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Ask Slashdot: Would You Take a Pay Cut To Telecommute?
coondoggie writes "IT pros want to telecommute — so much so that more than one-third of those surveyed by Dice.com said they would take a pay cut for the chance to work full time from home. In a survey conducted by the careers site, 35% of technology professionals said they would sacrifice up to 10% of their salaries for full-time telecommuting. The average tech pro was paid $79,384 last year, according to Dice's annual salary survey, which means a 10% pay cut is equivalent to $7,900 on average."
When you factor in commute time, gas and car maintenance, the need for 2 cars for family ,child care and office politics it's definitely a pay raise.
Having to provide less office space, less resources, less money on utilities to keep up an office... yet IT people are expected to take the pay cut? We go into the office for them, not the other way around.
If you're spending hours in your car everyday, and you could avoid that, how much would that be worth? And if you're paying your own commuting expenses, such as car/gas/parking, how much is that? It may be simple math that you come out ahead.
Really, I would think that the company themselves should be willing to pay more for someone who telecommutes, due to needing less facility needs (space, cubicles, utilities) that would be saved from allowing telecommuting. And there is the added benefit of making sure all the equipment can be administered via telecommuting as you can then simply call up the IT group(s) and they can fix the problem from home without waiting the upwards of a hour that it would take to bring someone in to flip a switch/enter a password.
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
In some companies, telecommuters tend to be forgotten about. This means that Jack Brown-Nose who comes in and does almost nothing will always be seen by the boss and keep an impression, while the co-workers who are at home actually working are invisible. End result: Jack tends to have an edge when it comes to promotions, or even keeping the job.
I've telecommuted for 5 of the past 6 years.
I've saved thousands of Pounds on the commute into London.
I can spend more time in the morning in bed.
But
You have to be comfortable with your own company.
It can get lonely.
You need the heating on all day in Winter.
On the whole it is great.
Now... If I had a job it would be great. If said job offered me the opportunity to work from home then even better
At the moment, this is all wishful thinking though.
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
"IT pros want to telecommute — so much so that more than one-third of those surveyed by Dice.com said they would take a pay cut for the chance to work full time from home" Yes. Obviously all of of the IT professionals want to telecommute if 33% of them say yes. The other 66% do not matter.
I'm so glad the summary could tell me that 10% of 79,384 is about 7900.
I think some working families throw their children into daycares during the day after school (if the kids go to school) until they come home from work. I hear daycares can cost a lot too.
You'll save 3-6K in gas, parking and transport alone. Pick up another $800-$1500 in phone, cell and internet reimbursement. Get back 1-2 hours of your day that you used to spend commuting. Not a bad deal.
Pro tip: If your job can be done from your house, it can be done from India.
Full-time telecommuting doesn't really work most places. Unless your work assignments are planned well and can be done truly independently, you've gotta put in some face time to get stuff figured out.
Hell yes. In fact, I just quit my day job so I could restructure as a less-benefits consultant so I could do exactly this.
Won't you take a pay cut for us. It's the only way to keep the jobs away from those $2 an hour people we know overseas... It's a perfect deal, you get to provide your own office space and we get a fancy new yacht to bang illegal under-age girls on.
Firstly, I don't make as much as the average tech pro. Secondly, I live ten minutes from my workplace. Telecommuting can be beneficial for some, but it's entirely circumstantial.
Transportation is budgeted as my #2 expense, just behind rent. Last year I had major car issues, and transportation may have exceeded housing in raw $ spent. Add to that the amount of time I would save and it becomes even more obvious.
"You want to know how to help your kids? Leave them the fuck alone." -George Carlin
You save money on time and logistics, but you also have to create a work area in your home. Certain organizations have sqft requirements. You also need to establish locked areas to hold files and documents. And, ultimately, you're no longer allowed to check-out. With a standard job you are expected to be responsive during your normal work hours (say 9--5:30). With telecommuting the work hours shift and you will easily find yourself on call 12 hours a day. Additionally, you lose camaraderie with your coworkers, a chance to hunker down and drive through projects faster, and possible extensive delays in communications.
Then factor in the possibility of children banging down the door to play, and the guilt you feel by having to shuffle them out to finish a project. Then a spouse who takes advantage of you "being there" for babysitting, phone calls, emotional chats, and I'd rather be at work during the day.
If it weren't for the office, I probably would never meet another soul. If anything, you should probably pay me more to not be around people.
If my commute was longer, 45min+ and/or there was no parking I would take a small pay cut. By small I mean, savings of not driving or buying a parking pass. So probably 5%. However, I already get to work from home at least twice a week and my commute is only 20-25 min without a pay cut.
"Thanks to the remote control I have the attention span of a gerbil."
I moved from Cleveland to Seattle about a year ago and now I telecommute all the time. It definitely saves on gas and lunch expenses, since I usually just eat leftovers now. Overall, it's hard for me to say whether it's been like a raise or not since the cost of living is a bit higher here, but there is no state income tax. It is hard to put a price on the ability to roll out of bed, make a cup of copy, and start working.
