A BLACKBURN man is at the forefront of BT's design strategy. He spoke to PAULINE HAWKINS about his work -- and breaking down the language barrier with American counterparts. TIME is money to BT and its advanced concepts manager Graham Whitehead.

Not so many years ago the importance of a businessman was gauged by how often he had to jump on an aeroplane to attend a meeting, lecture or conference.

Now, with the arrival of the videophone, busy men like Graham can be in one part of the country while addressing an audience hundreds of miles away.

He quoted an example of how he gave a one-hour lecture from his Suffolk offices to a group of students in Edinburgh which, thanks to his videophone, took a total of 63 minutes and involved no travel at all.

"These kits cost £20,000, but my time is very precious. The travel industry was already on the way down before September 11, but another reason why is that your status now in an American company is deemed by the fact they will not allow you to travel," he said.

International relations have become a part of Graham's life, which began 52 years ago in Blackburn. He lived in two streets in the town -- Lytham Road and Revidge Road -- and attended Longshaw Junior School. "I visited the other day. I happened to nip in and it's exactly the same as it was," he said.

Graham attended Queen Elizabeth's Grammar School from 1960-68 and spent the next three years studying mechanical engineering. After graduating with an honours degree he started work at the Post Office Research Centre in London. He has stayed with the industry -- and the company -- ever since, despite it changing its name first to Post Office Telecommunications and, in 1984, British Telecom and later becoming abbreviated to BT.

The company relocated its research centre from London to a 110-acre site in Ipswich and 2,500 workers and their families moved to East Anglia. From the hustle and bustle of London, Graham found himself having to adapt to a much slower pace of life.

"One of the first things I saw was a sticker in a Morris Minor which said, 'you won't hurry me, I live in Suffolk'," he said. "It's amazing how they sped up as you slowed down.

"I have worked there ever since -- all I have done is changed my job every four or five years, but moved around a very large organisation."

Graham's degree in mechanical engineering gave him a foothold in an industry which, thanks to the march of technology, has a wealth of products at its fingertips. He started looking at "holes and poles" -- looking at how the company could detect if a telegraph pole was rotten before one of its workers climbed up and was injured.

From this "basic but important" job he moved on to examining new methods of connecting telephone wires and later worked on the design and manufacture of transatlantic and trans-Pacific submarine systems to allow telephone calls to be made quickly and efficiently across the world. For his role in this work he received the Queen's Award for Technology in 1990.

Graham later lived in America for two years when BT was involved in a venture with Dupont. He discovered, on arrival at the other side of the pond, that Britain and America were, as Oscar Wilde had put it, "two countries divided by a common language".

For example, he found out that the expression "let's table this idea" -- which in England means examine and discuss it -- means "let's trash it" to the American. And if there were Australians involved it would become even more confusing, as they would walk away because the idea had not been written down.

Even though there are peculiarities in the language, the reliability of the telecommunications service today is a far cry from half a century ago.

"In the 1950s and '60s you might be the first in your street to have a telephone. People looked at it. They waited for it to ring and if it didn't, they polished it. Now when you pick a telephone up and don't get a dialling tone it's something you tell your mates about in the pub. It's so unusual because the system is so reliable," Graham said.

One of the projects Graham is currently working on is the use of "virtual reality" screens in public houses in a bid to woo back drinkers. But he is adamant that computers will never tell humans what to do -- and no-one will be forced to give up their books or nights out in favour of "virtual life".

It's never too late to enjoy the ever-expanding world of technology, however. Graham's father, Eddie, who lives in Astley Village, near Chorley, is 80 and has been bitten by the computer bug -- so much so that he is studying at night school.

The advance of technology, often at a frightening speed to most of us, seems to hold no fears for Graham, who, despite his hectic lifestyle, relaxes by morris dancing in his spare time.

"It's so different to what I normally do," he said.

But, he explains, people have always been a bit wary of new developments.

"If you went back in time you would find someone saying, 'oh no, somebody's invented a double-edged sword. I can't cope'."