Add Starwood Hotels CEO Frits van Paasschen to the list of CEOs who finds using his iPad and iPhone more productive than a PC. He tells the Wall Street Journal that he has dumped his PC, and does all of his work on his mobile devices with the aid of a Bluetooth keyboard.
I thought, you know what, I actually don’t use [my PC]. I do all of my work via mobile so essentially my office is wherever I go, and I can be much more productive.
Starwood’s CEO says the limitations of a smaller device has lead to changes that have actually boosted productivity, saying his meetings are paperless, emails are shorter, and he now refuses to deal with huge spreadsheets. “When I get the massive file, the first thing I’ll do is send it back and say tell me the key points that I actually need to understand,” says van Paasschen.
Mr. van Paasschen’s working day revolves around mobile, even when he’s not on the road. In the morning, he wakes to his iPhone alarm, sends a few texts, then heads to the gym in his basement. There, he whips out his iPad to catch a TED talk or Netflix documentary between reps. The tablet also joins him at breakfast, where he “reads the paper” using mobile apps like Zite and Flipboard before getting back to email and heading to work. After work, he often finds himself on his phone playing Letterpress, Scrabble or Sudoku.
Mr. van Paasschen admits that his travel-heavy schedule does make it easier for him to ditch the PC.
“You can work and dress and use technology in the way that most suits you, and I think that ultimately the result of that is that we’re all more productive,” Mr. van Paasschen said.
