Virtual Company

At the End, it’s the Good Old Telephone Conference

Holger Nauheimer — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 08:37:50 +0000

I just came back from Tel Aviv. In way, Tel Aviv is a city made for the virtual worker. All (repeat: all) coffee shops, beach bars, etc. have a free WLAN. In most places, you would find several of them to choose from. So, on Tuesday afternoon, I was doing some shopping at Dizzengoff and stopped from time to time to have a coffee and a email (or a short Skype chat with the Philippines, Austria, Slovakia). Remember, although I have a mobile phone with WLAN capacity, I rarely use this functionality. And I still don’t have a BlackBerry. But I do carry my 1,5 kg 13″ notebook wih me all the time.

However, in some places the WLAN sucked. Particularly where I needed it for Voice-over-IP. In my hotel, I was never able to have an uninterrupted conversion-over-IP for longer than 5 minutes. So, when I had to set up a telephone conference with a new client and a partner, I relied on a technology which is there for more than a century: good old telephone. After some search, I choose aitelephone, which has a long list of 63 local access, toll-free numbers. They also have the option of dialling out to more than 200 countries. The prices are moderate. If I am not mistaken, we will pay 13 US$ for a half hour conference of three parties, as you just pay for the connection time you use. It worked just fine, good transmission, on interruption. So, as long as all voce-over-IP systems are as unreliable as they are in the moment, I will use classical telephone conferences for mission critical conversations.

We Are a Member of HUB

Holger Nauheimer — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 14:04:41 +0000

Some weeks ago, I reported about the growing worldwide network of Self-HUBs. Today, we have become a member of this network. We will closely collaborate with Berlin Self-HUB, which will provide us with all kind of services, starting at office service, and then growing into other areas.

The advantage for us: The HUB will offer continuity and quality at a fair price. We will only be billed for actual hours worked. It will be an interesting learning journey for both sides. Cheers to a new cooperation.

Teleconferences in the 21st Century

Holger Nauheimer — Fri, 30 May 2008 12:08:37 +0000

This morning: I had an appointment with two folks from Shanghai for a teleconference to prepare a workshop. 8 am my local time. Since I am globalized, I am getting used to work at very weird times (recently, my telephone woke me up for a conference at 6 am). My wife has stopped complaining about teleconferences in the middle of the night. Anyhow.

One of the other two folks was the client, one a colleague. Both in Shanghai, different offices. The idea was that the client would call both of us in. 8.20 am my mobile rang; it was him. Then, he tried to also connect the Chinese colleague. I went into a waiting line with classical music, then I was kicked out of the line. We repeated the same process twice, with the same result.

No problem, I said – let me both call you with Skype Out. So, I got their numbers and started a Skype conference. In fact, my colleague has a Skype account, so I just needed to invite the client. Problem: he was behind an automatic operator system that wouldn’t let me get through to his line. Another three attempts without success.

Finally, my colleague proposed a classical teleconferencing system with access number in China. I called it using Skype Out, it worked perfectly, and one hour of conference costed me € 1 (US$ 1.50). It took us 45 minutes to get there. But finally we had our conference.

Virtual Conferences: Voice-Over-IP Solutions

Holger Nauheimer — Thu, 29 May 2008 13:19:41 +0000

A virtual company needs a virtual meeting room. In the past, we have been experimenting with a couple of systems. In short: none of the systems we tested worked without problems.

Ideally, we would like to have a system that includes the following features:

voice-over-IP
video
whiteboards and writeboards
sharing documents and collaborating in real time
sharing desktops

Our default system is Skpye. In its current version, Skype allows up to 25 participants in a telephone conference. If somebody doesn’t have access to a computer, we can connect them by calling their land line or mobile telephone, using Skype Out credits. By the way – this is a strange notion in our modern world – who wouldn’t be further away more than 500 yards from the next Internet connected computer? If you are not in the Amazon. And if you are in the Amazon, it is either a holiday and you wouldn’t participate in a conference, or you are on an expedition, and then you would have a satellite Internet connection with you. In essence, we have learned that Skype is the easiest possibility of connecting the voices of team members. Skype is free or cheap respectively if you use Skype Out. Technology works pretty well although sometimes one has to be patient to get 5-6 peoples’ audio equipments working. Also, people drop out from time to time and the conference manager has to reconnect them, which distracts the conference participants. Skype doesn’t have a real writeboard but one can use the Skype chat to take notes.

