Yesterday, I had a business meeting with some folks from an NGO looking for my company to sponsor one of their events. I had offered to meet the person at a mall in the west as it was near where she worked (she was thrilled at the convenience for her) and it would be on my way home anyway.

Nothing unusual with that arrangement , except that for a normal workday, I had pretty much spent most of it working outside of the office. Here’s how my day had gone:

12:30 am to 1:30 am – teleconference (and emails and work for a few hours in the evening before that)

8:30 am to 11:00 am – at my daughters’ school for Sports Day

11:45 am to 2:30 pm – in the office for meeting and work

2:30 pm to 3:30 pm – at a cafe somewhere in Raffles Place and met a counterpart from another company for benchmarking and fact-finding

4:00 pm to 5:30 pm – got to the mall in the west, settled down for an ice-cream treat while working and waiting for folks from NGO

5:30 pm to 6:30 pm – at a mall in the west meeting folks from NGO for sponsorship discussion

The arrangement could not have been more perfect. I got a head start travelling in the direction of home during the off-peak hours, beating the crowds that would be packing the trains on a late Friday afternoon. And I got myself a TGIF treat of ice-cream (salted caramel and double chocolate) on waffle (did I tell you it was half-priced!) whilst replying to e-mails and taking a conference call or two. And finally I arrived back home on time for my personal commitments (I teach catechism on Friday evenings) – if I had to take the meeting in the office, I would never have been able to make it back on time.

Being totally untethered from the office desk, I could plan and optimize my work day and work place for both professional and personal objectives – so perhaps, in some cases, you can have your cake (or ice-cream on waffle) and eat it too – wherever it is best to consume it!

If you want to see where else my laptop has been, see also this other blog post.