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Here's an interesting article on the perception of teleworkers as not being as strong of a worker as someone who shows up every day: http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/jobseeker/tools/ept/careerArticlesPost.html?post=42

What bothers me is if I show up to an office and run around for 8 hours with a cell phone pressed to my ear, I'll get promoted, even if I'm not actually accomplishing something. Even though we telecommuters are getting more done, and executives will admit to it, because we don't show up and have face-time, we're not considered as serious.

So what can we do to change the perception? One step at a time. We increase the numbers of telecommuters, and we do focused work so no one can ever complain or point fingers towards us as being anything less then stellar. We may be working in our jammies with kids running around, but we must never let that show up in how we present ourselves.

And we learn quickly from our mistakes when it does happen.

This is an interesting on article on some basics to get started.
Web Worker Daily Blog on Going Commando

What do I like: Most everything! She talks about the basics. I cannot agree enough with the need for a wireless headpiece to walk around. It has saved my keister so many times to be able to put the phone on mute while I answer the door and sign for a package while in a virtual meeting.

Ms. Sohn is correct to have an online social network. It can get very lonely at first, and you may find yourself wandering from room to room. I would play music loudly until I built up my network full of current and former coworkers and clients. By the same token, try to focus on a task until you're done, otherwise, you might be continually checking email. (yeah, did that too)

What I disagree with: Two things.

Ms. Sohn suggests using an internet phone like Skype or Vonage and no one uses plain old telephone anymore. Well, that works great while the power is on. I have used a cell phone for my business line for 7 years, I will confess up. I would not trust the internet to handle regular phone service because I have lost power at most inconvenient times. Or worse, the internet service goes down! For this, I'd recommend having a plain old telephone and a plain old modem to dial up and continue working. Obviously, you can't recieve or call out on a VOIP over modem.

Secondly, the professional support. Yes, you'll need to be a solid project manager to know when you need to park it in front of your computer to finish the work. One of my driving reasons why I telework is so I can be flexible and be a part of my daughter's life. And I was able to get out to lunch with my mother more when she was dying of esophogeal cancer. I think the key here is "balance." You can't be so flexible that the work doesn't get done (I did have that problem too); however, don't be so rigid that you might as well be punching a clock in a cubicle farm.

I've been cleaning out my office now that it's the end of the year. I found a cache of articles from 2001 - 2003 about how the world will be taken over by outsourcing. I'd always felt that telecommuters could effectively compete against outsourcing. We may charge more, but we're local. If, heaven forbid, there were a need for lawsuits, it's the local court system (hey, I'm sensitive to the fact that my readers could be in other countries attempting to get work within their countries...), the montery system is the same, and chances are, the time zone is going to be close enough for a conference call.

The bottom line is to remember what you're selling: a solution that will address the client's problems. No matter where you are, you're there to help them. And that means, no matter what, you're going to do your best to solve it. It does help if you're in a closer proximity, but it's not the end all. I fully believe that people half way across the world can solve the client's problems if they're willing to make the effort to do what needs to be done to communicate.

And so we're slowly taking over the world! Finally the US Government is setting up an almost reasonable program. See the article in the Washington Post here.

What I find really interesting is that they currently let lawyers work out of their homes so long as they're close by. This is the first time the government is going to let people be completely remote and live wherever they like. I'm sure that the requirement of being onsite at your own expense one day a week will get phased out when they see how successful the program is.

Happy October. Did you see the edition of Parade Magazine two weeks ago? I was trying to get the link but unfortunately, they're just an online advert for their magazine and not at all useful for seeing the articles. Oh well. It was a Back to the Land article that talked about a couple where the wife was able to keep her high tech job and work remotely. I thought "hooray."

Isn't this what we were promised? That technology would allow us to work anywhere? It's being held back by old management techniques. We need to work at the root instead of at the leaves to change the culture. We need to do more management by objective and have win-win agreements for success (thank you, Dr. Covey, for putting this so clearly in your
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People)

I remember in 2001 talking with a high tech internet company about contracting for them, and I said I am only available remotely. They said that they don't have any remote workers. I pointed out that they'd just offshored 1200 jobs to India, and they said that it was different. Obviously, I didn't get their work. Somehow it was better to ship it completely offshore rather then to hire someone locally. And I'm not going to get into the debate about offshoring. What I do wish to make clear is that there is no difference where it is remotely done and companies need to be more accepting. It will increase worker satisfaction, reduce dependence upon foreign oil, and dramatically reduce overhead costs.