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Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

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Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#11
post #5
post #2

I have had a soft phone at my last two jobs, and it was never used. We used Skype or Slack for our text communication, and Google Hangouts for more personal communication. And it worked perfectly well for maintaining a good flow of communication. Voice mail is, like texting, an asynchronous method of communication, but it requires more hardware and mental context switching to receive and respond to voice messages. I…

voice mail is asynchronous for the person sending it, but it's somewhat synchronous when you're on the receiving end: you cannot skip through the boring parts right to the interesting content, you have to linearly listen to the entire message. I think this is the biggest problem with voicemail. If all voicemail could turn speech into text, and it would end up in your e-mail inbox or "voice mail" app on your phone, we…

This is what I use Google Voice for. It translates the voice mail into text, and will send it in an email. It's not perfect, but it's good enough to figure out why the person called, and it does a good job capturing the phone number the person leaves.

Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#13
post #7

Having to work with vendors a lot it would be difficult for me to give it up. I know, they could simply email me, but the reason for the voice mail was the immediacy of the situation. Likely if they leave one they will zip out an email, but those take more time to write than leaving a voice message. Now I can see the reason for ditching voice mail if this is how some people are dodging responsibility. Seen that, wher…

> Likely if they leave one they will zip out an email, but those take more time to write than leaving a voice message.

That's exactly the problem. Voice mail has the wrong kind of contract - it takes very little effort from the demanding party, and too much effort from the demanded party.

Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#15
It's interesting - but I've noticed that, without any discussion whatsoever, we stopped using Voicemail at my company somewhere in the last three years. I haven't listened to any voicemail whatsoever in about two years.

A lot of my customers in the UAE and Singapore Region have switched to one of calling directly, and expecting you will always answer (Dubai), or alternatively making extensive use of Whatsapp/Whatsapp groups (Singapore).

Voicemail though? Completely dead.

Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#16

Voicemail is dead, and it's because of the significant minority that leave giant messages, as well as anybody you never met who "just wanted to touch base with you". It's a shame too, because there are times and topics for which texting/emailing is an incorrect alternative. Unfortunately people don't realize the 3rd rule of Dr. Luther Waxling: "Just because it happened to you doesn't make it interesting" (at 1:24 htt…

Texting does have an audio option

Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#17
The first thing I do when I sit down at a new job is disconnect my landline or VoIP phone and put it in a drawer. HipChat, Skype chat, Email, text, or FB message, please. Voice is dead to me.

I'm looking forward to the day when you can buy a SIM card from a cell carrier which offers only data and text, no voice call support.

Also, am I the only one that is mildly disappointed that Coke's headquarters isn't shaped like a huge Coke can?

Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#18

Voicemail is dead, and it's because of the significant minority that leave giant messages, as well as anybody you never met who "just wanted to touch base with you". It's a shame too, because there are times and topics for which texting/emailing is an incorrect alternative. Unfortunately people don't realize the 3rd rule of Dr. Luther Waxling: "Just because it happened to you doesn't make it interesting" (at 1:24 htt…

The worst part of voicemail was not even the monologues, but the fact that the important bit of information may be hidden deep within the various boring screed.

The issue is that most people have no idea how to communicate and voicemail is a very painful method to be forced to endure from someone who cant get to the point.

Email generally takes more effort to produce (since its not as much of a train of "thought") and its way easier to summarize as the consumer, so you can just hunt out the golden info in the pile of crap.

Re: Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters

#20
I lived in the US and currently in Brazil, so it's great to see two different aspects of the "voice mail culture".

Before cell phones were introduced here, almost every one in middle class had someone bring them an answering machine. When cell phones started showing up, thou, people didn't use voice mails that much.

Today, when you wanna talk to someone and they're not available, you just leave a text or a WhatsApp message. If it's not that important, they'll just see their missed calls and call you back.

This article made me remember that when I started working in the US, my boss got mad many times because I NEVER checked my voice mails so I missed meetings etc. Haha!

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