Due to the bad weather I left on Thursday morning - as I was driving I wanted to get there before it started getting dark! (BT provide a hire car)  This meant I was at the hotel by about 2.30 in the afternoon – but BT are great at  their flexible working options, so I was able to work from my hotel – I took my laptop with me so was able to log into BT Openzone at the hotel and get on with my work.  Using a secure method I was even able to access the internal BT Intranet…which makes life much easier!   I also have a Blackberry which allows me to access email when i’m on the move.  This is great as it means I can make good use of travelling time when i’m on a train or waiting in an airport.

I am on annual leave from Wednesday until the 5th Jan so better go and be busy for the next 2 days!

I have been travelling this week for a team meeting.  I work in a virtual team that is spread across the UK so we normally have weekly calls to discuss progress on our workstack.  Quarterly we have a face to face meeting which was due this month.  The meeting was in the BT building in Glasgow – what a great site!  Very modern building and everyone was very friendly! 

It was a very worthwhile trip as we shared the meeting with another team in our business area – its really good to find out what other people are doing – and to see how our work links together.  We also spent some time with the advisors who deal with some of our complaints – a great way to see the true issues they face day to day when resolving customer problems.  This is especially important in the customer experience role – and I find it really useful to go back to ‘live’ customer experiences to shape the changes we make to processes etc. that will give our customers a great experience!

Today I have a few conference calls to review different projects that are ongoing, conf. calls are a big feature of my working day - as part of a virtual team calls are a quick and easy way of getting a lot of people together to get decisions made or progress updates etc.  I remember my first conf call feeling quite strange as you can’t see people’s faces or body language, which is a big part of communication…but after the first couple of calls it gets easy and is now normal day to day work for me!

My first call is at 10.00 so i’m off to make sure I am fully prepared.  Have a good weekend!  I’m hoping the shops aren’t too mad!!