Post written by Marlon Ribunal.
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The trend that has tremendously grown in the last couple of years in the workforce is Telecommuting or, for many, Working From Home (WFH). More and more employees are going down to this path. For sure there are particular standards to meet first before an employee can be granted the privilege of WFH. The biggest factor that determines an employee’s capacity to get things done while WFH is his or herproductivity rate. Obviously, if he or she is not producing outcomes chances are WFH is not good for him or her and for the company.
In this post, we will survey the interwebs for technique or tips and tricks for an effective telecommuting.
On Working Remotely - Jeff Atwood ( Twitter | Blog ), author of Coding Horror, brings us back to when he started to telecommute. The key in the success of his WFH was finding a partner that shares his passion for what he does. If you are a lone wolf or the only employee in your company, as in the case of one who is self-employed, it really helps to find someone in your network that also loves what you are doing. This kind of relationships opens up opportunities for not only more business but also for learning. The concept of partnering without actually having to tie in business interest is an effective way to bring back the sense of team which is virtually taken away from your being WFH.
How To Telecommute: Getting Things Done – This is the last of an excellent series (Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3) on telecommuting. Brent Ozar ( Twitter | Blog ), author of Brent Ozar Blog, tells us how to simply “get things done” when they need to get done. Efficiency requires more than watching the clock. The secret in a WFH success is “Doing the right thing at the right time”. This might be a cliche but this is what it takes to effectively deliver results and outcomes to the boss. It is easy to be overwhelmed when WFH. Other “home stuff” can easily get in the way of your work. Learning to draw the demarcation between the essential and non-essential is a good quality to have.
Successful Communication As A Remote Worker - Scott Hanselman ( Twitter | Blog ), author ofHanselman Blog, gives us the “30 Tips For A Successful Communication As A Remote Worker”. Communication is the lifeblood of your WFH privilege. It may be the single most important factor in the whole picture. Lack of communication is oftentimes the cause of many wasted time and wasted production hours. Scott’s Tips give us some tips on how to manage remote meeting schedule. It also tells us what tools do we need to effectively communicate while physically absent from the office.
To sum this up, I hope the above pointers will have a great impact on your WFH strategy. I also hope that I gave you something useful that you can readily apply in your work or business.
If you have any other links or tips on WFH or remote working please share them with us. People are seeking for such ideas. Are you working remotely? How are you keeping a productive environment? What are your recommended tips and tricks? Share now!
Awesome post Marlon! Great links to some truly great resources thanks for putting this together.
We have to agree that in order to be effective from working from home the person in question needs have a good productivity rate in order for it to be worthwhile long term.
We believe you can be really productive working from home, it is all about managing your distractions correctly. We think that more and more people will be working from home in the future, especially as it is helping people and companies save money on travel and helping to reduce companies carbon footprint.
That’s why we started our conference calling service to make telecommuting easier for people to communicate to their clients and colleagues.
Tim Ferris talked a lot about this in Four Hour Work Week. I’m a fulltime student right now, so I’m not telecommuting to work, but for a lot of my classes, they’re online, so I am telecommuting to school. Similar principles.
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Your 8 tips on eliminating computer distractions (http://www.productivitybits.com/8-ways-to-eliminate-distractions-when-working-on-a-computer) ties in nicely to this since most of us will be on a computer when WFH.
I just want to add that working away from home somewhat re-envigorates me from time to time. Sometimes a little change in the surroundings can help keep you motivated. You can try working back in the office a few days a week or maybe work in a cafe from time to time.