In a work setting where you work, how much do you value interaction among your peers or co-workers? Managers? Your supervisor? Boss? Clients? Customers? Ask yourself, how many interactions or encounters do you get in a day with hearing people? Conversational interactions include impromptu conversations, meeting conversations, hall conversations or office conversations. All of these things occur on average 80 times a day. But for many deaf or even hard of hearing people the conversational occurences with hearing people can sometimes drop down to almost zero, which is like having an office with a brick wall around a desk. Yet, barriers are meant to come down.Not everybody is conversant in sign language, which includes deaf and hard of hearing people. Just because one has a hearing loss does not mean the person is knowledgeable in sign language. But fortunately, we have technology that can easily help bridge this communication gap very well. Not a 100% solution but with technology it can certainly bring up the number of conversational occurences in a typical work day, and boost your ranking and productivity among your co-workers, supervisors, managers, boss, and customers.
My technology is simply my digital hearing aid that I use everyday at work and has helped me use the phone, field radio, meetings, have conversations with my co-workers and customers. I often get stopped (or I do the same thing myself) by my co-workers and supervisor in hallways and discuss impromptu businesses aside from the normal day to day "How ya doing?" kind of thing. Whether if you're socially shy or not, the goal should be to see the number of conversational or interactive occurences go up high enough and be seen as a productive, engaging and independent worker rather than to subconsiously or consciously build that brick wall around you and your office space.
When hearing aids (or cochlear implants) cannot work for you there are means of using technology to boost that interactive communication level. One good example is the use of a face to face communication device such as the UbiDuo. This device enabled Jason Curry, who is the CEO and founder of sComm which is the maker of UbiDuo, see his own number of communication encounters rise high enough to see that his own productivity and successes soared beyond anything he could imagined.
With the UbiDuo, I am able to have about 40 encounters with my hearing staff in my office. The picture below shows me having a conversation with Jill Meyers, the COO of sComm. Jill and I talk about 15 to 20 times a day. We are able to strike up a conversation anytime on the UbiDuo and discuss work-related issues. If I didn’t have the UbiDuo, my encounter number will almost be zero — unless I had an interpreter sitting by me all day!Jason raised a very important point. If you are deaf or hard of hearing, what do you want your encounter number with hearing people be in your work setting? Exactly what kind of communication or assistive technology do you need that would help boost your number of interactive occurrences at your place of work? Each deaf or hard of hearing person's way of communicating varies from one to another depending on work and office settings. So, finding the right technology to suit your communication needs is the most important thing you can do for yourself, and your career.
Jill and I talk about 15 to 20 times a day. We are able to strike up a conversation anytime on the UbiDuo and discuss work-related issues. If I didn’t have the UbiDuo, my encounter number will almost be zero — unless I had an interpreter sitting by me all day!
If you work with a person who is deaf or hard of hearing, do you want their encounter number to be 40 or 50 instead of zero? The only time that a deaf or hard of hearing person ideally could have a face-to-face encounter with a hearing person is when they have an interpreter. As I’ve mentioned before, we are not trying to replace interpreters, but we are trying to increase the number of encounters for a deaf or hard of hearing person when an interpreter is not available.
The UbiDuo fills the gap when an interpreter is not available by increasing their number of encounters in professional or social situations. If you are deaf or hard of hearing, what do you want your encounter number to be?
7 comments:
Where I work, we have Microsoft Communicator...which is an IM program. It enables us to have group conferences, chats, and to share our screens with other people. I also have a Z-150 videophone from ZVRS which allows me to call into conferences in the conference room.
I have a lot of interactions with co-workers, my boss, and many other work. I do miss out on things whenever we go out for lunch or a company dinner...but I get by with some lip reading and gestures.
I have two issues with the Ubi Duo...
1.) The price...if my company would purchase it..it would not be a problem. I understand why it's expensive..it must cost a lot to manufacture.
2.) When I go and see my boss in the boss' office, I simply bring my laptop and type back/forth. There would be no space on the desk for a Ubi Duo because there's a keyboard there.
Nonetheless, an Ubi Duo would really work for a deaf person whose job was to meet with clients in a conference room or something...like a car salesman to negotiate the purchase of a car...or in a setting where using a computer isn't practical...it also would be extremely great for job interviews.
All those things are great. You have to pretty much tailor technology to your needs and preferences.
People need to understand that technology would eventually be the key to see *simultaneous* communication happen. This is an area that will continue to improve over time. We see that everyday. One way communication at a time is not the answer (i.e. the back and forth communication rather than a smoother, interactive communication kind).
Your question on the price of the UbiDuo, all we can do is wait and see how it progresses over time since sComm is a relatively young company it continues to grow. Yes, it is expensive to manufacture specialized products, especially in a niche market.
You have to ask yourself, how valuable is it to have these interactions or encounters when it comes to communication? Do you simply just see the price tag or do see the potential end result that would pay for itself over time?
When you bring in your laptop to your boss, it is not a true face to face communication since you both are taking turns typing. You are communicating, that's for sure. But it isn't simultaneous communication.
UbiDuo is great for any situation whether it's social, for work, or working out a contract deal with a hearing client. Including able to have a mini-conference up to 4 people at the same time on the UbiDuo. There's an intrinsic value in simultaneous communication, especially between a deaf/hh person and hearing person.
I am HOH and as such, I have normal peer to peer conversations with my co-workers and my boss. I don't use any special accommodations at all. I have a few co workers who knows some signs due to their being around deaf employees in another division but we don't communicate in signs except in situations where they want to share something w/ me and didn't want anyone to eavesdrop. I do notice some deaf employees having limited peer to peer conversations. Ubiduo might work for them but I don't see how that would help much in spontaneous conversation situations. Kind of awkward for friendship relationship in the work place but awesome for managers and co workers to discuss shop.
Then again, I'm not totally deaf, what do I know?
Candy~
A problem with the Ubi Duo is that every time I see one in the public areana, they are usually broken or the countertops are so high that I cannot see the screen because of reflections from overhead lights. It's time to update the design now that they've been in use several years.
In the future I would expect items like the P3 netbook (small laptops with videophone software) to have plugs to connect two netbooks to carry on such a conversation.
This costs about $150-$250 each and brings down the price considerably from Ubi Duo levels. I wonder why this hasn't happened yet.
As with any technology, one could expect improvements over time for certain products and be competitive. This is a natural progression to expect.
Technology is great but so are people!
A very unusual place- a rural cafe has two deaf employees. They do not have any other employees as it is a family business. Her husband, the Chef is deaf. She is the deaf waitress. She took it on herself to teach sign language to everyone.
They figured out I was deaf because she said I was "signing to myself" when I was trying to decide what to order and they introduced me to their deaf staff since we were getting ours "to go"!
I have joined their weekly sign language class to help her along. It is a very unusual situation but her personality makes it work. =)
Since I got my new hearing aids, I have upgraded myself from 'deaf' to HH' I hear so much better with them and I am enjoying my friends at work so much!! Before that it was a chore to talk to anyone. Now I'm participating in the chatter and it has made a world of difference in my happiness at work. This experience has led me to believe that when the hybrid implant is FDA approved I will get it immediately. I was going to do it last summer and then learned my ins. wouldn't pay for it because it isn't yet approved by the FDA.
I didn't realize how much I was sinking before the new hearing aids. It was like being in a dark hole and not even realizing it. This is what progressive hearing loss does to you, because the loss is so gradual you continually compensate without realizing how hard you're working at communicating, until you get new aids.
Because my job is in public service it would be very hard to conduct business with an ubiduo. I am frequently helping young children who can't spell very well yet. So I MUST hear at work.
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