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Telecommuting, '''e-commuting''', '''e-work''', '''telework''', '''working at home (WAH)''', or '''working from home (WFH)''' is a style which is based on results and not on close scrutiny of individual employees. This is referred to as Management By Objectives as opposed to Management By Observation . The terms ''telecommuting'' and ''telework'' were coined by American Jack Nilles in 1973. JALA biography of Jack Nilles Last modified: January 5, 2006 Accessed: March 11, 2007 Long distance telework is facilitated by such tools as Virtual Private Networks , Videoconferencing , and Voice Over IP . It can be efficient and useful for companies as it allows staff and workers to communicate over a large distance, saving significant amounts of travel time and cost. As Broadband Internet connections become more commonplace, more and more workers have enough bandwidth at home to use these tools to link their home office to their corporate Intranet and internal phone networks. TECHNOLOGY The roots of telecommuting lay early 1970s technology, linking satellite offices to downtown mainframes by Dumb Terminals using telephone lines as a Network Bridge . The massive ongoing decrease in cost and increase in performance and usability of personal computers forged the way to decentralize even further, moving the office to the home. By the early 1980s, these branch offices and home workers were able to connect to the company mainframe using personal computers and Terminal Emulation . The adoption of Local Area Network s promoted sharing of resources, and Client Server computing allowed for even greater decentralization. Today, Telecommuter s can carry Laptop PCs around which they can use both at the office and at home (and almost anywhere else). Telecommuters are linked to their home office by using Groupware , virtual private networks, and similar technologies to collaborate and interact with team members. As the price of VPN-capable Routers , high-speed Internet connections to the home, and VOIP technology has plummeted in recent years, the cost to connect a telecommuter to their employer's intranet and telecommunications system has become negligible when compared with the Operating Cost s of conventional offices. BENEFITS Telecommuting, options increase the employability of marginalized groups, such as mothers and fathers with small children, the handicapped and people living in remote areas. It can also reduce an individual's Carbon Footprint , through minimizing daily Commuting . The set up also offers possibilities for increased service and internationalisation, since telecommuters in different time zones can ensure that a company is virtually open for business around the clock. Telework has also enabled Offshore Outsourcing . Telecommuting provides employee flexibility, eases the working parent's burden, increases employee productivity, and reduces absenteeism. Virtual offices allow employers to keep valuable employees, allow employers to hire employees otherwise not available, and have facilitated productive re-engineering of order-management and customer service processes. Environmental benefits Telecommuting gained more ground in the United States in 1996 after "the agencies. The bill threatened to withhold money from agencies that failed to provide telecommuting options to all eligible employees. Telecommuting is seen as a solution to Traffic Congestion caused by single-car commuting, and the resulting urban Air Pollution and Petroleum use. Initial investments in the network infrastructure and hardware are balanced by an increased productivity and overall greater well-being of telecommuting staff (more quality family time, less travel-related stress), which makes the arrangement attractive to companies, especially those who face large operating costs related to the need for a central office. Even so, telecommuting has not been as widely adopted as expected. "The number of U.S. telecommuters falls somewhere between 9 million and 24 million—far short of the 55 million telecommuters that some forecasters predicted would be in place in the early 2000s. Although the majority of Fortune 1,000 firms offer telecommuting, more than half say that only between 1 percent and 5 percent of employees participate in such programs".Wells, S. (2001, October). "Making telecommuting work" version . ''HR Magazine''. CURRENT TRENDS Distributed work Telecommuters need not necessarily work from the home. A more recent extension of telecommuting is distributed work. Distributed work entails the conduct of organizational tasks in places that extends beyond the confines of traditional Office s. It can refer to organizational arrangements that permit or require workers to perform work more effectively at any appropriate location, such as their homes and Customers' sites - through the application of information and communication technology. An example is Financial Planner s who meet clients during lunchtime with access to various financial planning tools and offerings on their mobile computers, or Publishing executives who recommend and place orders for the latest book offerings to libraries and university professors, among others. Another example is the telework centers around Washington, D.C. in Maryland (6), Virginia (8), and D.C. and West Virginia (one each), which generally are relatively close to a majority of people who might otherwise drive or take Public Transit , and also feature the full complement of office equipment and a high-speed Internet connection for maximum Productivity , and perhaps may feature support staff such as receptionists.Commuter Connections, Telework Centers, http://www.mwcog.org/commuter/Bdy-TDMTele.html These work arrangements are likely to become more popular with current trends towards greater Customization of services and virtual organizing. Distributed work offers great potential for firms to reduce costs, enhance competitive advantage and agility, access a greater variety of scarce talents, and improve employee flexibility, effectiveness and productivity.Venkatesh, A. and Vitalari, N. P., "An Emerging Distributed Work Arrangement: An Investigation of Computer-Based Supplemental Work at Home", ''Management Science'', 1992, 38(12), pp. 1687-1706.Korte, W. B., "Telework – Potentials, Inceptions, Operations and Likely Future Situations," in W. B. Korte, S. Robinson, and W. J. Steinle (Eds.), ''Telework: Present Situations and Future Development of A New Form of Work Organization'', Elsevier Science Publishers, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1988.Sieber, P. "Virtuality as a Strategic Approach for Small and Medium Sized IT Companies to Stay Competitive in a Global Market," in J.I. DeGross, S. Jarvenpaa, and A. Srinivasan (Eds.), ''Proceedings of the Seventeenth International Conference on Information Systems'', Cleveland, OH, 1996, pp. 468.Taylor, W. C., "At VeriFone, It's a Dog's Life (And they Love it)," Fast Company, 1995, 1 (Premiere Issue), pp. 115-121. http://www.fastcompany.com/online/01/vfone.html It has gained in popularity in the West, particularly in Europe. While increasing in importance, distributed work has not yet gained widespread acceptance in Asia.Sia, C. L., Teo, H. H., Tan, B. C. Y., Wei, K. K., "Effects of Environmental Uncertainty on Organizational Intention to Adopt Distributed Work Arrangements," ''IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management'', 2004, 51(3), pp. 253-267 Virtual offices Virtual offices please management because they reduce overheads, reduce office space needs, increase productivity, and reduce staff turnover. However, managers (whose roles are varied and not well defined) in telecommuting roles typically receive fewer promotions due to the lack of direct contact they need. From that aspect, telecommuting seems to work best for Professional s such as Engineer s. Microjobs Telecommuters who begin working from home part-time for one company may acquire self-employed status through agreement or necessity. From that position an employee may seek more work from other sources. Ultimately, the size of the job unit may reduce, so that many more people are working for small periods of time for multiple clients. These short-time-period jobs have been named Microjob s.1 POTENTIAL DRAWBACKS
POPULAR TELECOMMUTING JOBS The proliferation of many smaller Internet companies has resulted in an increase of Data Entry related telecommuting jobs. The tight budgets of many of these companies make it economically impossible to carry full time staff. Contracting with home based freelancers is a cost effective way of meeting the demands of daily data entry tasks. These tasks may include the preparation of correspondence, reports, spreadsheets, lists, records and databases.2 Some of the most popular telecommuting data entry jobs:34
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