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
I work for Rackspace full time from home, and I'm paid the same as I would be at the office. Whether I work from home or not is ultimately irrelevant, because the most important variable of all is loving your job. I work where I do because it is a truly amazing place to work.
That said, volunteering a pay cut is risky business. Your salary is a gauge of how much your company values you, so you should try to get as much as you possibly can.
A few things to keep in mind:
1. If you telecommute, it's also cheaper for the employer (less electricity, water, bandwidth, etc)
2. If you take a pay cut, any time you get a raise it's going to be less than it could have been, since most companies do raises as a percentage of your current salary
3. The downside of working exclusively from home is that it's easier to not get noticed. If you're not getting much face time with your peers, you better be doing some amazing work
because I do desktop support, including hardware diagnosis and repair.
However, in general I think being able to telecommute would be worth a small pay cut on account of less wear-and-tear on your car, less gas expended, and the extra free time - I drive 1:40 each day, round trip.
Couldn't sleep in later, though, because my kid needs me in the mornings.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
I wouldn't take a pay cut, but I'd consider it a raise during an economy where most companies are stingy with raises. I could save $5000 a year on car costs alone (I'd only need one car if I worked from home). The trick is, to save that much cash, I would have to get rid of a car. That means I couldn't come in without planning far ahead. Most of the people in my company that work from home do it 2-3 days a week. I wouldn't want that.
If you can telecommute full time and do your job from the comfort of home, then so can anyone in the world. You're now competing with folks who would be happy to have your job at 10% of what you're paid -- not just a 10% discount!
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Company based in Oregon. Employees who live and/or work in Oregon pay Oregon income tax on their pay.
Employees who BOTH live AND work in Washington do not, as Washington has no income tax.
We have three employees in our department who took odd-hours shifts solely because those shifts mandate working from home. All three live in Washington. All three got an effective 10+% pay raise by no longer having to pay Oregon income tax. (Plus no commuting costs.) We only have one other Washington-domiciled employee in the department, and he's lobbying for another off-hours-shift position.
For me, no. The value of what I do, the requirements and qualifications needed to do the work, and my employability elsewhere are not reduced by telecommuting (or lack thereof). Telecommuting is a perk, not compensation... and if it's the only way to get the job done (i.e. the employer is a "virtual office"), then it's just part of the circumstances of employment (and therefore still is not compensation).
If the same amount of work gets done, the same amount of salary gets paid. If someone else views telecommuting as a part of compensation or salary, fine for them, but I won't allow an employer to claim that for me.
Everybody gets what the majority deserves.
I work from home sometimes with a wife and four kids. I'd take a pay cut to be forced to go into the office.
Then that means someone else lifts the servers, swaps the backup tapes/HDDs, gets interrupted by users while reading /.
Of course, that means I can't completely trust the servers or backup media. I'll always trust the users to find a way to interrupt me, so they're not a factor. In short, pay me more because I'm entailing more risk by being responsible for systems that I have less trust in.
I used to want that, but the more work I had that I could take home, the less it seemed like a good idea. To me that's like asking "Would you take a pay cut to always be on the job and move all your office crap in your bedroom?" Not a chance in hell.
When you factor in the full cost of commuting (fuel, maintenance, parking, higher food costs) 10% in some cases would be money ahead. Moreover, the entire time consumed by commuting, including dressing for outdoors, finding the keys, etc, is saved also. For me that would be around 2 additional hours a day I could spend doing something else, like, well, working.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Last month, Dice warned that IT tech talent poaching is expected to get more aggressive this year. A combination of factors -- including growing numbers of unfilled job openings and underpaid employees who want more lucrative jobs -- is causing a hiring rush that's expected to worsen.
With so many unemployed people, why is there so much poaching?
Oh yeah, if you're out of work, you're no good.
OK, so I'm no good. I'll borrow some money and get retrained in something else (the solution of many who have no clue). Let's see, where is there a demand? Hmmmmm. No where. Nursing shortage? Ahahahahahahah. Guess what! There's hiring freezes because hospitals have budget problems because - Unemployed people have no health insurance and can't pay their bill, jackass.
So, something else right? Well then, you run into this: He went to school because he couldn't get a job and therefore there's something wrong with him.
You can't fucking win.
Start a business? Really?!? been there done that: failed three times. It's not easy . If it were, everyone would do it because just about everyone wants to work for themselves and be their own man!
For the "consultants" out there:
Unless you're drumming up business (you're your own sales guy) and have multiple customers, being a S-Corp/1099 "consultant" working for one company or a contracting firm isn't a real business - it's just a tax status.
Rant over. Another day has passed where I haven't shot myself - I'm doing good.
Just in gas, it typically costs me $7800/yr in gas. So add in wear and tear plus insurance savings, its likely a break even at worst. For most people, working from home saves money for both the employee and the employer.
In some companies, telecommuters tend to be forgotten about.
I'd say most companies fit this description.
Visibility is a huge issue for almost every worker out there from the VP to the customer support person.
