Building a Case For Telecommuting 230
Esther Schindler writes "Many of us geeks prefer to work at home without distractions, but a lot of bosses still believe that if they don't see you, you must be lolling about, eating bon-bons and playing Angry Birds. 'There may be many reasons a manager is distrustful of telecommuting but the phenomenon of what Albiero calls "presentism"—that is, only trusting and rewarding the folks you see at their computer is a major factor.' So it may be of some use to read through the research compiled by Diann Daniel that says telecommuting creates happier and more productive employees (which naturally include fewer distractions and better work-life balance), and an accompanying infographic showing the environmental benefits from reduced commuting. She follows it up with suggestions on how managers can mentor and support teleworkers. Some of this is general advice, but some of the tips are more specific: 'It may seem like a lot more work—all this up-front addressing of communication issues that happen far more naturally in the office—but the upside is increased efficiency. Albiero sees this especially in the area of meetings. He speaks of one client who has now instituted a meeting format that is structured to allow for the first five minutes of all meetings to be "small-talk minutes." Thus, everyone knows they needn't call in for those minutes unless they want to join."
Infographic (Score:4, Informative)
and an accompanying infographic
When this word plateaus [google.com], I will bring back synergy.
Re:I love it! (Score:5, Informative)
Call your auto insurance and see if you can get a discount for not having a "daily commute car". We did... both of our cars (wife doesn't work) are considered "secondary". Saved a couple hundred bucks.
Re:I'm definitely sick of (Score:4, Informative)
At Google, that included ducking the three way nerf gun crossfire between the SRE, sysop and intern cube farms.
Re:I love it! (Score:4, Informative)
I couldn't agree more. When I'm working on a difficult problem, I can buckle down and disable all distractions with ease. Turn off IM, close email, and just work. No co-workers coming up behind me and bothering me.
My company also uses Skype and GotoMeeting to get everyone together, and it works pretty well. It takes some discipline from the office people to make sure to include remote employees, but it seems to be working out well. I know I couldn't be happier.
Re:I love it! (Score:4, Informative)
Go read about the "Broken Window Fallacy". Our country is failing because of wars for oil, having to import oil, etc. Not to mention all the good citizens it loses to auto accidents. You want people to be killed and maimed just so that the medical industries can do better? This country needs to do anything it can to reduce oil usage; telecommuting is a good first step. Personal rapid transit like SkyTran [skytran.net] is a good second step.
Re:person to person = best communication method (Score:4, Informative)
The answer is that those meetings don't work very well. You get people not paying attention, people answering their email, people who are hard to understand over the phone, etc etc etc. Such meetings are very rarely productive. If you are having a lot of them, time to starting looking for another job, because your company is in trouble.