But not all solutions are high-tech. A person has to have the koosh ball in his or her hand before speaking. We've found that just the act of throwing the koosh ball around to one another can loosen up a meeting. In addition, for some meetings Graham has been using MSN Instant Messenger effectively, as well as private chat rooms on the MSN Communities Web site. For larger meetings, he uses an infrared conference system that includes four microphone hookups.
Phone calls pose a difficult challenge for hearing-impaired employees.
But if the person I was talking to didn't have a TTY, I had to go through a relay person to communicate with them. The advent of the Internet has made a great difference in the lives of deaf employees. With reorganizations forcing him to frequently switch buildings, Smith needed to work closely with the Human Resources and Facilities departments to ensure he could easily get in and out of each new building to which he was assigned. One problem that everyone has here is that you change buildings about every year or two. I recognized that it wasn't practical for them to spend money outfitting a building with automatic door openers just to have me move six months later.