Now We’re cooking with gas…!!!

Ars preview of mobile NetNewsWire: “

Ars at WWDC: ‘After yesterday’s exhibition of iPhone third-party applications developed primarily by companies who had never programmed for the Mac before, we here at Ars were champing at the bit to get a peek at a few applications written by grizzled Mac veterans and see how they stacked up.’

Grizzled?

”

(Via ranchero.com.)

One of the things that is very important to the future of productivity and economic stability in the US is telecommuting. There are some things that work, and there are some things that don’t, However, what has to change is the mind set of Management. A lot of managers think “Telecommuting” or “Working From Home” is more Home than work. From someone who works out of their home daily, this couldn’t be further from the truth. With $5.00 a gallon gasoline approaching on the horizon, people need to find other options as we don’t have decent public transportation here in the US. Telecommuting is going to have to fit the bill.

Telecommuting is a bad word. It is the right word in that is accurately describes the situation. However, it has a stigma that is difficult to overcome. Obviously, telecommuting doesn’t work for everyone. It is a viable solution for a lot of people. Just like working on a car, telecommuting requires the right tools.

Telecommuting is about many things, the least of which is getting out of work. The major point to be made about Telecommuting is that it’s important that all parties involved have an understanding of the expectations and tools available to them to telecommute. Both sides need to understand time for a Telecommuter is different and is a bit more fluid. For example, when someone say’s “end of the day” what does that mean for you? Here it means before going to bed, which is about 2:00 AM most nights. First thing in the morning is usually about 8:00 or 9:00AM, depending on when the first cup of coffee is finished.

With 18 hours in a typical workday, things get moved around quite a bit. The children are here and require attention. The children go to bed before 2:00 AM, usually. There are times when items don’t get worked on till way after 5 or 6 o’clock. Managers need to understand that there are different time pressures on a telecommuting employee than on a “regular” employee. One of the things that Managers need to do is set deadlines. Solid deadlines are important. “End of the day”, “before lunch”, “First thing in the morning”, are all to non-specific if an task needs to be performed at or before a specific time. If a managers comes into the office at 8:00AM and they want it waiting for them, then they need to be specific. On the other hand, having someone telecommuting doesn’t give management the excuse to abuse that person’s time. Having a manager assign a 3 hour task at 4:30PM and expecting it to be finished by 8:00 in the morning is unreasonable. If you wouldn’t demand that from a “regular” employee, don’t do it to a “telecommuter.” Again, not saying there aren’t times when this is called for, just don’t abuse it. Remember, lack of planning on your part, does not constitute an emergency on mine.

The technology is available for people to be able to work from home on a regular basis. Broadband, VOIP, Video Conferencing, VPN, scanners, all contribute to being able to work from the house. There are 3 printers, 2 scanners, wireless networking, and a second monitor hooked up to my MacBook Pro. This makes it easy to work, collaborate and interact with others. As a matter of fact, with a laptop, it’s easy to work from home or Kansas or Starbucks, it makes little difference. Location is unimportant.

Aside from a home/apartment and food, transportation and day care are the items which can take a large chunk from the family budget. These are bills that don’t have to be paid in this house. We have a relationship with a day care up the road about a mile for when both parents have to be out and about on a specific day and taking the children isn’t an option. However, as they say, a penny saved, is a penny earned. What would be ideal would be to have a block full of people who worked from home and when running out to a client was necessary, I could drop off the children at a neighbors house for the hour or so it usually takes to handle the issue or vice versa.

A perfect example of this is how this day progressed. My son just wanted a PB&J sandwich and the grandmother just picked up the daughter. These are not things that do not take place when you work in the office. I mowed the yard, took a shower, visited some clients, etc. I started this post about 8:00 in the morning. It’s now about 4:00PM. I haven’t worked on this all day. I have seen clients, fixed some computer issues, went to the store, etc. All of this is part of my daily “work.” You just have to be task centered and not time centered. But I’m going to write about that later this week.

The rest of this week, I’m going to work on some posts about specifics that I use and how I use them and my workflow. Being an example of how telecommuting can work I’m in a unique position to help others and show them how to make it a viable option. So stay tuned, and as always, let me know what you think and if you have other ideas comment so that others can share your knowledge.