Adam Hommey, the Speakerphone Samurai
Who IS this Wild Man?

A rebel is born...and raised...and raises hell!

I first realized that Speakerphone ROCKS over ten years ago when, as a college student at Penn State, I had, if I do say so myself, the tightest, most awesome dorm room in history during my "super-senior" (read: fifth) year. (I won't lie. I was having too much fun to hang it up after just four years. The extra semester was WELL worth it.)

I found it was a lot easier to have a phone conversation about my history class when I had both hands free to hold open the textbook and be able to flip through notes at the same time. Back then, headsets weren't as good as they are now.

Over the next several years in the Working World, I was saddened - and maddened - by the level of anti-speakerphone feeling that pervades today’s “cube farms,” where there is no privacy and everyone is in their co-workers’ business. Then management wonders why there is a lack of “teamwork” and people don’t “trust” each other.

(On a personal note, I hate "cube farms" and "bullpens" in general - they are, IMHO, the WORST thing you can have if you expect to foster teamwork, mutual understanding, good feelings, and trust among your employees - but I'll save that rant for another time.)

Anyway...

This anti-speakerphone antipathy gets passed on to the customer.

At one part-time job I held down while I was in MBA school, I kid you not, I listened to a customer service representative argue with a client, in heated tones, for over five minutes, demanding that the client take her off speakerphone…finally ending the call for this reason without giving the paying client a chance to state the reason for their call.

It's only been a little more than eight years since then, but today, that company is gone…bought out by the competition. When you go to that company's old website URL, it forwards right to their competitor's website now. Coincidence? I wonder...

Seriously...that was ridiculous. Come on, people. Are we allergic to paying customers? I'm an internet marketer and entrepreneur, and I don't know many people, especially in my field, who don't like to speak to paying customers.

I don't care one bit if my clients and customers use speakerphone or not if they are my good customers as long as they play by the rules of being polite on speakerphone; all I want is for them to be comfortable while speaking to me.

There's been a lot of misuse of speakerphone that has given it a bad rap. I am here to set the record straight.

I have embarked on a mission to foster understanding and acceptance of speakerphone by all. SpeakerphoneROCKS.com is the first salvo being fired in this Revolution!

These days, as the home-based (I love it!) owner of two internet marketing businesses, approximately 100% of the business calls I take or make on any given day require me to sort e-mails, review documents, conduct Web searches, or review website drafts and modifications while on the phone.

That, and I really, really hate holding a receiver. I have just a touch of CTS in the left arm so it goes numb if I kept it bent for too long, and I don't want it to get worse to the point where I need the surgery. I'm right-handed, so I need to hold a receiver with the left hand if I am trying to multitask.

Most of the time, I use a headset, especially if it's a call that I expect to last a while. My Plantronics headset is pretty good.

A suggestion about headsets:

Don't "go cheap." Spend $30 - $40 USD and get a good, high quality headset that works well and allows the other person to hear you clearly. I recommend you get a headset with volume and Mute controls right on the wire that plugs into your phone base. The extra ten bucks is DEFINITELY worth it.

(ANOTHER TIP - Get a phone where the headset wire can plug into the cordless handheld, so you can use the headset throughout the home or office.)

But sometimes, especially if I have to move around the office (to/from the file cabinet, if I am on tech support with my ISP and I have to crawl under the desk to unplug the cable modem, etc.) or if it's going to be a call that I know is only going to last about 10 seconds, I hit the Speaker button.

This is also handy if the phone rings while I am in the other room, the ID announces it is a call I really need, and I have to fly across the room to answer before the call slips into voicemail.

Also, if I am going to be on hold for awhile, I'll switch to speakerphone so I can work on other things without the headset wire in the way.

That, or if I need to make a big difference for my client by 2:30 today, and rather than just let all calls go to voice mail, I want to at least try to be available but not do my client a disservice by stopping what I am doing to lift a receiver while receiving a non-urgent, routine call or making a quick call for tech support for the project I am working on.

But I'm not abusing speakerphone. I promise.

If I have you on speaker, rest assured that no one else is in the room with me or that I have everything wide open so the whole world can hear. I really hate when people do that.

Don't get me wrong, I do understand why many people don't like to be put on speakerphone. That's why I want things to change.

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