Do you give your number to your office people?

Malaysia
December 9, 2008 5:21am CST
I'm working in a consulting firm and it's a necessity for me to put my private mobile number to people since I don't have an office mobile number. So far, nobody has disturb me during my vacation since I'm not so important yet but I do have colleagues who are always disturbed by other colleagues during their vacation. And it's very irritating if you have Blackberry. What about you? Do you give your private number to your office people or customers? Or you prefer to have a separate number?
1 person likes this
8 responses
@Nhey16 (2518)
• Philippines
17 Dec 08
hello daydreamer20, lucky for you and you're not irritated with calls every now and then. My husband has no choice but to answer all the calls he get from their clients, but I do tell him that when he's not in the office he should have time off by turning off his phone coz I'm the one annoyed with all the calls. They don't even care whatever time was it. Even at midnight they do call him, it's ok if he's the last resort to call, but most of the time, even how small their problems with regards to their work, they don't have the initiative to search for an answer but instead they call my husband, and most of the time I'm the one who was awaken with the calls... I'm just so glad that as of the moment those kinds of calls were lessen.... :)
• Malaysia
18 Dec 08
Some clients are like that. They will not care what time it is for you because they're paying your for answering the calls. They can be quite unreasonable. The good thing is, they require your husband's help which means your husband's job is secure. The bad thing is, you will surely get a lot of disturbances and unwanted calls at night.
• Malaysia
19 Dec 08
No problem. :)
@Nhey16 (2518)
• Philippines
19 Dec 08
hello daydreamer... :) i'm very glad that you've marked my response as the best in this discussion... that's one good thing about this phone calls my husband receives, he has a good job, and i'm also thankful for that... :)
@ratyz5 (7808)
• Philippines
9 Dec 08
As much as possible, I would like to have a separate contact number for my work since I would be able to focus more if that were the case than on having a single mobile phone and have different messages that might even clog my inbox, preventing me to receive important messages if ever there were and my inbox was already full.
@ratyz5 (7808)
• Philippines
11 Dec 08
Yes indeed and it would really be practical to use two separate mobile phones in such cases like that. (^_^ )
• Malaysia
11 Dec 08
Yes, I do agree with you that the ideal case is to have a separate line for business or work related issues. Work related items can get pretty hectic at times.
1 person likes this
@sunita64 (6469)
• India
9 Dec 08
Well our office has numbers of all the officers as in case of emergency they can be called, so there doesn,t arise any question of not giving the phone numbers and every month we are paid some money for running our mobiles as well, so no choice.
• Malaysia
11 Dec 08
That's the company policy since they are giving you allowances for phones. Some companies do that, and some even give you a separate mobile phone just for company usage.
@flowerhorn (1008)
• Malaysia
19 Dec 08
Even though I don't give my private number to my vendors, somehow they manage to get hold of my number. And guess who is the culprit? It is none other than the Malay receptionist that gave my number to them. However I have no hard feeling on her as she is just doing a good job at the expense of my privacy. Luckily, all my vendors who have my number do not call me during my holidays. They only reached for my phone number when they cannot contact me in the office phone as I do move around the company.
• Malaysia
19 Dec 08
That is not that bad. Some of my friends are not so fortunate and they even got people calling their cell phones while they are out of the country.
15 Dec 08
I am not working in an office, but yes most of my colleagues knows my landline and mobile number and they even called me sometimes when I am on my days off asking how I am. And most of the time they called me when they wanted to swap shifts, because they knew I find it difficult to say no especially when it comes to work. Sometimes it's annoying though.
• Malaysia
17 Dec 08
It's nice and all to call you to ask how you're doing. But it's not so nice when they ask you to help them with their work when you're supposed to be on vacation. :D
@Albee22 (41)
• Malaysia
9 Dec 08
If necessary need the number then i will give them.Just only for the close friends.Not for stranger please.^^
• Malaysia
11 Dec 08
I doubt anyone will give their private number to strangers :D
@wrangel15 (1443)
• Philippines
9 Dec 08
My office mates has a copy of my mobile number. There are times when we meet during the weekend and we have to get each other's number. At some other times, we have to call each other regarding office works when someone is in the client's office.
• Malaysia
11 Dec 08
That's the normal practice actually, but sometimes it does backfire on you especially if they still need your help even though you're no longer with the company.
@syfarisk (378)
• Malaysia
9 Dec 08
I do have friends who just don't like to give away their phone numbers to other people. I don't think that's a good attribute to have. As I'm involved in business, I believe it's important that we do make friends with as many people as possible, and give them our phone numbers so that they can contact us. It's important to market ourselves and attract people to our life. Try to get as many people as possible to know us. This will help our lives progress better in the future. Our options will increase and opportunities will come into our lives easier. Plus, our lives with be more merrier and more enjoyable. That's why if you look at people who do business, they will give away their business cards to other people that has their number on it. There are also people who do business on the Internet who give away their phone numbers at their websites or blogs. Attracting people is vital for future success. But of course, everyone needs to have their privacy, or their resting session, or their vacations. So the wise thing to do is to have two numbers, a personal one, and a business one. The personal one, don't ever give away to anyone, except people who you can trust and people who are close to you. People who you like to spend time with when you are not doing your business work. This is the wise thing to do.
• Malaysia
11 Dec 08
The ideal would be to have 1 private number and 1 business number, which also means you will need 2 mobile phones. That's the ideal. But it can be quite costly. It's true that one needs to keep in touch with as many people as possible - networking. But when you have a colleague who always call you while you're on vacation, that's not a very good thing.