Telecommuting and HR

I read an article in Fast Company entitled Robots Are Changing the Future of Telecommuting written by Ariel Schwartz in which she describes her experience with using a robot as her presence in the office. The robot is, as she describes it, "a hybrid of WALL-E and a Segway". Although she was in her home office, the robot represented her physical presence in the corporate office in New York. She sat in on meetings, she made her way through the hallways, she stood beside peoples desks and she made her way around the office remotely. To her the advantages were that when she did visit the office in person she knew the layout.

Some people may think there is not enough advantage to the technology to offset the cost of the technology. But it did make me think about how telecommuting has advance and also made me think about the issues that the Human Resources department might have with advancing telecommuting. It is no secret that working out of the office, either on the road or working out of a home office (or the couch as it may be), has changed significantly. Initially it was keeping in touch via the telephone, then connecting through a modem to an office main frame, then through an Internet connection. Today with smart phones funtioning as computers and wi-fi being ubiquitous (connect while you are at McDonalds, Starbucks or even Waffle House) it is not hard to be continually connected.

There are many studies that show that telecommuting can be very advantageous to both the company and the employee. These advantages include:

• For the Employer:
• Higher productivity due to fewer interruptions
• Happier employees
• Reduced need for actual square footage
• Increased applicant pool since you don't need to be in the same city
• Greater capability to get the needed talent
• Reduced relocation costs
• For the Employee:
• Ability to concentrate
• No, or reduced time, in traffic
• Less wear and tear on a car, saving money
• Less money spent on gas
• Less money spent on lunches
• More time to spend with family, or exercising or whatever.

There are however disadvantages. Here is what I see some of those being.

• For the employer:
• Need to have the appropriate technology in place to handle telecommuters
• Need to change methods of management. Productivity no longer equals physical presence
• Managers have to have ways of actively connecting with employees
• Potential liability for Workers Comp issues due to egronomically improper work postures
• Necessity of evaluating employees for ability to work at home (not everyone is well suited)
• Tracking time worked, which is important if the telecommuter is non-exempt
• Deciding which jobs are telecommuting appropriate
• Dealing with morale issues of those employees who are not telecommuting eligible
• For the employee:
• Lack of connectivity or social interaction with fellow workers
• Lack of connectivity (loyalty or identification) to the company
• Potential lack of direction
• Feeling of "out of sight, out of mind" may lead to being let go in down times
• Potentially being overworked, either voluntarily or involuntarily. Because  you can always connect you find yourself working more.

I am sure there are more issues that I have missed. Please let me know. The HR department gets thrown into the mix by having its own set of problems associated with telecommuting. These include:

• Staying connected to employees. We often hear of issues by being out of our offices and walking around. So how do you "walk around" with telecommuters?
• Staying connected with managers and supervisors.
• Dealing with differing capabilities of employees to deal with technology
• Being aware of "plaintiff" issues that may arise with improper pay, harassment by computer or email, claims of workers comp injuries, or unionization attempts.
• Balancing what kind of presence and how much presence is important in a workplace that is split between telecommuters and non-telecommuters.

I know that there are many of you out there that have already successfully dealt with some of these issues. Please share with us by leaving a comment so that others may learn. Telecommuting is here to stay. Technology advances is going to make it easier to do. But that does not mean it is going to make the "people" issues of management, social interaction and abuse go away.

Telecommuting: Diminishing Due to Job Cuts?

I heard a report on the radio the other day that many people who work from home as telecommuters are giving up the opportunity to do so in order to protect their jobs. The people interviewed thought that without the office "visability" they would be considered expendable. One quote was that "Having the jacket on the back of the chair 14 hours a day was the best way to show that you were irreplaceable." A article from over a year ago, in the Wall Street Journal reported similar feelings. In Some Companies Rethink The Telecommuting Trend writer Sue Shellenbarger reports that many companies, considered leaders in the use of telecommuters, are calling those telecommuters back to the office. In many cases cutting telecommuting to one day per week. And this was before the recession hit.

In both cases, the employee's and the employer's, I think cutting back on telecommuting is a mistake. Study after study has found that telecommuters are more productive than if they had stayed in the office. Here is a good report, put together by a student at Kennesaw State University, that covers the upsides and downsides of telecommuting. Telecommuting: Does It Work? Many workers are concerned about visability. Well your best visability is your effective and productive work. Shellenbarger, from the WSJ article referenced above, offers these tips:

• Perform well. In explaining the callbacks at Hewlett-Packard, Chief Information Officer Randy Mott said last year that telecommuting "had gotten applied more broadly than really made sense," and would be limited to "people who are proficient and who've shown they can perform over time." Make sure measurable objectives are set for your job, then meet them.
  
• Increase your visibility. One behavior sure to irk managers is to use work-at-home freedom to move to a location so remote, such as Hawaii, that travel costs soar. Although Intel disputes the assertion, people familiar with the callbacks there cite such abuses as a factor. Wherever you're located, find ways to remain visible.
  
