My new mantra is "Email is not work".  I just got back from OSBC 2008, and saw once again, how tied we all are to our electronic devices.  Now I like my BlackBerry as much as the next person, but I'm afraid that we may be so busy checking email that we are missing out on valuable opportunities to think and learn.  Matt Asay talks about this in his blog Back in the good old days when I had time to think. 

I only got my BlackBerry about 6 months ago.  My impetus for buying it was a bike trip to Italy last October, where I needed to have some ability to communicate with work.  I didn't want to be forced to spend time tracking down internet cafes when I would rather be on my bike or exploring a Tuscan hill town with my friends.  My fear in getting the BlackBerry was that I would become one of those "crackberry addicts".  As a recovering workaholic, I've (finally) learned to create some boundaries around my work.  It took a cancer diagnosis a couple years ago to make me realize that, as much as I love my work, spending all my time consumed by work was not the way I wanted to spend my life.  I also know that time I spend thinking is way more valuable to my company than time I spend checking email.  Hence my new mantra.

This has been my second year of attending the OSBC conference, and each year I've come back from the conference with new insights and "aha's".  I've been able to learn about how other companies have been successful and think about how OpenLogic needs to evolve as we grow our business.  I'm pretty positive those insights are way more important than an instant response to an email.  I will continue to use my BlackBerry to help me in my work, but I choose not to become addicted.