Wednesday, September 30, 2009

you can really clean up with remote work

Yesterday I was running around getting some errands done and as I drove past my dry cleaner I remembered that I had dropped clothes off there nearly two weeks ago. I’ll admit that I can be a bit absent minded from time to time, but my wardrobe is not very extensive, so one would think that I would notice a good portion of my clothes missing from my closet. Had I not driven past the dry cleaner it could have been another two weeks before I realized that I still needed to pick that order up. The point is, when I used to work in an office everyday, I couldn’t have made it a week without realizing that I needed to go pick up my clothes because I was wearing them every day – every week. As I placed the freshly cleaned and pressed threads into my car I started to think about how much money I was saving by working from home and not having to wear collared shirts and slacks every day. At $20 – $30 per week for dry cleaning I was spending close to $100 per month just on washing my clothes and I compared that to what I am spending now, which is closer to $20 per month. I thought to myself "I just got a raise"… I knew that I would be saving money by working from home and the concept is really not new to anyone, but this spurred a question for me about how much money I was really saving. So naturally, being the nerd that I am, I got go home and broke into a fresh spreadsheet. Anyone who knows me well enough would not be surprised by this, as excel has not just been a tool for me, but a way of life through out my career… Anyway, back to my point…. I started to tally up all of the costs that I could see a real difference in once I started to work from home and the savings were pretty great! Take a mental inventory of how much money going to work costs you every day when you have to commute to work. With gas prices where they are today, you can really see it pay dividends – I estimated about $150 in savings per month. Things like tolls, eating at restaurants for lunch, and afternoon trips to Starbucks for $3.00 shot of caffeine all seem like minimal expenses by themselves, but when summed up for monthly totals they really started to gain weight. Add in things like wear and tear on my vehicle which leads to reduced maintenance, or even reductions on car insurance by reducing my daily driving distance by 20 miles, and the savings can really be quite staggering. It can be hundreds to thousands of dollars annually depending on how frequently you work from home. That really is like getting a raise. 

Now, me being me, I couldn’t just leave this thought alone and leave it at fiscal gains. I naturally started to think about all of the other areas of my life that have benefited from this change in behavior. My candy and sweets intake has been curbed substantially by not picking up 15 pieces of candy on a daily basis as I pass by the never ending supplies that are left out to lure in guests at a cubicle. Not to mention that I eat healthier by eating lunch at home every day. I get about 45 minutes to an hour back in my day by not sitting in gridlock traffic. I get more work done in the day by reducing the daily distractions that are present in any office. The list goes on… 

So, what have I lost in all of this give & take? So far it seems like I have only been on the receiving side of the equation. I mean, you have to lose something to gain something, right? Well, there is the social aspect of not being in the office, but that is not really an issue anymore with things like social networking sites, and communication technologies such as chat and text messaging. Perhaps the human connection has been reduced a bit, but work was never about that to me anyway – that is why people have social lives away from work. What about the professional exposure that is lost by not being in the office? Well, this one is tricky because it is dependent upon both the employee and the employer. I don’t make it a common practice to quote politicians, but I recently came across a statement by Tom Reynolds who was quoted as saying "If you’re not willing to let your employees telecommute, you haven’t done your job as a manager because you can’t adequately judge your employees’ performance: you’ve lost the focus of the performance". This statement hits at the underlying core concept behind driving employee development and exposure in a remote environment – which is that not only do you have to let your actions and results speak for themselves, but you also have to work for an organization that not only understands and supports this management philosophy, but also understands how to manage effectively in this manner. This is not an easy concept to inject into business that has a mixture of managers that do this really well and those that don’t know how to be effective in this model. The mission of virtualwirks is to help organizations bridge the gap in this area. We apply our experience in this arena to help companies with the philosophy, concepts, tools, and methods to do this effectively. The concept of a heavily populated remote workforce is not just a fad of the times, but a shift in the way that the world works, and businesses are recognizing the benefits that can be achieved by the company, the employees, and society… Achieving this, however, is not easy, but we can help… And we can assure you that you won’t feel like you have just been taken to the cleaners.

–Tadd

1. Jacklynn says:

   December 4, 2011 at 2:29 am

   You’re the one with the banris here. I’m watching for your posts.