4 Responses

1. Homeworking
   Neil

   I would suggest you could include:

   Benefits of homeworking
   Support from organisation
   Health & safety – workstation assessment, taking regular breaks, etc
   Importance of communication – having regular meetings, telephone conversations, etc
   Performance management – objective setting with measured outputs

   Just a few thoughts!

   Sandra Beale MCIPD

2. As a frequent home worker – a few more thoughts
   Drawbacks and pitfalls and how to handle / overcome.
   Communication skills – phone, written take on a higher level of importance than face to face.
   Self Motivation.
   Self Management.
   Self Organistaion.
   Self responsibility.
   Time planning.
   The importance of planning and conducting reviews / 1-1’s when not seeing someone regularly.
   Teleconference skills.
   Software skills.

   Much will depend on the type of work being completed at home. The workshop could be about getting out the issues and concerns / sharing best ideas and practices. Even consider setting up a support network.

   People then take away action plans of personal areas they need to develop and have contacts of people working in a similiar situation for support.

3. TRUST
   Neil,

   In my experience as a home worker in the past in a large organisation the biggest issue for all concerned Manager, Worker and Co-Workers is TRUST.

   If you can get that engendered then I reckon you’re half way there.

   Regards,

4. Reporting what is going on properly
   Having employed a number of Home workers I agree that the question of Trust is paramount. I find that this is best managed by agreeing once a week (say Monday) what is to be done and having a report on Friday afternoon which sets out what has been done, what was planned an has not been completed and what was planned and has not yet been started finally what has been done that was not planned – a word or two about why is also very useful. I find that over time I get a pretty good feel of how well the staff are performing.
   Some people can cope well on their own but more than a few get a bit stir crazy when they are away from colleagues in an office. The usual result of that is a drop off in creativity, quality and workrate.
   Hope that helps.
   Alan