It's flu season: connect and optimize your workers

This blog brings up a big point when discussing telecommuting: the technology must be able to handle the bandwidth when it becomes the norm. But that is solved by applying some well known technologies. It is a technical shift in where the bandwidth is required and applying smarts to how the traffic is compressed and managed.

However, the biggest problem with telecomuting is the corporate culture and default workflows built up over time.

I have been a Technical Writer for the last 15 years. For most clients, Technical Writing is a contractual obligation that comes along with the 'real' work - programming.

Programmers rarely want to bother me as it would involve me asking them questions about documentation, which we all know is generally an anathema to them.

As a result, I have generally had my desk out of the main working area, sometimes even on another floor, but nonetheless, still on site.

If fact a lot of what I do could be done from home, but when it comes to the crunch, most line control people are not comfortable with not being able to 'see' their staff doing work. So even if some managers expressed that they did not care if I 'sat on the beach doing the work', those in more close quarters are not so flexible.

Even though programmers accasionally work from home to enable them to concentrate upon some particular issues, away from all the interruptions of the normal office flows, the norm is still to be in the office, interacting with every one else, especially if there are subordinate staff to look after.

I have occasionally done work from home for clients I have had in the past, because they know I can work autonomously (Tech Writers generally have to!).

With my latest client, I started by working every day at the office, but mostly I interact with one person, whose skills are a complement to mine. Because we have to document a large system built up over 14 years without much design doco, and that utilises several different languages to build its interacting systems, I started programming some Access, XMl, REgex and Word to extract info from the source files into a single database from which I could derive the information to present in Word.
As my computer at the office was not particularly powerful and with not enough screen space to really see all the elements I am working on, I started working from home, where I have a quad-core with large screens attached (for audio recording).

I still kept going into the office once a week to basically discusss strategic issues with the other person with whom I interact. Eventually I stopped going in and have not done so for the last six months. We just use email and the phone if email would be too complicated or drawn out. We have even joked that I could be on a beach in Vanuatu and nobody would know the difference, as long as I produce the goods.

It works well because I have been able to read between the lines what the other person is speaking and writing. Without that, communication can really get off the rails. It also helps that we both do not have a competitive agenda, but focus upon the work and what we can each do to get the job done. It could not work if I could not trust that I am not being shafted behind my back.

Having high speed wireless (real 6-7Mbps down and 3-5Mbps up) has made the communication a lot easier, especially as some attatchments are up to 20MB. I usually make the phone calls using my VoIP - 10c ea untimed. We abandoned Skype as v4 became far too unreliable.

It should be noted that the Project Manager is based in another State, and so is used to remote management (and having to trust staff). The other person does most of the interaction with him anyway, and I am comfortable with that and trust them as well.

It has also worked out well for me health wise because I have a respiratory condition that leaves be a bit breathless and coughing if I exert myself too much. It puts me in the at-risk group for swine flu. The company even sent an email out saying that because of the flu risk, those working from home should continue to do so, but that customer facing people still needed to maintian working contact with clients.


This goes to show that:

- Management has to be comfortable with telecomuting, particularly with regard to trust and staff control. (At least they don't have to worry about things like dress codes and personal hygene issues).

- Those working closely together must be able to communicate well, without allowing hidden agendas and politics to create mistrust.

- The work must be such that it can be split into well defined tasks that can be woked on by one person fairly autonomously.


Reminds me of making programs multi-threaded: need better compartmentalisation of tasks and autonomy of those tasks, otherwise there is too much overhead and downtime.
It is finding the right balance for the tasks at hand.


Basically, I think that much corporate culture and managment processes have to change to really allow telecommuting. The technology required will follow suite.

You bring up a good point, Chris, in that companies need to focus not only on connectivity, but also on quality of experience. Mobile WAN acceleration and remote access solutions are good tools, but companies really need to look at a holistic strategy for pandemic planning and business continuity.

Companies need to have a plan in place for providing workers with access that is reliable, high-performing, and secure. Security is an issue that didn't come up in your post, but I wanted to point it out because hackers will likely try to target businesses when they are most vulnerable. During our current economic malaise, it's also important to create a solution that won't break the bank. Too many companies overspend in preparing for a worst-case scenario when there may have been more cost effective solutions for them.

One approach I'd love to see you address more is managed services and how they might provide a way for companies to make flu and overall DR preparations more cost-efficient because businesses can purchase services as an operational expense, versus purchasing equipment as a capital expense. For example, rather than setting up their own access gateways, which takes a lot of both time and money, companies can use a provider's hosted SSL VPN service as well as leverage that provider?s staff to manage the solution. Performance-improving tools such as WAN optimization and hosted security and log management services may also be offered by service providers as part of an overall package.

Your article does a great job of emphasizing that H1N1 is a real threat that companies should prepare for, and planning needs to be about more than just access. But in addition to performance, security as well as cost-effectiveness should be priorities too.

- Kathy Lynch, Virtela