Telefini Small Business Blog

Sheely is my nickname, and I have been going by this since 3^rd grade. My full first name has been a challenge for people to pronounce. While growing up, I dreaded the first day of class as attendance records inevitably listed my full name, and I’d have to introduce myself after teachers inevitably butchered the pronunciation – it didn’t help that often the last few letters would be cut off from the list.  I write about this because names are important. They are a part of our identity and personality. For many, names have even greater significance, whether to honor relatives, symbolize values, or reflect the history of their family line.

I write about names today because since its inception, Telefini has suffered the same fate that I and anyone with a less than common name have had to endure – constant mispronunciation. I understand that if you haven’t heard Telefini said aloud, certain assumptions are made on how to state the name -  the most common of which goes like this: TEL-A-FEENY (“tel-a” as in the first part of ‘telephone’ and “feeny” as in rhymes with ‘Oscar Meyer “Weenie’”).  In fact, we intended Telefini to be pronounced more in line with the term “telephony” (TA-LAF-A-NEE), which in its most basic definition means “the working or use of telephones.” You can hear how telephony is pronounced by searching in Google or simply click here. More precisely, we employ the general technologies of IP Telephony to provide our telephone solutions.

Thus, we named Telefini in part as a play on words, though we tend to pronounce it a little differently than telephony. Specifically, we say TE-LIF-IN-NEE.  We’ve thought about adding an accent to the name, but we like the way it is spelled currently, and probably won’t change it. Soon, we’ll be launching some videos of our products and in the process we’ll be able to say our name out loud for the masses to hear. Until then, we’ll just have to politely teach others how we prefer to be called. Of course, we're open to any suggestions you have for explaining how to pronounce our name. After all, your name is a powerful representation of who you are and what you stand for.

For me, the little things truly make my day. I don’t mean this to be cheesy. I genuinely get excited when I learn a new trick for example in Excel or Word. Just recently (and I can’t believe I’m admitting it), I learned that if you have a couple tabs open in one Internet Explorer window, you can actually drag out each tab into its own window (which is also great if you have two monitors). It seems simple and a little silly, but I find these small discoveries can make a difference, and at a time when it can be so tough to run a business, why not find reasons to get excited?

First, a look back

For those of you who don’t know me, working for Telefini is still relatively new. For the vast majority of my professional life, I worked for Boys & Girls Clubs. I know, I know. You’re wondering how in the world I went from working with children everyday to working for a phone company, but that’s another story. For now, I bring this up simply to say that no matter what you do in life, it’s important to make it exciting and enjoyable. Believe me, after coming from a job where I worked with amazing youth and could pretty much guarantee I’d have time to play games every day (and have it considered part of my job), I wasn’t sure I could ever top that. To be honest, you really can’t beat working with, supporting, and inspiring youth, but that’s not a big surprise. However, there are some pretty awesome aspects about our phone systems, including Voicemail to Email, that make working with Telefini exciting in its own way.

Discovering Voicemail to Email