The other option is WebEx. I have only participated in 2 WebEx conferences and I liked them. WebEx has voice-over-IP, whiteboards, chat, and some other nice features. I also like the nice desing and its structure. So, I wanted to test it more and subscribed to a free trial. The first time, the free trial worked (but I had only one more person connected). After that, the system refused further login attempts. A series of telephone and email conversations with hotlines and service staff did not help. At the end, the WebEx staff obvioulsy lost interest in me because they stopped contacting me although I filed a strong complaint. Here I am – I would like to test WebEx further but don’t know how. Not a good start. The fees for a WebEx conference seem to be pretty high, but I haven’t really gotten into price negotiations (like other similar software providers, they do not publish their entire price list but want you to negotiate with their sales persons).

In the past, we had used Hotconference quite successfully, and sometimes I consider going back to it. I even did Webinars through the system. Hotconference includes voice-over-IP, video, whiteboards, chat, desktop sharing. The technology problems are the same like in other software platforms. Obviously there is a generic problem which is related to the audio systems of computers – these are the only problems we have faced in all applications. Some audio equipment just refuses to work, and even worse, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. Bandwidth is another inhibitive factor in most of the systems. The advantage of Hotconference is its price – much more affordable than other systems. However, when we stopped using it, I had the feeling that they didn’t put much effort into further development. For a long time, the system wouldn’t work on Macs, and I don’t know whether they have introduced this option later on. The CEO of the company, Joel Therien is a viral marketer. He continues to send you emails even if you have told him 5 times that you don’t want them. Fortunately they now go into my spam folder right away.

Then, there is Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro (which used to be Macromedia Breeze). I am excited about the possibilities and the flexibility of that software. It has voice-over-IP, video, white and writeboards, chat, presentation and desktop sharing and you can arrange the parts as you like. Additionally, it is programmed in Flash so you don’t need to download software to your computer (which many organizations wouldn’t allow). However, the problems of audio equipment are the same like described before. And it is pricy, too.

The technical problems of voice-over-IP solutions reduce the efficiency of virtual conferences quite dramatically. We usually spend 15-20 minutes at the beginning of each larger conference to adjust all our machines; and in long conferences, people drop out and have to be reconnected.

An alternative to the described platforms is the use of classical telephone conferences combined with a software that does everything except connecting voices and videos, such as GoToMeeting and others. I will write about these possibilities at another occasion.

Self-Hub. A Place for Social Entrepreneurs.

Holger Nauheimer — Thu, 08 May 2008 15:12:07 +0000

Tuesday I visited Self-Hub Germany in search for potential cooperation partners. Self-Hub Berlin opened three months ago as part of a global network that provides places for young entrepreneurs to meet and to perform. Self-Hub offers office space – for hours, days, months, or permanently and a variable range of other office services. Depending on your subscription, you get a telephone number, a fixed or a variable place to work, meeting rooms, access to the wirless or cable Internet network and membership in the global Self-Hub network. But Self-Hub is more – it enables an atmosphere of entrepreneurship and exchange.

Many projects have already established their base in Berlin-Kreuzberg. A place for us to work as well?

Similar projects exist in a dozen of other cities – London, Amsterdam, Toronto, etc. Look at the full list at the Hub Berlin Blog (in English language).

On Technology of Virtual Collaboration (2). A First List of Tools.

Holger Nauheimer — Tue, 06 May 2008 10:36:33 +0000

I got plenty of recommendations from the LinkedIn community on application of technology for virtual collaboration. Here is a first list of suggested tools. Some of them I knew and I do apply them already, some of them are new for me, and some that I use are not listed (for example HUMAP tool for asychronous discussion and file sharing, and Adobe Connect Pro for tele and video conferencing). I will investigate all of them further and report back.

Tools for sharing documents
Google Apps/Sites
BaseCamp
Sharepoint
LiveLink
ClearSpace
eRoom
http://grou.ps/
Office Communicator
Lotus Notes
Mayetic Village
Joomla
Groove

Tools for asynchronous discussions
WordPress blog
PHPBB
VBulletin
Basecamp
Sharepoint
Phorum
eRoom

Short messaging
Mobile phones
ICQ
Skype
Office Communicator

Tele/video conferencing
Skype with White Board Meeting AddOn
Skype with HighSpeed Conferencing AddOn
Netmeeting with Windows XP
Windows Meeting Space with Windows Vista
WebEx
Microsoft LiveMeeting
Premiere Global Service
Goto Meeting

DeskTop sharing
Goto Meeting
SmartBoards

Remote synchronization of computers
Rsync
Groove
iDrive

Second Call from Monster

Holger Nauheimer — Tue, 06 May 2008 06:02:01 +0000

Yesterday, the same sales agent called back trying to sell me the Monster products. I am still not convinced. They offer me to browse in the German data base of 900,000 CVs for something like Euro 1,000, or have a classified in Germany for Euro 799 (or world wide for Euro 10,000). But she wasn’t really able to advise me on the strategy of search.