Telecommuting simply exacerbates this problem. Furthermore, lots of folks are just not motivated (despite thinking they are) to work if there aren't people nearby to motivate them.
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I live in small city, I drive a big 5minutes each days but my salary is about a third (I use to think that I could double it but I recently turn down an offer at a conference and it was 3 times my current salary) of what it could be in a big city. But a paycut to stay home, no fucking way, not with a 5minutes drive....
Jehovah be praised, Oracle was not selected
I'm a single guy. If I could fully telecommute, I would take a $20k pay cut for sure and spend time traveling to Europe etc.
Currently hooked on AMP
At my office, the longest commute for anyone is maybe 20 minutes in traffic. Personally, my commute is about 5 minutes.
We are a web company, yet highly value being in the office. In fact, people have left telecommuting jobs and moved states just to come work in the office with us.
In addition, coworking spaces are huge now. These locations are filled with people that are technically telecommuters, but they are tired of not being around other people and are sick of the "Starbucks office."
So to me the question "would you take a pay cut to telecommute?" misses the point entirely. People are willing to take pay cuts to work in better environments. If that means leaving the office to telecommute, leaving your job to work at a smaller company, leaving your job to start a company, or volunteering to move to a different office across the country, people will do it if they believe that the value added by the change or the potential it offers outweighs the loss of income.
I don't know anyone, except managers, who have had pay rises (even to keep up with inflation) in the last few years. Effectively, this is already a pay cut.
I wouldn't take any more of a cut, but I would consider working from home 2 or 3 days a week for the same money. That way I get to save a bit to make up for some of the inflationary pay cut and the company gets to save of "overheads" so the "investors" get a bigger earning per share this quarter.
Stick Men
I worked remotely for about five years, and it was really cool at first. But it got very old. I worked at my apartment, by myself, and communicated with my team mostly through IRC.
One problem with telecommuting, at least for me, was that I liked what I did (software development) and so at the end of "the day" I had a tendency to keep working. It was a lot of fun at first, because we were building awesome software and it was fun to be a part of. But after a few years of doing that, you just get tired of always fucking being at home. It gets depressing. You could argue that I should have gone and hung out in coffee shops whilst hacking, but that just isn't really my thing.
You also might talk about saving money. Maybe you do, maybe you don't. I mean, I know I wasn't spending much money on gas. But I also live in Texas, and it gets pretty fucking hot here so I was leaving the air conditioner on all day. That gets to be pretty expensive.
Now I work at an office about 15 minutes away. It's awesome, because I have people in the same office to communicate with. It's small, there are only four hackers, but that's the way I like it. I certainly don't regret working from home for so long, but I'm glad to be done with it. I'm sure it works fine for other types of people, but for me it was not a great situation.
I'd find it so useful, because it means that if they want say a once a week face to face meeting I could live further away out in the bush(I love being in the bush, but I also 3 my internet) so I'd drive in once a week for the meeting or something. I'd love to do it.
I hate telecommuting. I am completely unproductive. All I do is surf Slashdot all day.
Wait ...
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
I dunno, would my bank take a cut in my mortgage payment if I went into work less?
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I used to work for a major open source project at home for 2 years... it felt awesome for the first 6 months, but after that I felt terrible being at home alone all day long, every day. I have a few other friends who experienced something like that, working at home for large tech companies for various reasons - it's awesome for the first few months, but you'll feel really bad after a while.
Seeing as how it cost almost $7,900 just to put gas in my Prius this morning, I'd come out ahead by not having to drive to work every day.
According to US tax law, I can't deduct my commute. Moreover, I've never heard of anyone who could negotiate a higher salary because they lived further away. So my workday really starts when I arrive at work and ends when I leave the facility.
If I'm negotiating with my employer, then, any offer of a shorter commute is not something I'm going to acknowledge. The only way I'd take a paycut is if I'm actually doing less and have less responsibility than when I'm working at the office. I'd also have to be compensated me for the use of my home and provided a work computer, phone and internet connection.
I'm amazed at the number of people who would take a massive interruption in their lives, commit their own resources to the company *and* take a paycut on top of it.
I will take a 10% cut of my $110k salary, and work from my home--China. Even with the huge inflation $110k is a lot of dough in China.
My commute (10 miles each way) is my 'gym class'. If I did not have that, I would have to join a gym and pay $$$ to wait in line to use the machines which are not properly wiped off by the previous user.
On the days that I do telecommute (because of a package delivery, doctors appointment etc), I find myself not as energetic as those days that I do the bicycle commute into the office.
I am single; no children. Therefore I cannot comment about day care. I don't know how much it costs.
I do have hobbies at home. They can be distracting. I sew, weld, and do light art. Those can be quite distracting from work.
Most Respectfully Yours Mark Allyn Bellingham, Washington
Over the winter my commute topped 4 hours each way for a 30 mile drive. Normally that takes about 45 minutes, but it regularly goes over an hour with traffic. Figure in gas prices, wear and tear on the car, tolls, along with all that drive time and I'd give up 10% of my salary if I was home every day. I don't know that I would WANT to be home every day, but maybe I'd get used to it.
