Conference calls - love them!

While those of us who use it frequently think that conference calls are such a norm, this is really not the case in Asia Pacific.  I deduced that the only reason why we think this is such, is because we are on it TOO frequently.  The fact is that conference calls are really not that common in Asia Pacific.  It is not a surprise that there are many in Asia Pacific who had never or rarely go on a conference call.  I remembered years back when I was first scheduled to go on a conference call and was presented with some strange terms like "dial in numbers' "passcodes". I was not able to imagine how this work or what will happen during which.  In order to save myself from any possible embarrassments, I actually call into a call prior to the call timing to 'see' what a conference call is all about!  And I went..oooh...oookkk.. thats all?

My work evolves around ALOT of conference calls at varying hours of the day.  From here, I had cultivated the love for conference calls.  Why do people love conference calls? Well, you get to see many different personalities during calls!  We have calls that are sooo quiet with only 1 voice going on and on and on about something and anything and everything.  By the end of such calls, you tend to wonder if its only yourself and the other voice on call.  There are calls where everyone jump at each and every chance to speak.  This is where you get to hear something like "whaho...iare..thwe..calldoing.. (cross between what/how, is/are, this/we and call/doing), than TOTAL SILENCE (as both parties try to give chance to the other to speak first), than we have "okI...iwill..wilgo...first (yes both parties thought the other is not speaking and speaks at the same time again!).  This is when the call leader will go, "Mr X, can we hear from you first" to set the call mode right again.  There are calls where we have some people hoping on 2, 5, 8, 10, 15 minutes late.  Here we have the call leader reiterate, repeat, recap, replicate again and again what was said earlier. And before we know it, its already 30mins into the call time.  There are calls where more than half the time participants say "sorry, I am still online.  I was just on mute earlier" (It takes about a min to unmute yourself!).  It is not uncommon for you to hear "We have achieving our targets for this (bop bop) month and I am glad to announce that (bop bop) we are already more than 50% into our (bop bop) next months goals.  Yes this participant is taking the call from India and he had forgotten to close his office windows.  Another common thing you will hear "I will move on to review (oh..oh) on last month event (oh..oh).. YES! participant is on MSN and his/her friend just MSN him/her to talk about shopping later! And the ultimate that I ever hear from "sorry, the operator is sleeping so he/she did not pick up the call to put me into this call" :)

Conference calls can indeed make my otherwise routine day much more interesting and fun. 

I take my calls from here.  Sometimes I gaze out of the windows to take a breather when the calls get too intense or I stare out and daydream when the calls gets too monotonous.  Guess where my phone is!

My Super phone which see me through numerous calls.  I am very good friend with it.  Theres mute, speaker, hold, voice functions on this.  Makes calls such an easy affair