After a 2-day workshop in Bangkok, I wondered why, in this age of videoconferences and social networks, we still subject ourselves to the hassles of traveling including security checks, tourist traps and time away from our families.
At the end of those 2 days, I got my answer.
1. Benchmarking. Travel allows us to gauge our country’s (and our company’s) performance against others. We can see what they are doing right, what we can improve on and what we should avoid. These things are sometimes evident as soon as we arrive at our destination’s airport. If we’re truly serious about improving our situation then we can use travel as an additional opportunity for reflecting and as a springboard for action.
2. Personal connections. There’s nothing like being face to face with your friends and colleagues from other countries. Seeing the look of genuine delight on their faces upon seeing you again can make the trip worth it. You can’t fax a smile or email a handshake.
3. Best experienced live. There are some things which are best experienced live, like watching a cultural performance, seeing an artist work his magic right before your eyes or listening to a brilliant lecturer. One of our guest speakers, Dr. Anil Tendulkar from Mumbai, was simply a joy to listen to. His topic was cardiovascular surgery (tough topic) but throughout the presentation, he kept his audience’s interest and clarified a lot of things for me. As he was concluding his talk I was actually sorry to see him go.
4. Instant feedback. If you have questions, for example about your foreign counterparts’ key to success, now’s the time to ask them right there, right now.
5. Cultural enrichment. This is an opportunity to learn about other cultures. Our differences may be apparent from the beginning. But we may also be surprised to learn about our similarities. This will make you better equipped during your next visit. As Renato Echivarre of Educated Minds would say, “True freedom begins with an educated mind.”.
Technology may be a great enabler and we now use it in ways that we may not have imagined possible before but it still can’t replace good old personal time. Not yet anyway.
Filed under: Global Village, On the road
Carlos,
Well said! All the emoticons in the world cannot convey what a smile can do… create bonds, build comraderie and strengthen connections. That alone makes the in person connections and face to face meetings impossible to be replicated by technology.
We need to be what Arianna Huffington said were “hybrids”… conversant with technology and have real time social skills that are the backbone of business interactions. The research shows that the world will belong to those who can “talk to other people”.
Thank you for penning your thoughts.
Susan RoAne, author How To Work a Room and What Do I Say Next?
Susan,
Thanks for stopping by! I appreciate your feedback. After all that’s been said about technology, it is still only an enabler. Real social skills are still needed to lay the foundations of lasting relationships.
Cheers,
Carlos
My former boss once said that you can’t fax a handshake. I guess now we should say, “you can’t email a handshake”.
Great insights, indeed a human touch can not be replaced by technology.
Hi Greg,
I think your ex-boss may have the more original version. To be honest, I’ve also heard this expression before and I thought it might fit right in here when I was writing this post. Thanks for stopping by!
Carlos
Face to face is very effective. I agree. But now people are reluctant to call on the phone – they would rather email. In my experience, face to face or voice to voice – you will resolve more issues and move every relationship further and faster. Pick up the phone, go see the client, you will be rewarded.
We’ve launched a site for arranging face-to-face networking meetings will new people for business, professional or social purposes (described below). We are launching a blog for the site that will include articles about the importance of real world networking. Let me know if you’d be interested in submitted an article with a link to your site.
Regards, John
Using MeetingWave.com, you can organize in-person meetings with new people by following the site’s Public Invite process:
1. Post a “Public Invite” describing who you’d like to meet or the purpose of the meeting, whether it’s coffee, lunch, drinks, golf or some other activity.
2. You’ll be notified by email when someone accepts your Public Invite.
3. You can approve or decline anyone’s acceptance for any reason – it’s entirely up to you. The other people will be notified of your decision. Approve at least one acceptance, and your meeting is on!
If you invite a specific person to attend a meeting, you would not need to “approve” that person’s acceptance in order for that person to receive confirmation that he may attend the meeting. MeetingWave.com assumes that if you have specified someone to invite, you would not have any reason to decline that person’s acceptance.
You can choose to have the meeting location disclosed only to people you approve to attend. Moreover, the site’s messaging system allows you to communicate – directly and privately – with those who have indicated an interest in attending your meeting.
The style of writing is very familiar to me. Have you written guest posts for other bloggers?
Hi,
Thanks for visiting. No, I haven’t written any guest posts for others.