I'd gladly take a cut if it meant I could telecommute but then again I'm in retail sales so that isn't going to happen 8(
I'm doing outsourced work for a US Corp. in India... and they don't let me telecommute! You insensitive clod!
Set your phasers on "funky"!
That's not really an option for SMB consultants here in the bay area. I'd take a pay cut to telecommute. The problem is too many consulting companies use contract/consultant status to offload the cost of vehicles on to their employees. I had one job where I was supposed to be able to take public transportation and and telecommute occasionally. I wound up having to drive my own car every day because there was always a server that needed to be pulled at the colo or an errand to Fry's for parts. I wound up losing about .50 cents a mile for every mile I drove (depreciation, consumables, fuel, insurance, etc. The company loved it because I was salaried so they didn't have any extra cost beyond the initial .54 cents a mile. I'd never do that again.
The absolute best money the govt could put forward towards green initiatives is a heavy tax break based on number of telecommuters employed by a company.
It is absolutely absurd the amount of fuel I waste every year to unplug from my network at home just to drive to work to plug back in and perform the same job. In fact there are very few people in my office that really could not perform their job full time from home.
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I live 3 blocks from my office.
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I know most folks would jump at the opportunity to telecommute. I've been lucky, as my current workplace is very flexible and allows people to work from home at their own discretion with project manager approval. Some managers are very loose with it and only care if you are getting work done and can be reached through reasonable means. Other prefer that you're in the office, but make allowances under special circumstances.
Now, I absolutely love the flexibility, but there is something that would be missed if we moved to a full telecommute model. There are plenty of times when you might overhear a co-worker discussing a problem or perhaps a solution. You might be able to provide some insight or a solution to them. It saves them a ton of time, and it gets you some respect points with your peers. And obviously it works both ways, where someone else might help you at at some point.
In a pure telecommuting environment, you'd probably miss out on some of those incidentals. Although there are some that would argue that you'd also decrease the amount of distractions, which can definitely be true. So, there are good and bad points. Just playing a little devil's advocate.
If all you have are silver bullets, everything looks like a werewolf.
It is a figure of speech as well as a measure of desire to say that "I would take a pay cut ...". In this case, it actually makes sense, but that still doesn't mean taking it literally....
I switched to full-time telecommute 10 years ago, and it definitely has financial advantages, in addition to enhancing your quality of life.
Career-wise was quite the change. Being out of immediate touch is a nice bonus, since you don't have to put up with all those 'quirky' people you work with, but you can still pull off informal social occasions with the co-workers you can stand.
Eventually, you become a 'virtual contractor' - you aren't really part of it, you are an outsider that does task work. This is the perfect segue into becoming a 'real contractor' and working for yourself.
If you time it right, you can arrange a 'buy out' from your employer, to help ease the transition, and from then on everything is great.
Next time you are listening to some doofus expand a 30s presentation into a 1 hour seminar; look at the people around you. Some will have a look of annoyance at their time being wasted; some will be asleep; some will be hanging on every word as if their next advancement depended upon it; and some will be quite serene. The latter is your contractor, because how your company wants to piss away its money doesn't bother them. They just want some to splatter on them.
I telecommuted full-time for 2 years and hated nearly every minute of it.
But I learned something from it: I'm a social creature that gets a lot of satisfaction out of the day-to-day, face-to-face interactions with my coworkers. It makes me feel more involved and more fulfilled.
The truth is that I was more productive at home due to the fewer distractions. But I was much less satisfied with my job. When I would go out to the local coffee shop for my daily cup, I would chat the ear off the barista because I was just that starved for human interaction.
The other downside is that if you work from home, you have to be very diligent about drawing clear lines between work and home. It's very easy to always be "at work" when you work from home.
Don't take the job. You'd be surprised how much more you spend in electricity and other utilities by simply being at home all day. And, for me anyway, I like being able to get out of the house and having that physical separation between work and home life.
In my experience over the years telecommuting has been a disaster for corporate America. This is based on observations of friends who telecommute and experiences with clients. I realize there are exceptions, but far, far too often telecommuting has a dramatic negative impact on productivity. Everyone I know who's worked from home spends the bulk of the day on personal things. It might be good for that particular employee, but it sucks for everyone else.
Certainly, there are certain jobs where it's feasible. Developers and designers come to mind. It's very easy to quantify how productive they are: is the task they've been assigned complete? But even then, I think the loss of direct communication, being able to just walk into their office and ask a question, is very detrimental.
However, the real problem are managers who telecommute. If they're not present overseeing employees and projects then what good are they? I can't count the number of meetings that have had to been scheduled around some jerk who works from home a few days a week. And then, because they aren't around much, they have to get caught up on everything because they can actually do their job. These people routinely spend their time at the office not actually managing anything, but merely being updated. They contribute little but somehow manage to keep their jobs.