Well, I must confess, I haven’t yet produced a job profile for my virtual co-workers. Maybe I should start from this end…

On Technology for Virtual Collaboration

Holger Nauheimer — Sun, 04 May 2008 13:51:49 +0000

Last week, I have posted a question on LinkedIn:

Tools for a Virtual Organization
Our Board has decided that our global organization Change Facilitation will become a virtual organization. We need tools for virtual collaboration, mainly
- share documents
- jointly work on documents
- discussion forum
- short messaging
- whiteboard / desktop share
- remote synchronization of computers
- tele and video conferences / voice over IP

I know there is not one stone that kills all the birds. But we would like to have a simple and affordable solution.

What do you suggest?

So far, I have received 15 replies, which all can be seen at LinkedIn. Lots of good material to work on. I will analyze and summarize all the results in th ecoming weeks.

To date, we are using

Skype for calls and teleconferences
Skype for short messenging
Adobe Connect Pro for videoconferences
HUMAP tool for asynchronous documentation, online collaboration on documents and internal polls and surveys
Basecamp for project management
Emails for all kind of stuff
Blogs for communication with the outside world

I know there must a better way of doing things.

In Search of Personnel. First Call from Monster.

Holger Nauheimer — Sun, 04 May 2008 13:39:33 +0000

On Friday, I received a call from a sales agent of Monster, one of the biggest job engines in the Internet. I had left them a written note saying that I would appreciate some advice on how to find somebody who is willing to work in a virtual company. Not an easy task for traditional recruiters who are used to search in local markets. It should be a more easy task for an Internet based recruiter.

The devil is in the detail: are job searchers prepared for an employment in a virtual company? Shall I look for employees at all? Or better for a service provider who wrks for us on a service contract? In the latter case, how can build up loyalty, how can we motivate our staff? How have other virtual companies dealt with this issue?

The first contact with the sales agent of Monster did not provide me with an answer to my questions. Rather, the agent told me about the different option Monster offers for designed job announcement, either in one country or several countries. She tried to do her best to sell me somethign.

I am not there yet. Before I start to think how my placement will look like, I need some coaching on the process, At the end, she gave up on me and promised that her colleague will call me on Monday…

List of Open Questions

Holger Nauheimer — Sun, 04 May 2008 13:29:03 +0000

There are a couple of things that we will have to consider when we fully go virtual. These questions are of such a different nature that we will need to do our research in very different fields. Here is a draft list of general issues to be worked on:

1. Legal form of company. Currently, we are a limited company which is registered in a European country. We intend to become a shareholder company during the next 12 months. Is there an alternative, given that we want to have a broad ownership of people?

2. Location of company. If we are a global, virtual company, we could have our legal seat anywhere – depending on conpany and tax laws. Accessibility id not an issue any more. So, where should we open our company?

3. Personnel. This is the biggest issue. Where can we find personnel that is willing, ready and skilled to leave a traditional setting of an organization to fully work in a virtual environment? What skills are actually required? Should we offer permanent employment or have people working on a service contract? How can we build employees’ loyalty, how can we motivate them? How can we minimize the risk to loose good people? What incentive processes will we implement? How many people do we actually need?

4. Teams. How can we do team building in a vrtual environment? How often do we need to meet face-to-face to provide the necessary glue? How can we install a common corporate identity?

5. Technology and communication. Which are the right tools that facilitate virtual cooperation? How can we make our communication effective in a simple way? What are actually the processes for which we need tools?

6. Customers and clients. How can we convince our customers that a virtual company is as reliable and effective as a classical firm where you can walk in and meet somebody (ar least during working hours)? How do we prevent to create the image of a mailbox company (which we actually will be)?

7. Virtual processes vs. face-to-face. How much of our processes can actually be transferred into the virtual world? Which are the processes that require face-to-face meetings?

8. Change management. How do we need to change to make all of this possible?