Cold Calling

What’s the best way of responding to a cold call? I ask because we get loads here in The Times Business department – PRs offering thrilling opportunities to attend telecoms conferences in Harrogate and so forth – and have noticed we each have different ways of handling them.

My colleague Patrick Hosking, who sits opposite me, rarely gives unsolicited callers more than 15 seconds and his response usually involves a combination of the phrases “not interested” and “put it in an e-mail please, goodbye”. By contrast, Christine Seib, who sits to my right, can devote chunks of her working day to dealing with spurious queries, politely explaining why she can’t help, and invariably ending each call with a cheerful “no worries”.

My general response, meanwhile, lies somewhere in between…

Read atTimes Online