Plus, if they live close to the Oregon border, they can do all their shopping in Oregon and not have to pay any sales tax!
-- Give me ambiguity or give me something else!
If you could telecommute, you could get one of those jobs in the bigger city, make double or triple your current salary, and then take your 10% pay cut. You'd have a higher salary, same cost of living, and no commute. Remember that and make a counter offer next time someone offers you a job at a conference.
I would take a cut of 10-15% without even batting an eyelash if I were able to.
http://teasphere.wordpress.com - A little spot of tea
can be done remotely. If the company is structured well, any "knowledge worker" job can be done without a physical office. I think companies of the future won't have office space. Perhaps a transient location to get together, but no permanent workspaces. The concept of an office is outdated. Lets hope it does along with industrial era management philosophies. I work remotely all the time. I'm just as effective (if not more so).
The downside:
I've interviewed for office jobs in my area and had a couple offers, but nobody could make it worth my time. A few thousand dollars more each year are just not worth it. When I think about having 60 to 90 minutes each day driving to and from work instead of spending it with my family, the numbers just don't add up.
...which was considerably less than commuting costs (including parking) so it was a net pay raise.
It gave me back at least two hours in my day that were previously spent commuting.
I get much more done in the day. I have at least as heavy a project load as my colleagues, but I always finish ahead of schedule and get called upon to help on tasks that have fallen behind schedule.
I've been working from home for the last 2 years and here's the pros and cons:
Pros
1- I can take a sh*t in my own bathroom (with the door open!)
2- I don't have to bring my lunch to work and can make a delicious Mac & Cheese at home. Also, i'm saving money and loosing weight because I don't eat out all the time (which i used to do everyday when working at an office).
3- I save between 7-10 hours a week in commute time. I'm also self-employed so that's basically an extra day of work i'm able to squeeze in my week.
Cons
- So lonely. After 6 days without going outside the perimeter of my house, I feel depressed.
- It takes willpower because you can be easily distracted (such as posting on slashdot or browsing facebook).
I've been working at the same place for 6.5 years and I wanted to move to my hometown 7 hours away. My boss offered me to telecommute (greatest boss ever) instead of accepting my resignation without doing anything. As a bonus, he matched the salary I was offered at that other job I had interviewed for. I'm really looking forward to it, but part if me is a bit worried about human contact.
Say the company cut the sq ft per employee in half by going to non-dedicated workspace for when employees are in the office, and say we are talking about IT workers in central office tower space that is Class A or B. I used the following reference:
http://books.google.ca/books?id=lJmBYCED_nMC&pg=PA92&dq=office+space+cost+per+employee&hl=en&ei=LY6bTZrONcnPgAeAuZCdBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CEIQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=office%20space%20cost%20per%20employee&f=false
On page 92, for the city of Ottawa and an urban location, the savings per employee are significant. They give a figure of about 18,000 per employee but I would think that figure is high (the calculation includes costs of setting up space as well as operational costs, and also estimates zero on-site time for the telecommuter).
Still, using much more conservative numbers, a business with an existing employee base and location could easily look to save 5,000 per employee per year in space rental costs, hvac savings, and reduced power/lighting costs. Insurance rates could be affected as well.
I don't see why the employee would opt for a pay cut to save the employer money.
A couple of years ago my department laid off a bunch of us, but I found another job inside my company. The catch was that instead of telecommuting plus frequent customer visits, I've got a long commute in a direction where public transit isn't available. It really takes an annoying amount of my time, plus a lot of money spent on gas (I could reduce that by spending a bunch of money on a new car instead.) But hey, it's a job, I get to keep my benefits and get a similar salary. But, like going to an office almost every day? What a weird way to work, hadn't done it in years.
Back in the 90s I was commuting by train, which was better. It still took too long, but I could read or work on the train, and I could get out of the office at a reasonable time by saying "gotta catch the train" and get home at a semi-civilized time of day.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
I've worked out of my house and it should really come with a RAISE, not a pay cut.
First of all, who pays for high speed internet access? It can be a drag when someone in the house decides to stream a HD movie or some other bandwidth suck that slows network access. Sure, you can get another connection, but who pays for it? And in some cases, the broadband provider (yes, singular) won't deliver service to the same address twice, no matter how you explain it.
What about the computer equipment required? Am I supposed to use my home PC or will I be provided with a computer? What kind? Printer? Color, laser, etc?
Telephone? In some cases, a mobile would work, but in a lot of cases mobiles blow -- voice lag, weak signals, the whole laundry list of problems.
Then there's the SPACE issue. Most people I know don't have a huge empty spare room in their house they can put a proper desk, computer, printer, phone and all the crap associated with many jobs. If you have a wife and kids you definitely need to have a totally seperate room with a door you can close.
And then who pays for the other items? Electricity? Heat and A/C? Heat is significant -- I turn mine down WAY LOW in the daytime. Misc office supplies (paper, staples, pens, toner, etc)?
