Remote Working

David Nickson, Suzy Siddons

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781138143845
• eBook ISBN: 9781136368882
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

As more people choose to work from home, the challenges for both the home worker and traditional management increase. Many questions arise regarding how to appraise the remote worker, the logistics of home working, and productivity. The authors focus on developing the right skills to cope with this new environment and stress the importance of knowing what the homeworker needs. Other issues addressed are finding the right balance between the office, home and client sites, dealing with the creation of workable home office environment, and technological and legal issues.

1

Introduction

Estimates vary, as do definitions, but today there are reckoned to be over 2 million people in the UK who are either full- or part-time home workers. This may not be the much-heralded teleworking revolution forecast from the late 1970s onwards but it is a very significant minority. As such it is one that needs to be managed and supported effectively if the benefits of remote working are to be realized.

This book is aimed at all those who manage remote workers, those who are implementing remote working and, finally, remote workers themselves. The emphasis is on remote workers who are employees, but the areas relating to the skills needed to manage or work from home apply equally well to the self-employed and freelance. The goal is to enable remote workers and their managers to work effectively together to realize the benefits of home working.

The organizations targeted here will range from small to large and from those that may have a handful of remote workers through to those that will have thousands. Similarly, these organizations will vary from those that are almost completely office-based through to those that are virtual companies with minimal physical presence in the form of office space. Whilst dealing with these extremes it is the authors’ expectation that most remote working schemes will apply to a significant minority of the workforce in a medium- to large-sized organization.

Why is Remote Working Beneficial?

The potential benefits for both the remote worker and the sponsoring organization stem from flexibility and cost-effectiveness. Examples include:

■  fitting in family commitments with work

■  elimination of wasted commuting time

■  reduction in expensive office space

■  improved work/life balance

■  flexible working time

■  improved geographical coverage.

Realizing these benefits cannot be taken for granted; the sponsoring organization will have to provide both the operational and organizational support needed to make them deliverable. In addition, both office- and home-based staff will need to have the right skill set in addition to the specialist skills needed to do their job. In other words, it is unreasonable to take a person out of their office desk and drop them into a cupboard under the stairs with a computer and a mobile phone and expect things to carry on as before. It may work, but it will be surprising if it does. For remote working to pay off there needs to be an investment in training and infrastructure to support it.

The case example below is from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) website (© Crown Copyright) and shows that remote working can deliver real benefits to both employer and employee.

The Co-operative Bank in Manchester employs teleworkers in its Managed Accounts team. By working from home, teleworkers save on office clothes, travelling time and costs. The Bank benefits from staff retention and increased productivity.

Kirsty Milne has worked for the Co-operative Bank in Manchester for some fifteen years. She lives 35 miles from the Bank’s offices in Manchester and used to spend three hours a day travelling to and from work. But since 1995 she’s been teleworking. It’s completely changed her life and she loves it.

Are you suited to working from home?

‘I applied to do telework and was given a psychometric test and interviewed to see if I’d be suited to working at home. I work a 35-hour week and I’m the team coach for all the teleworkers. I help them develop skills so they can move through the Bank if they wish.’

Work-life balance

All teleworkers are still part of the Managed Accounts team and go into the Bank once a month:

‘We teleworkers are treated exactly as we would be if we were in the office. When I worked in the office, I didn’t have a social life in the week and often didn’t see my husband because he works in the evenings. The travel was particularly stressful.’

Home working saves money

‘Now I don’t feel so tired all the time. I can even walk the dogs before I start work each morning. By not travelling to Manchester I’ve saved money. I’ve sold my car, and saved on clothes for work and food. I know I’m much more productive because there are no interruptions.

‘I think the Bank gains too because it retains staff. It takes two years before people are fully experienced. Training them to that point is very expensive. If they leave they take the knowledge with them. Costs for setting up employees with home workstations has been significantly lower than buying additional office space.’

Selecting the right people

The Bank is very careful how it selects people, particularly because of the potential isolation. Staff need to be highly motivated. All equipment is supplied and the Bank checks the home for health and safety. All teleworkers need a minimum of two years’ experience to gain a wide knowledge of the Bank’s products.

Who is a Remote Worker?

For the purposes of this book, a home or remote worker is anyone who is based at home and uses it as their main place of work at least for two days a week. Examples of remote workers include: journalists; information technology specialists; trainers; sales staff; service engineers; installation engineers; maintenance staff; telesales; graphic artists and illustrators; designers; architects; district nurses and midwives; financial advisers.

This is quite a varied list, but the one thing they will all have in common is that they do not have an office- or factory-based location from which they operate every day. Although what they do will be very different, they will all encounter problems associated with being home-based, such as space for equipment, communications with the home office, need for management support and so on. The remote worker needs skills and operational support over and above that of the on-site employee.

Why are They Different?

