This series of four articles describe some of the new developments in information technology that have the potential to enable individuals and work teams to use telecommuting to meet organizational and business goals more effectively and efficiently.
The series also discusses how telecommuting changes the boundaries that have defined many current management practices and identifies areas in which it appears. Managing out-of-bounds telecommuters requires input not only from managers and employees but also from information systems professionals.
What is TelecommutingA major trend to emerge from the revolution in the world of work is the phenomenal increase in the number of people who are telecommuting. Telecommuting means doing work at home or in a remote location using information technology (IT) as links to the central office or other place of employment. According to Jack Niles, who coined the term in 1973, telecommuting is “moving the work to workers instead of moving the workers to work”. The work-at-home movement of the 1980s has surged with the growth of the telecommunication industry to create the telecommuting movement of the 1990s and this century. Telecommuting may not be for everyone, but it is here to stay. Recent studies in the US, Europe, and Australia show that a significant number of people work at a place other than a conventional office and more will be doing so in the future. Indeed, more and more people are operating small businesses either full-time or part-time from their home. Projections are that by the year 2010, approximately 35 percent of the entire workforce will be telecommuting either full- or part-time.
What Are the Benefits?The research that has been conducted so far with telecommuting indicates that most employers start telecommuting programs to improve productivity and reduce overhead costs. Productivity studies consistently find that telecommuters outperform their peers at the traditional office by 10 to 30 percent of increased output. Employees, on the other hand, say they like the experience because it makes them feel that they are more in control of their lives, and that it improves their quality of life. Also the flexible hours allows them to better meet the demands of their personal lives.
Some managers, however, are resistant to telecommuting because they are no longer able to directly monitor employees, while others feel an extra burden trying to assure motivation and accountability when employees are out of sight. Employees, on the other hand, fear being isolated and overlooked for career advancement. Another drawback facing employees is not having access to the usual support service typically found in the office.
ConclusionThus having described the concept of telecommuting, this article begs a number of questions such as how can the goals and fears of both employers and employees be reconciled? Moreover, how can we effectively manage telecommuters so that organization work teams all operate seamlessly and effectively in the accomplishment of organizational goals?
The answers to these questions are discussed in other articles in this series:Information Technology and Telecommuting
Managing Out of Bounds Telecommuting
Value and Telecommuting.
This article has been extracted and modified from Chrispin, B.R. & Fisher, D.M. (1997). Managing telecommuters: An out-of-bounds experience. "Proceedings of the 26th Annual Meeting of the Western Decision Sciences Institute, Hawaii, USA. March 25-29, 1997."