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Working Hints for a New Telecommuter?
McPierce asks: "This week I accepted an offer to work for a company in a different state (I'm located in NC, USA, and the company's located in NY,USA). As part of my employment, the company's going to give me a laptop, a PDA (Blackberry 6510) for email/development and will fly me to NY every 6-8 weeks for meetings. My question is to those who telecommute for a living and who have families at home. How do you do your work at home? Do you go out (bookstore/library/coffee shop) to get things done, or do you have a home office and boundaries setup with your family to keep them from distracting your during working hours? How about accepting phone calls from your employer? In my case, I'm concerned about getting calls outside of the normal business hours (8am-6pm) since the philosophy might be 'we'll call when we need to since you're working remotely'? Any ideas or suggestions?"
I don't have a family but I work from home. I have a definite line between "work" and "non-work", including a different computer in a different room. This is good for tax purposes (I'm also self-employed). If you're like most computer folks you *need* to keep the "mind spaces" separate.
I also NEVER answer the phone. My clients quickly get the point and use email which I much prefer. I also don't own a cell but I do carry a wireless PDA. So email is more accessible than phone and I usually answer right away.
You'll figure out a routine after a while. If you feel disoriented at first, just set off one room in the house as your "office" and pretend that you have to show up at a certain time, and once you cross the door you are in a workplace and can't just get up and fix yourself a sandwich whenever you feel like, etc. I.e. impose some discipline on yourself.