IN PREVIOUS columns I have referred to the process of “creativebrooding,” which I learned from a friend. It means to mentallydepart from the normal business environment and imagine what yourbusiness could be like if you had no limitations.

Creative brooding works even better when you're out of theoffice. I don't get a lot of time away from business, except fordaily 20-mile bicycle rides in the summer-and we get only twomonths of summer here in northern New York. However, travel topleasant environs for insurance events creates a nearly perfectopportunity for creative brooding.

At these events, I have always watched corporate “roadwarriors,” armed with their laptops, and thought it would be fun tobe that connected. Two years ago, we acquired a second office andused a virtual private network to link it to our first one. Thatexperience taught me that such connectivity was possible even for asmall agency.

Two recent experiences pushed us from dreaming about greaterconnectivity to achieving it. First, my laptop aged into a relic. Ihad bought a scanner to use with it, but the computer could notadapt to the scanner's USB connection, no matter how many adapterswe tried. So last year we purchased a new, state-of-the-artlaptop.

Second, I passed through the Richmond, Va., airport, where Inoticed a business lounge with workstations equipped with freehigh-speed Internet access. The hotel where I stayed on that tripalso provided such service. It struck me that high-speed Internetaccess is becoming increasingly available on the road, just as paytelephone service once rapidly expanded in the past. You can evenget Internet access through the phones in airliners, if you'rewilling to pay $5.95 per minute.

So I began to creatively brood on the possibility of a portableoffice with free Internet access that could allow me to operateindependently from the conventional office whenever I wished. Uponreturning home, I talked to my IT consultant about the idea, and hecame up with an easy solution: I could use Terminal Services, aproduct that powers the VPN between our two offices, to connect tothe office from my laptop. I can use this program to access anye-mail application or other in-house programs and data, because itgives me real-time access to my office desktop. Then, I can usedirect Internet connections to access resources outside theoffice.

Since our offices scan documents into an electronic filingsystem, my “portable office” model needed to incorporate scanningas well. The answer was our year-old Visioneer XP100 scanner-theone that would not work with my ancient laptop. The scanner issmaller than a rolling pin, fits right in my new laptop's case and,through the USB port, is powered by the laptop's battery. It scanscolor and black-and-white documents; and while it isn't as fast asa desktop scanner, the quality of its scanned PDF files is just asgood. Terminal Services lets me log on to our main office system,access our server's complete Microsoft Outlook contact list, selecta person and send him or her an e-mail message with an attachmentscanned on my laptop. It's just as good as being in the office.

But what about those pictures that help an underwriterunderstand an account or a claims adjuster quickly visualize aloss? Or assume you want to taunt the folks who are waist-deep insnow while you're in a warmer climate? The solution is a digitalcamera. I bought an inch-thick, 3.2-megapixel camera with acredit-card-size “footprint” for $234 on eBay. (The model, a CanonSD110, sells new for approximately $349.) With a 256mb storagecard, you can use such a camera to record better video and soundthan the bulky video cameras of just a few years ago could. A USBconnection creates on-the-fly flexibility, with immediaterecognition when you plug in the USB cord. My grand total was lessthan $2,000 for everything-and well worth the investment.

This configuration can give agents an impressive level offlexibility and responsiveness when they're away from theoffice-and may even eliminate the need to ever be there. It's anexample of how growing high-speed Internet access has created anentirely new set of options for us. Take a break and spend sometime thinking about the possibilities. Consider how different workcould become for you and your employees. The required technology ishere today.