Telecommuting Pendulum Swinging Back In The Other Direction?
from the management-fads dept
One of the more amusing things to watch in the business world is how management fads swing back and forth like a pendulum. It appears that just as telecommuting was becoming a lot more popular, leading to buzzwords like homeshoring, some are already moving in the other direction. HP, who was one of the first big companies to promote more flexible work rules is apparently cutting back on telecommuting for their IT staff, claiming that too many people were abusing it and workers are more productive when together. This is pretty much the complete opposite of competitor Sun, which has tried to get as many people as possible to telecommute (apparently 83% of their IT staff now are telecommuters). Both approaches seem a bit extreme. Telecommuting, by itself, is neither good nor bad. It certainly can be abused -- but allowing people to work from home can have tremendous advantages as well. Rather than declaring it completely a good thing or bad thing, it would seem to make sense to have a more balanced approach that looks at the different situations of different employees to see when it makes sense and when it doesn't. Of course, a balanced approach doesn't sell well when it comes to promoting the latest management fad.
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Freedom leads to abuse
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Managing by numbers, not by people.
With offshoring/telecommuting, managers saw the immediate cost savings of such an idea and failed to look at the people and circumstances involved.
This is akin to deciding you're going to cut your grocery bill by taking your previous receipt and randomly crossing out items until you reach your goal. You might spend less, but that's not the goal. You can spend less by buying less food, but you'll still need to eat. Instead, researching your receipt and finding places where you can substitute choices with less expensive choices without sacrificing the over-all quality is how the problem should be approached.
Plot out your department's productivity and set goals to improve it. Use telecommuting/offshoring as a tool to assist "where it fits" based on staff and job factors and you'll have a finer tuned department and "get more for less".
And remember that productivity is a wholistic measurement of the quality of work, not a singular measurement of an arbitrary quantity (like lines of code, phone calls answered, or ... comments posted).
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as usual, the half that leaves is the talented/motivated half. the half that will stay will be the bottom of the barrel. expect HP's MIS team to really start sucking ass...
by the way, anyone with exec background at W-M and Dell would hardly be considered an "employee advocate". Those employees are probably lucky they aren't motivated by cattle prod or electrodes to the scrotum.
clearly the sign of a corporation well past its prime and on slippery slope to obsolescence.
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Productivity
Some people just can't commit their time to work productively when they are at home, though. That is where the corporations started thinking telecommuting isn't such a good idea. I think that it has to be evaluated on a person-by-person basis, not on a blanket policy. Not everyone likes walnuts in their brownies (like me).
If I don't have to have an office, with the computer, network, phone, heating/cooling/lights, lunchroom, bathroom, parking,...., and I get just as much done as someone that does need an office, why should the company fork out that money for all the things that they need to provide in the office just to "have me in the office?"
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Re:
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Re: Freedom leads to abuse
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Telecommuting
I wish I could telecommute; those hours devoid of actual work could be spent on many other productive activities. But unfortunately my position is too low on the totem pole to be paperless.
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Re:
I just left my job because it moved to Cincinatti. They told us all web development groups are moving to Cincinatti, then moved some groups but not others. Complete BS.
Layoffs by misery works!
I can't wait til they realize they laid off the team with the most profitable applications in the whole corp. and they need to change them or have a problem.
When you lose thousands of credit applications a day, it hurts, especially when the nearest competitor in the company is doing 400.
I hope the savings is worth it.
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What if telecommuting becomes a necessity?
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Management Fads
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Re: anonymous coward
what about ur father? :D
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