Our fourth workshop a year ago.
Hi I am Takeshi CEO of su-re.co.
Since Corona started, all meetings have been online. As a stay-at-home person who travels around the world, I found this very comfortable and thought it would be nice to be able to talk to many people while enjoying about my nerdy life. This week, I had my first offline meeting, and so I try to summarise what I felt the strength of the offline information and the way I need to work online going forward.
It was the first time I'd ever had a proper business meeting face to face, other than chance encounters on the beach. It is twice, but not once in a week (^^;). Usually, I'd say, "Why don't we have a meeting online?". As I wrote the other day, my visiting fellowship was cancelled, and my in-person training was cancelled, I wanted to do something opposite. Anyway, my naive nature is doing the opposite of whatever people say!!
A couple of business friends contacted me, and I said:
'Yes, fine.
'Please specify a location, as I have a free at XX o'clock.
I finally arranged two in-person meetings after six months of staying home.
The first person I met was Florian, a French consultant in the forest issues. We decided to meet at an open cafe on the way home from dropping my kids off at school. I'm the kind of person who fills my spare time with something, e.g. I'm either reading an audiobook or having a company meeting. On that occasion, I forgot to bring my computer with me and waited for ten minutes for Florian to arrive in the open cafe with no one else in sight. In the office, when we have an online meeting, we usually stay up until the last minute doing some work and then go to the virtual discussion as if we were in a warp machine. Today, for the first time in probably six months, I sit in a café, order a cappuccino other than our su-re.coffee, and wait for Florian to arrive. I don't think I could have spent 10 minutes alone in a fancy cafe in Bali before Corona started, without being disturbed. It's the right kind of "new normal". When I'm absent-minded, things that hadn't been connected before start to come together and new ideas start to emerge.
I am getting sleepy, so I will continue this tomorrow (^^;)
I love travelling and I couldn't imagine before that how to stay at home for a long time. But after the pandemic, everything is online. I can meet more people and I find that stay-at-home is a comfortable, effective, and environmental benefit life.