I doubt I'll ever be in the position to negotiate for it, but if someone said "we want you to work with us but its a telecommute position" I'd almost be tempted to negotiate the price of a small apartment and turn that into an office, or find one of those one-man-band offices that are kind of like a studio apartment.
There's so many BS small items associated with working from home that really add up you can't take a pay cut.
I got myself a place 5 minutes by Segway from work, and then bought a Segway.
Hell, you'd have to pay me extra to telecommute!
For my current job, YES, definitely. Anything to get away from these guys.
For my previous job, yes, probably. I liked the co-workers enough, but the commute really sucked.
But I'm a solo developer. For the majority of my career I've worked alone (I'm a team-player, I swear, it's just the job[s]). Sure, there are meetings now and then and once in a blue moon someone will walk up and ask me something, but by and far my physical presence in the building is not required.
And honestly it's a huge time-sink when the boss comes out and rants about Obamacare, how aliens colonized earth, how entitlement culture is destroying America, or how he's pissed that his vendors didn't send him something for Christmas (a three-tier box of candies came the next day). Similarly when random people wander back here and start talking to me about phones, the webfilter, or whatnot. I have to direct them to the people who actually know those systems just because my desk is the closest to the door. And DEAR GOD I had to vacate the area because the big guy farted something toxic earlier today. I think the saddest part is that to avoid getting fired and to keep the office peace, I've become "the quiet one".
But in theory, if I was employed in a real tech company where I worked on a team telecommuting wouldn't be an option because I'd be working with people, and being physically close to them would be too big of a resource to give up. In theory.
A reason why this won't fly (at least on litigious countries) is that companies would be far too prone to lawsuits about some freaking ergonomics-related issue.
How can anyone live on $79k?
But only if I NEVER had to show up for meetings or travel. Even one in-person meeting blows the deal.
"Liechtenstein is the world's largest producer of sausage casings, potassium storage units, and false teeth."
Wow! 10% of 79,000.00 is 7,900.00?
Who knew!!!
Pro Tip followup:
You don't know the difference in quality from a project done in India, and one done by 'fairly' local, educated employees. Don't be sad, it was just YOUR job that was so simple, that it could be moved to India. It's easy to blame someone else though, isn't it?
I could give examples of this, but it would give away who I work for and our competitors. Suffice it to say, our competitors are far behind us in revenue, customer retention, and growth.
Want to pay less for crappy code(with no line breaks, comments, or formatting at all)? Don't expect to be able to charge the same(or more) as you were before. Your customers WILL notice, in ways you might not understand until it happens to your company. You will be able to get away with it for a little while, but the customers will see better and move away from you, with their money.
*Yes, I've been 'working from home' for most of my career. Not to far from a decade now.
My office is located out in the suburbs. Some of us live very close and the rest are commuting opposite of rush hour (no traffic!). It works out great. And the floor space is cheaper for the company, too.
I went from 3-4 hours commuting to D.C. every day to a 5 minute drive or a bike ride. It's better than telecommuting.
Godaddy is a scam and a ripoff.
SInce $8 a day is roughly what I spend on gasoline to commute. I might even go a bit more for the savings in car repairs.
in gas, at today's usurous rates. Let's ignore insurance, tires, and repairs for the moment.
If would cost me about 4% net to take a 10% pay cut and stay home. In other words, a 6% cut would break even.
I already took a 15% cut in 2009 to keep my job. I'm not interested.
If, however, you're actually paying more than 10% of your gross on commuting, you might want to reconsider either your method of commuting, your distance, or your salary.
Because that seems like you're already losing, to me. And I'm on the cusp of losing.
Yes, for those of you about to give me a good going-over, I'm considering finding work closer to home, but this position has many advantages that have enough value to keep me here unless something very sweet comes up closer. And I'm not expecting anything. The market is not that good yet.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
You misunderstand the term. To telecommute, you have to do the job from home.
On the other hand, what shoddy equipment was bought that you need a full time repairman?
If I'm going to let my employer 'have a piece of my house' from which I'll work, why should I take a pay cut? This makes no sense, NEVER NEVER NEVER ASK FOR A CUT IN PAY. Corporations are doing just fine, regardless of the picture they paint about needing more tax cuts, and your salary cut too. FEH
IMHO the daily commute is one of the worst things about having to work. But for those against, whether they are employers who would just rather see butts on seats, or employees fearing pay cuts, there are some good reasons to telecommute.
First, there the environmental value. If a substantial percentage of the workforce were to work from home, then that would mean a lot less pollution. Second, more telecommuters means less traffic on the roads and fewer traffic jams. Really, until the day comes when most cars on the road are driven by computers instead of people, telecommuting will be probably be the best way to cut down on traffic, thus freeing up the roads more for those who have no choice. Third, I'd go for it even if it meant losing some money in the end, just because of all the time it would save me on a daily basis. Think about it: all that extra free time -- I'd be mighty grateful for that at the end of every day! (and at the end of every year, when you think what it would add it up).
