If I’d known there would be no internet access on this 4+ hour flight, I might have come better prepared to work offline.
I wouldn’t have come, as I did, eager for an extended stretch of uninterrupted work time (online).
I have a constant battle with my email inbox, and flight time is the perfect time to catch up on email and clear it out.
I’m headed to two and a half days of meetings and you can bet my inbox will fill up quickly. I would have liked to empty it out first…
Had I known there wouldn’t be internet on this flight, I wouldn’t have promised clients/team members that I’d be online working.
I certainly wouldn’t have made myself the point person on completing a task on deadline.
So, here I am.
Nice that there’s a movie playing, but this is work time, not play time.
I sorted through a pile of papers, notes that have been accumulating on my desk = WIN.
I typed them into a to-do list = WIN.
I typed some other random notes, thoughts I’ve been exploring as I seek to identify the 4-5 values I’d like to guide my business = WIN.
Now I have several more hours to fill on this cross country flight — and no internet.
I do have a book I’ve been wanting to read.
I do often lament that I don’t have time to think.
But what I’d really like? To buy a pass to gogo in flight and get some work done before my busy days of meetings begin.
I know I’m whining.
Whine, whine, whine.
When did in-flight internet become an assumed service? How did we travel for business without it? How can I spend the remainder of this flight productively?
Tell me something! How do you spend your flight time? Do you assume that you’ll have in-flight internet, or do you come prepared to work offline?
Photo Credit: Kristoffer via flickr
I am the founder/CEO of the Weaving Influence team, the author of Reach: Creating the Biggest Possible Audience for Your Message, Book, or Cause, and the host of the Book Marketing Action Podcast. I’m a wife and mom of three kids, and I enjoy running, reading, writing, coffee, and dark chocolate.
Have been exactly in the same spot with the same line of thinking Becky…
I always take 4 things to do. I only count on Internet access at the airport. I take cards to write, things in my to read and reply file, podcasts saved away to listen to, and when I open my net book I find lots of stuff to read, write, organize, or delete. Electronic files need no wastebasket.
Have fun. Maybe on the way back you can sit next to someone whose device is throwing a signal. Good luck.
HiBecky,
I have moved flight time from action time to quiet time. And I am more productive because of it. Time to disconnect, be still (kinda cool when you are going 500 mph), and let my brain digest events. Or let the right ideas bubble to the surface. Because I get still instead of always being busy.
Cheers,
David
I am with David. I use flight time for “down-time”. It has almost become sacred time, where I can stop, catch my breath for a few precious hours and stare in wonder at the earth below.
I always bring multiple things to do. Like yourself, I often have the next book I want to read. Always have my iPod which is loaded with music, podcasts and books. Always have writing material, but most often what I actually need to do is take the opportunity to rest.
Perhaps it’s my age and that I have had some kind of electronic “tether” related to work for many many years, but I actually do not like being “on” all the time. I think more of us need to make spaces, or like this flight, take the opportunities granted us to turn “off” and defuse.