• Make an effort to collaborate. Elliott Masie, head of the Masie Center, a Saratoga Springs, N.Y., research organization, says many younger managers are comfortable collaborating online. But as pressures mount, older managers may revert to the notion that to build teamwork, "it's important for everybody to sit around and sing 'Kumbaya' together," he says. It may be wise to join that chorus.

There have been studies that there are some problems with telecommuting. The suprising issue is not with the telecommuters, rather it is with those left in the office. New study says telecommuting can hurt office morale writer Richard A. D'Errico reports that a study "...found that the greater the number of telecommuters at an organization, the less satisfied the office workers were with their jobs."

So the HR challenge is making sure that the entire process gets managed appropriately. The study suggests that "...managers work to ensure that there's more face-to-face contact among telecommuters and office workers, and provide office workers with more autonomy to do their jobs. "

What have been your experiences?

• Do you fear for your telecommuting job?


• Have you seen cutbacks in the numbers of telecommuters?


• Do non-telecommuters have morale problems in your workplace?


• What have you done to make yourself more "valuable"?

Productivity Through Technology: A FLSA Trainwreck

As the gas crunch continues to escalate in the U.S. many companies are trying come up with solutions that help employees deal with the costs. One of these solutions is telecommuting, allowing workers to spend time at home and less time on the road. It is nothing new. This interest in telecommuting has been around for awhile as a way to reduce traffic, part of a corporate social responsibility initiative or as part of a progressive employee relations policy. The gas crunch has just sparked more interest. Plus study after study has shown that most workers are more productive as telecommuters.

So companies issue laptops, Blackberrys or Treos or IPhones, and other mobile devices to make their telecommuting (and traveling) employees productive. And with this come a host of issues that make this move more problematic than most companies would like it to be. These issues include:

• Security, for both the devices and the information contained on them.
• Personal use of the devices and privacy expectations
• Use of these devices by non-exempt employees and payment of overtime.

As we have seen in several news stories about stolen government laptops this is certainly an issue. So you need to have some policy and procedure statement that covers leaving these devices laying about for someone else to pick up. This should probably contain some statement about use in WIFI hotspots and use of a firewall. Get your techies to help on that.

If you issue business devices for business use do you allow personal use of those devices as well? Ideally not, that would make it cleaner to deal with. But that is not practical in the real world. You cannot expect your traveling employees to carry two computers so that they will be able to do personal things at night. If you have employees who are gone all week long they need to communicate with family and the bank and their doctors, etc. But you need to have a policy that does let them know that it is a company owned machine and as a result they should have no expectation of privacy and that all information on the machine is subject to review by the company if it is deemed necessary. This expectation of privacy also needs to apply to company owned phones and texting devices. All of that information is recoverable and employees need to be aware of that fact.

The train wreck I alluded to in the title is with the Fair Labor Standards Act. The FLSA requires that all non-exempt employees (both hourly and salaried non-exempt employees) be paid for time worked more than 40 hours in a week (in some state and local jurisdictions for more than 8 hours in a day). This means if you have a non-exempt employee with a company issued laptop/Blackberry/phone and they are checking email, working on projects, etc. you have to track all their time and then compensate them for the overtime. This can get very complicated, particularly if those devises are used for personal things.

We have learned that it is human nature that when an email pops up it gets read, especially on a Blackberry (that is why they are referred to as a "Crackberry.") Few of us ignore that late night email or that after-hours call. The law does allow some "de minimus" use that take up insignificant time. However, if that time starts adding up it then becomes compensible. So you need to set up a policy on the use of those devices and recording that time. If it is going to put someone into an overtime situation then you need to have some approval process in place to make sure OT does not run rampent. It is expensive.

This stuff can get so complicated sometimes that it discourages employers from issuing those devices to non-exempt employees. This can create a "digital divide" in our employee groups. So be careful of your reaction to this. The law can be a roadblock to a technologically productive workforce if you let it be. Perhaps it is time for an other overall of the FLSA. But don't hold your breath. With the influence of unions on the government it is not going to happen.

Tips for Remote Teams

I happen to be working from home today and as I was reviewing some older email and scanning for newsletter ideas I came across a BNET set of articles on Managing Remote Teams. The first of these tip articles was directed to the managers and was entitled "How to Manage Employees in Remote Locations". (Click the title to read the article.) One of the things that struck me in the article was related to something I wrote about a few blogs ago and that is PASSION. You, as the manager, have to have a passion for the work and you also have to select workers who are suited to the task and have that passion as well.

The second article, "Ten Tools for Remote Teams" talks about all the various connection and productivity mechanisms you can use to make teams more effective. Many of these I was familiar with, however, I was not familiar with the wiki or ftp site. Interesting information. Does anyone have an experience with this tool? If so leave a comment and let me know.

Remote working, telecommuting, working offsite or however you may refer to it is a hot topic for HR today. Here in Atlanta, Georgia, where we have horrendous traffic we are encouraged by the Governor to institute as much telecommuting as possible. Being aware of these tips and tools will help you and managers be more effective in setting up and running remote work and managing remote workers.

Comment your success or lack of success in this arena so others can learn.