On the other hand, one of the worst barriers that holds back telecommuting is the lack of decent bandwidth -- upload bandwidth -- available to the average consumer through local ISPs. The down/up ratio is usually 10:1 or worse; I sure wish that would change. Often, link reliability is also a challenge, although using a second ISP can be a solution. I'd say another issue is the poor quality, poor manageability and high price of commercial software, which is important when dealing with so many remote systems and when downtime results in a serious loss of productivity (I say that because most people and organizations are too stupid to consider FOSS as an alternative, even when technically there are no barriers to speak of).
Count in the costs of the wear&tear, health issues that may come up due to telecommute, workplace stress or health conditions.
Read radical news here
Bossthink says "employees are overheads, not assets", but a large chunk of every management layer is dedicated solely to justifying its own existence to the ones above.
Usually quite a lot of that's achieved by 'disciplinary proceedings' and the 'performance review process', and all the other soul-crushing, morale-destroying methods and practices so beloved by the peons.
Threaten the ability of these management layers to stalk hallways in search of prey and you threaten their reason for existence.
We'll see a massive standoff between the greedy and the desperate.
No. I'm still leasing my car for the next 4 years because of work. Whatever the amount of gas I would save, I would still need to pay for it and the insurance, and a pay cut would certainly hit me. Once I finish my lease, I could reconsidering it.
Basically, there is little or no need for an office anymore. The entire concept is obsolete. The only reason management balks at the telecommuting because they would be subject to staffing reductions. Either that, or they have some micromanagement complex. Studies conducted repeatedly have shown that telecommuters are happier and even more productive. Employees in a telecommute role generally stay in their jobs longer. Some have said a telecommuter should be paid more. Uh, no, in some cases you are making a compromise with the company. I would gladly take a 10% pay cut for the privilege so long as a contract is in place that states if management changes its mind, my salary must revert back to the additional 10%. I hate offices! They are stuffy, inertial relics of a bygone era.
Isn't Dice a find-a-job site? Aren't they really asking "Would you take a pay cut to get a job?" What next? "25% of Dice visitors feel that not having health insurance is okay?"
I have a 2 hour commute each way and I am desperate enough to leave I'll take a pay cut to work within 1 hour each way commuting distance.... Telecommuting for just 10% it's a no brainer. I'll take a 30% cut for a closer job where I can actually learn how to make computer software with a team that understands what the "technical debt" is.
As someone who has telecommuted for half of my working life at a variety of companies I would say that in my experience there are obvious pros and cons to working from home.
Ask yourself the following questions:
1) Do you have space for an office at home? Will it take up space currently being used for other purposes? Will your office be used for other purposes in your other 8 hours? You need to be able to close the door on your work at the end of your working day and keep it closed until the next morning.
2) Are you a workaholic or do you have tendencies towards that problem? If so, working from home is dangerous for you as you may not be able to put down what you are doing at the normal end of your working day and may return to your work outside of your core hours. The OP is talking about taking a pay cut. Are you willing to do more for less?
3) Are you disciplined enough to work consistently when your garden, laundry, kitchen, TV or games room are in need of attention or are a potential distraction? Will your spouse expect you to do more housework because you are "at home"?
4) Is your boss disciplined enough to work from home? If your boss would fail to be disciplined when working from home, he/she may assume that you are too. If your office does not have a telecommuting culture, being "different" may breed resentment or envy in your colleagues.
5) Is your office political or cut-throat? Does your job rely on working closely with the end user? Will not being in the office result in your being manoeuvred out of the door if cuts are made, as a result of you being "Out of Sight, Out of Mind"?
6) Not being in the office results in a huge drop in levels of human contact. Can you do without the social aspect of your workplace?
7) Is your company geared up for telecommuting? Will they pay for your home office equipment (printers, paper) and costs (heating, lighting, electricity, furniture, internet, coffee) in the same way that they would if you were in the office? Will they pay for your travel to the "Office" as it's now not your usual place of work?
Don't get me wrong, for the right person and personality, telecommuting is a fantastic opportunity. But I would never have taken a pay cut to work from home. You are saving your company on office space use, electricity, heating, lighting, furniture costs and in my experience you will be hugely more productive working from home where there are far fewer distractions than you would encounter working in an office. You will be fresher when you arrive at your desk having commuted down the stairs rather than down the motorway [freeway/turnpike/peage/autobahn]. Typically the coffee's better too!
As someone who currently telecommutes and also works part time, I'd say I have one of the best setups ever. While I have taken a 25% pay cut, I am able to work from anywhere I want, allowing me to not only save on commuting, but also work from anywhere I want. I've taken advantage of this to spend the last 3 months living in Colorado where I am able to ski 3-4 days a week and plan on spending the month of May visiting friends on the west coast.
At least at my (software developer) job, they were fine with me doing 1/2 my time during the working day and 1/2 of my time in the evenings (I usually do big pushes in the evenings, so I write in the evening, the testers test in the morning and report stuff back to me which I fix the following evening).
