Coca Cola unplugs corporate HQ voicemail

[CountDeMoney]

The antisocial omg-actual-human-contact-omg Millennial Assburger generation scores a strategic tech victory in the workplace.

Coca-Cola Disconnects Voice Mail at Headquarters
By Duane D. Stanford - Dec 22, 2014
Bloomberg

Forget about leaving a voice mail at Coca-Cola Co.'s (KO) Atlanta headquarters. Send a text instead.

Office voice mail at the world's largest soft-drink maker was shut down "to simplify the way we work and increase productivity," according to an internal memo from Chief Information Officer Ed Steinike. The change went into effect this month, and a standard outgoing message now throws up an electronic stiff arm, telling callers to try later or use "an alternative method" to contact the person.

Coca-Cola is one of the biggest companies yet to ditch its old-style voice mail, which requires users to push buttons to scroll through messages and listen to them one at a time. Landline voice mail is increasingly redundant now that smartphones are ubiquitous and texting is as routine as talking.

"Most people have it, but they don't end up using it," said Vishy Gopalakrishnan, who manages AT&T Inc. (T)'s unified communications unit. "There are ways to get around it."

The Nov. 6 memo announcing the change at Coca-Cola created a stir among some employees, who assumed it was part of a program to cut $3 billion in annual expenses by 2019. That plan, which was announced in October in response to a global sales slump, has caused growing unease inside the company over the possibility of firings.

The savings from eliminating voice mail will be less than $100,000 a year, said Amanda Rosseter, a Coke spokeswoman. The decision had more to do with simplifying work than trimming costs, she said.

Younger Workers

Techies have predicted the death of voice mail for years as smartphones co-opt much of the office work once performed by telephones and desktop computers. Younger employees who came of age texting while largely ignoring voice mail are bringing that habit into the workforce.

"People north of 40 are schizophrenic about voice mail," said Michael Schrage, a research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management's Center for Digital Business. "People under 35 scarcely ever use it."

Coca-Cola, which so far has cut voice mail at its Atlanta office complex and a nearby technology center, allowed employees to keep it if they claimed a "business critical need."

About 6 percent of workers opted to retain it, Rosseter said. Use of the office-based system had been declining, according to the memo.

"Many people in many corporations simply don't have the time or desire to spend 25 minutes plowing through a stack of 15 to 25 voice mails at the end or beginning of the day," said Schrage, who wrote in a September 2013 Harvard Business Review article that it was "time to hang up on voice mail."

Eliminating Overlap

Companies are increasingly combining telephone, e-mail, text and video systems into unified Internet-based systems that eliminate overlap, said AT&T's Gopalakrishnan.

Smartphones show a list of names next to voice mails, making it easier to choose which ones to ignore, and office phone calls can be easily transferred to those devices. Some can even convert voice-mail messages into texts that can then be sent via e-mail.

Companies may eventually choose to eliminate landlines altogether as the workforce becomes more mobile, said Craig Wigginton, who runs Deloitte & Touche's global telecommunications consulting practice.

Wigginton said he spends most of his work life traveling and only occasionally steps into his office in New York City. When his phone there rings, it goes to his computer, no matter where he is in the world.

"People can work remotely better and more flexibly than in the past," he said. "Just like you have cord-cuttings at home, I would call this a little bit of a cord-cutting in the corporate environment as well."

[Eddie Teach]

Why do you hate progress? 

[KRonn]

Can't do this at my work place, unless the phone system is changed to allow texting. Hmm, maybe it does allow texting, never tried it.   

[DGuller]

Good riddance.  There are far more efficient ways to get in touch with someone these days.

[Zanza]

Companies may eventually choose to eliminate landlines altogether as the workforce becomes more mobile

We'll not get phones in our project rooms next year as everybody has a corporate mobile phone anyway. Maybe one of those spider things for having conference calls with multiple participants. I guess the VOIP phones we have might be cheaper when calling overseas, but that's about the only reason I can think of to keep them.

[alfred russel]

The antisocial omg-actual-human-contact-omg Millennial Assburger generation scores a strategic tech victory in the workplace.

It isn't anti social, it is more efficient. If you get a voicemail, you have to pull out a notepad and write down the key points (like call back number), then avoid losing the paper. I usually ended up having to replay a rambling message several times. You know there is a system where the caller can do the transcription for you and put it in a place the message won't be lost? It is called email. No human contact is being lost--there isn't anything about taking away phones, and talking to a machine isn't more social than writing an email.

You also don't have the hastle of updating a voicemail message for when you are out of the office for an afternoon.

[Josquius]

I've never used my voice mail. Always annoys me when people whine at me for not getting a message they supposidely left on it.  Good move

[CountDeMoney]

Good riddance.  There are far more efficient ways to get in touch with someone these days.

Yeah, like getting up, going to your office, and then making your goofy self-isolating ass even more uncomfortable than using the fucking phone.  I can do that.

[DGuller]

Good riddance.  There are far more efficient ways to get in touch with someone these days.

Yeah, like getting up, going to your office, and then making your goofy self-isolating ass even more uncomfortable than using the fucking phone.  I can do that.

I'll just text security to escort you out.

[alfred russel]

CdM would have attributed the replacement of the Pony Express by the telegraph to anti social assburgers too.

[Admiral Yi]

The one downside IMO is the extra work created for the caller.

[CountDeMoney]

I'll just text security to escort you out.

Not if I am security, numbnuts.  Now come with me and get an updated ID photo, because you've been dodging me for 2 months.

[Sheilbh]

I've never used my voice mail. Always annoys me when people whine at me for not getting a message they supposidely left on it.  Good move

Same. It's just pointless.

[CountDeMoney]

CdM would have attributed the replacement of the Pony Express by the telegraph to anti social assburgers too.

Increasingly insulated and isolated workplaces filled by Millennial ass twats with more fucking social anxiety disorders than you can shake a stick at lose the ability to discern in email what one can otherwise interpret in a telephone conversation, and even voice mail.  But by all means, keep eliminating the avenues to interact with other human beings effectively.  That will do wonders for everybody involved. 

Let's all waste time writing unnecessary emails back and forth, misinterpreting intentions with your "A is A" lack of nuance, when it can all be resolved by a conversation--even a one-way conversation like voice mail.

[Grey Fox]

I so rarely get voicemail that when I actually do, it's been so long that I have to change my password before hearing the message, every damn time and that message will be my father saying "It's me, call back.".