing information and for allowing interactivity. The soul of the Internet is to be the enabler.
Let me explain...
I have already been able to retrieve my emails and so know that I have 2 team members stuck at home, and I have had a text message from a third to tell me they will be running late.
The key is that it's ok, there is no need for concern.
Using our VPN (virtual private network) they will be able to access Exchange and hence their email, they will be able to talk to our offices in New York, Rhode Island, Fresno (California) and London using messenger, and they can continue to run the technology we provide to our customers because they are ASP models and hence accessed through a standard browser. They will also divert their office phones to their mobile phones and retrieve their voicemails by dialling in.
And if none of us make it in today then I will just log on to our telephone service centre on the web and divert all our phone numbers to our US support line.
Will our client's know any difference?
Well, we are British and so the temptation to share the 'hardship' we are enduring to continue to provide a good service will be too much to bear for some (and we do love a good chat about the weather!!). But they don't have to know. We could pack up the office today, move 1,000 miles away and still be reachable on the same numbers and email accounts.
In the modern corporate world we take things like Blackberries, VPN's, IM, SMS, ASP applications etc for granted, but just for one day, today, stop for a moment and wonder in its complex simplicity.
...
Whether First Great Western will be able to make a train work this evening to get me home tonight is another matter.
Enjoy the snow.
(Photo credits: Sky News - http://news.sky.com)
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