Telecommuting
Proposal: How Many Days Working from
Home Should You Request?
If you’re excited about the prospect of
telecommuting, you may have blissful visions of working
from home five days a week, with occasional trips into
the office for meetings.
Or maybe your notion is to propose telecommuting five days
a week, leaving you room to negotiate fewer days if the
full-time, work-from-home pitch is rejected.
Wise strategies? Or, career peril?
(Note: For this discussion, we are not addressing
independent sales reps, telecommuters who live very far
from the main office, e.g., out-of-state, and certain
self-employed individuals. Most of these workers operate
out of a home office on a full-time basis.)
Telecommuting: Who's
Doing What and Why?
First, consider the norm. Most employed
telecommuters work from home one to three days a week
and go to the office the remaining days.
The reasons may be many and varied, but here are two
common ones.
1. “Face time”: Right or wrong, face time still
has measurable impact on how you and your work are
perceived.
Without enough visibility, access, and concurrent
involvement, you will undoubtedly miss out on
information and opportunities that maintain and advance
your career.
“Out of sight/out of mind” is real, so regular weekly
“appearances” are still important.
Most managers, however willing they are to allow their
employees to telecommute, still want face-to-face
communication on a regular basis. It provides them with
a degree of needed comfort and control.
Bottom-line: Your manager is likely to be more
agreeable to your telecommuting proposal if you suggest
one or two days a week working from home to start.
If you feel you need negotiating room, propose two or
three days a week and negotiate one or two days.
2. Isolation: This is a common experience among
telecommuters.
Even if you have a dreadful commute to the office or
work very well independently, working from home alone
five days a week, week in and week out, is very
isolating.
Camaraderie and professional interaction are necessary
energizers in the actual work output and the workday of
most people.
Bottom-line: Going into the office two or three
days a week makes a measurable difference in keeping
telecommuters feeling connected.
Telecommuting Proposal
Strategy Tip
Propose one, two, or at the most, three telecommuting
days. One day is a safe start, especially if your
manager
is apprehensive; it makes for a good trial.
Oh—and don’t suggest Mondays.
Telecommuting Proposal Template:
Read about the
short-cut route to putting together a professional,
organized, convincing telecommuting proposal. Or...
A year ago, I used the Flex
Success method to secure a one day telework arrangement,
which at the time was a first for this
department.
Last month, I submitted a new
proposal to extend that arrangement to two days
and just heard that it's been granted effective
immediately (with the potential to add a third day in
three months).
My manager specifically mentioned how he appreciated
the formal proposal I had submitted; it demonstrated
to him that I had fully thought through what I was
asking. I couldn't have done it without your guidance.
Thank you - you made this so easy! Kacie
Harkins
Product Development Manager, The Chickering Group, An
Aetna Company, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Listen to a
four-minute national radio story featuring a
Telecommuting
Flex Success
user. (Real
Player required.)
Hi Pat. Thank you so much for your [Flex Success]
proposal. I have known for a long time that I wanted to
do this, but didn't know how to approach it. The
guidance your [telecommuting] template provided was just
the boost I needed to send me in the right direction. My
boss was very impressed and approved it almost
immediately even though telecommuting has not been done
in this office before. I am so excited...thanks so much!
Tracy Ayotte,
Information Systems Administrator,
CORE Research,
Geneva, FL
Consultant Pat Katepoo has thought of everything, put it
into no-nonsense terminology and included an
irresistible business case. Just fill in the blanks.
Susan Seitel,
President,
WFC Resources
If you're
willing to experiment to prove to your manager that
working remotely is possible, you can do some of your
work tasks from home before you make your proposal.
I recommend my
Telecommuting Flex Success customers use GoToMyPC for that purpose.
Click here to get your free 30-day trial of GoToMyPC,
 which allows you to access your work computer from home.
|