The main difference is that they are remote from the parent organization. They have to operate largely unsupervised and have to manage their own time and schedules. Consequently they need skills over and above those needed to do the job in a more conventional working environment. Furthermore, those they work with, those they work for, and those that work for them will need an expanded set of skills if they too are to be effective.

A consequence of this is that remote working is not for everyone, and whilst there are relatively few who are totally unsuited to any amount of remote working, many will need help and careful management support if they are to be effective and happy. This book aims to provide both employers, employed, and the self-employed with a grounding in the organizational and personal skills and support structures needed to get the best from remote working. It also intends to help identify those who would not benefit from being based at home.

Key Points

Research has shown that one of the main problems with remote based workers is that they tend to work too much rather than too little, with consequent danger of burn out.

Scope and Depth

This book is aimed at helping any organization that is looking at implementing remote working for anything up to several hundred remote workers. It is assumed that these workers may be distributed geographically but will be within one country – all examples relating to rules and regulations have been taken from the United Kingdom. Some suggestions on additional points to be considered when operating internationally are given, but only a very limited amount of research has been put into this area.

In order to cover all the areas that need to be addressed, this book deals with a number of specialist subjects. Most of these merit whole books in their own right, and the bibliography lists titles that offer in-depth material. However, in order to provide the non-specialist with the bare bones of each subject a potted introduction to each area has been provided as well as the points that are specific to remote working. It is not the intention to try to give people instant expertise in these subjects, such as security and logistics, but to provide the knowledge needed to ask the right questions of the appropriate specialist.

What’s in the Book?

The book is split into broadly three parts.

The first two chapters form an introduction and overview and are for all readers. They introduce the structure of the book, the concepts behind it and what the reader will get out of it. The main concepts of the book will be presented and readers will be able to quickly find out where in the book to get help with their remote working needs.

The next group of chapters (Chapters 4–7) addresses operational and organizational considerations. This is mainly targeted at the human resources staff and managers who will have home-based staff in their organization and addresses the organizational and operational issues that will need to be covered in implementing home-based working. Chapters 4 and 5 define at some length the skills that managers will require if they are to make remote working successful for both the organization and the home-based staff, while Chapters 6 and 7 consider logistic and technological issues. These chapters will raise awareness of the responsibilities of employers for home-based staff and what they need to do to ensure the best chance of success. Although these responsibilities include complying with Health and Safety and Employment regulations, readers should note that this is not a legal textbook. Further reading is suggested for those with a need to know.

Chapters 8– deal with the remote worker’s environment, the skills they will need and the practical issues revolving around being home-based and working successfully. Both the HR/management community and the remote workers themselves will find useful information here. Management will need to ensure that the relevant training and support exists to allow both the worker and the organization to realize the benefits of home working.

For anything that involves significant organizational change, as the implementation of remote working does, assessing the risks associated with it and taking appropriate action to contain them is highly recommended. The final chapter is therefore concerned with risk management, and proves to be a good way of summarizing all the things that need to be put in place in order for a remote working system to be successful and effective.

In summary the book provides a guide for anyone implementing remote working, whether they are employer, employee, or self-employed. Used as a checklist for what needs to be put in place, it will significantly increase the chances that all those involved – both those whose role is inside the organization and those people who are to work remotely from it – will benefit from the experience.

2

Implementing Remote Working

This chapter is a master checklist for implementing a remote working system and introduces all the concepts that are covered in detail later in the book. The objective is to communicate the scope of remote working and all the factors that need to be considered, and dealt with, if it is to be successful. There are many examples of failed remote and home working programmes, whose demise was due to overlooking the true scope of the project. It is not just a matter of giving someone a notebook computer and telling them, ‘As of Monday, you work from home.’

Scope of Implementation

Figure 1 shows the high level activities that need to be considered when implementing remote working. This will be true if remote working is being considered for the first time or if roles/people are being added to an existing remote working system.

Figure 1

These activities form quite a list, and the monitoring and change element is there to make sure that it is understood that implementing remote working is an ongoing process, with associated overheads in terms of both costs and human resources. Although these are covered in greater depth in the rest of the book, a short brief of the scope of work to be expected is provided here.

Key Points

Do not underestimate the scope of any remote working implementation – even a single remote worker needs a sound infrastructure to support him or h...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Halftitle
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Implementing Remote Working
• 3. Who Should be a Remote Worker?
• 4. Skills for Managers: General Management Skills
• 5. Skills for Managers: Feedback, Appraisal, Control and Development
• 6. Logistics
• 7. Technology
• 8. Personal Skills for the Remote Worker
• 9. The Home Office Environment
• 10. The Remote Worker’s Children, Relatives and Pets
• 11. Risk and Remote Working
• Appendix A. Example Work Practices
• Appendix B. Plain English Remote Working Policy
• Appendix C. Site Survey Form
• Glossary
• Bibliography and Sources
• Index