Working Life > Modes of Working > Teleworking

Teleworking: When Your Home Becomes Your Office

Definition, Explanation

Telework describes various types of work whereby en employee has a permanent position within a company but only does part of his work on the company's premises. The employee communicates with his/her employer and the team via communication equipment like the telephone, computer with data transfer and fax. This way of working is especially suitable for jobs where relatively independent and autonomous office work is to be carried out.

The classic variation is telework at home whereby the sole place of work is at home. This possibility is favoured by fathers and mothers who want to work and at the same time take care of their children.

A dominating variation of telework is alternating telework, whereby the place of work comprises both at home and in the company. Frequently, several employees share the workplace in the company.

In the case of employees whose job involves working at different places, like at home, in the company, at the customer's and in a hotel, thus salespersons and project employees, one speaks of mobile telework.

A further variation is neighbourhood or satellite offices. In this case, employees of various companies chare offices and infrastructure.

Besides employees who work in their home office, many self-employed or freelancers count among teleworkers. They join forces with virtual companies for the duration or period of a project.

The teleworker benefits from little to no travelling, free organisation of working time, greater freedom in choosing where to live and a better combination of family and job. Women with children particularly like these advantages, also as a secondary occupation or in part-time. On the other hand, a greater portion of self-discipline, motivation and good time management are required. The lack of communication with colleagues can sometimes be problematic, which is perceived as isolation and possibly as a career detriment because the direct comparison to colleagues, as well as the separation of professional and private life is missing.

On the part of the employer and the management, telework demands a large amount of trust in the teleworker and concrete target agreements. Frequently, a larger amount of coordination is necessary and frictional losses and conflicts arise due to the communication by telephone and computer.

Tips, Checklist

• Clarify with your employer, who sets up the workplace at home and who pays for the costs
• Consider the aspects of job security and employment protection. Data protection must be ensured through secure data transmission, security software, regular backups and the teleworker's corresponding sensitiveness. As part of this, is that children should not be allowed to play on telework PCs
• Clarify the general conditions with your family in advance – no disturbing, the office is not a place for children to play – and define rules of behaviour
• Consider data protection related aspects. It is not permitted to process personal data in a home office, for example
• Make sure you do not neglect communicating with colleagues, superiors, teleworkers and team colleagues
• Clarify insurance-related aspects like liability issues in the case of loss of data on the home office PC and statutory regulations with your employer
• Some offers of telework must be treated with caution with regard to exploitation

Articles

• Working from home, a true story; jobolgy, July 2009
• Staying Productiv When You're Working From Home; Dumb Little Man, June 30, 2009

Last update: 02/11/2010