I can only imagine how much pushback employees at Coca-Cola gave when their management decided to pull the plug on voice mail. Can you see the arguments for keeping it around? Lots of defense of the status quo.
The reality is that a whole generation is in the workforce now that has not used voice mail, faxes or phone trees. Cloud computing and mobile devices allows everyone to build their own brand, businesses and workflow from anywhere.
But, our human condition doesn’t pace well with technological innovation. While we can invent and create totally different ways to work, people don’t like to change. It’s because they think relatively rather than absolutely. We accept what has been in place rather than think about what we would do if we had a white sheet of paper to start.
Sure, we talk about being agile. But how many people actually embrace this?
Technology is a weird thing. It can help you today if you are on the latest and greatest. But it can also hook you to a fault if you can’t let go of old systems that are not relevant any longer.
What would happen if you got rid of voice mail today in your business? For that matter, what other technologies could you consolidate or eliminate?