Honestly, you could offer to pay me 2-3x as much and I wouldn't give up the set up I have. That said, I realize my situation is fairly unique and is likely due to the fact that I'm working for a small mid-west start up (about 25 employees); but that said, if there is any to get freedom of location and/or time I would highly recommend taking it.
That said, there are some disadvantages: I do miss some of the office comradery and also I have to keep strict accounting of my time. While in the office you can take 1/2 hour for lunch or waste 10 minutes here-or-there on Facebook, when telecommuting, that really is a no-no. If you put down time on your timesheet, that is actual time worked, not time in office. As such, I find myself actually doing about 1/2 - 1 hour more of work a day than in the office where I can just log my time sitting in my chair. It's a tradeoff, but at least in my opinion, one well worth making.
Case in point: Me. I took a 20% pay cut to go to telecommuting. I gained back 520 hours a year of my life just from the commute alone. That doesn't even take into consideration the amount of interaction I get with my family during the day, and especially having lunch dates with my wife.
Before commenting on the Bible, please read it first
My commute is 40 miles each way.
I leave in the dark and come home in the dark.
I can do 99% of my job from a keyboard.
I'd telecommute for TWENTY PERCENT less.
I am my own gestalt.
My commute is 14 minutes -- in traffic. When I work from home, I have kids who don't respect the sanctity of my work, and while my wife does, she can't help but ask me to do one little thing here and there. Working at home I don't get hallway conversations, I don't run into people in the hallways and catch up on the latest exciting thing they're doing (or advertise for a position in my department).
At work, I have better bandwidth, I'm closer to my lab, and someone else pays the electricity bill. My work desk is big enough to spread out everything I need to work on, while at home my iMac is pushed to the front of my desk so it's easier to see with my feet up.
If they want to offer me 10% more because they don't want to pay the facilities and utilities charges associated with storing my butt, we're within negotiating space, but I would walk away from a 10% "take it or leave it".
According to the article, "The average tech pro was paid $79,384 last year, according to Dice's annual salary survey"
I would like to know what part of the US that happened in last year? What industry, etc.
please! ( -:
I'd love to work at home but then how would I communicate with my co-workers?
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I work from home almost exclusively. I have done so for more than 10 years now. In order to make that work smoothly, I charge roughly 33% less than I would theoretically charge going into an office. In my experience that 10% number isn't enough to make it stick. Its not enough savings to make it worth the extra hassle of someone telecommuting.
I wouldn't ever telecommute, even for a pay increase. I might not like most of the people I work with, but I need at least a little face to face social interaction to keep life worth living. Sitting in my dark room by myself reading emails and grinding away at decade old c scripts would remind me too much of the years when my existence consisted entirely of WoW and sleeping.
I took this crappy job just to get away from that.
Would I take a pay cut to telecommute? No, but then I only live 15 minutes for work (which includes stopping for coffee).
Ceci n'est pas un sig.
Having said that I wouldn't go 100% telecommute either. One day a week or maybe two at most. More than that and you lose face to face interaction with co-workers and supervisors/managers. I could have done a recent project completely at home with no supervision but all anyone would have seen would be the end result. It's just as important to be able to physically present the process you go through in order to be appreciated for the work you do. No appreciation for the work = you don't get appreciated as an employee and you'll be passed up on opportunities.
So the average pay of $75,000 or whatever is irrelevant. What is the median pay of a tech worker?
That being said of course if we can telecommute it's better than wasting time traveling to and from work, or preparing / dressing up for work. Thats a complete waste of productivity.
How about the companies pay us more to work from home since it benefits them and lowers their cost for office space? Yep didn't think so...
-Xen
If trains would increase productivity, lets tax workers and build more train tracks?
Human need for company & interaction is understandable, however, what I don't understand is that why are we discussing this in terms of either-or. i have seen plenty of folks who telecommute 1-2 days a week and are perfectly fine with it. This also allows more types/numbers of jobs to be telecommute-able since usually even those jobs that can be done remotely can need occasional 'human touch'.
We are always correct.. even when we realize we were wrong.
As someone who works for a company that has frozen raises for the last 4+ years while still compensating executives with increasing amounts of equity-based incentives (read: options), I'd be willing to stop asking for increased compensation in return for working from home.
You should be asking for an increase of 10% since the company will likely save that much in overhead. .. saving my company my office space .. desk / chair / computer / bandwidth / coffee etc etc. .. thats a significant saving right there. .. .. and FUZE ..
I work from home
Oh and since 3 of us did it we also don't require a group PA
In return we received a salary increase of 10% first year and 2.5% for each year since
Oh and we use Skype for most of our group conferences
I'm seriously considering relocating to Singapore since it will not significantly impact my daily work routine and I can cover off some additional hours our local "office" can't.
as a full time home worker for a mutil national, this is very close to the truth in many ways, it's scary.
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/working_home
Since I've been doing embedded Linux and Android work, I mostly work from home AND my pay is higher. Its a simple supply and demand thing. Go where the demand is, and you'll get better pay and a better work environment.
The Bolachek Journals
Personally I'd be very happy coming into an office but with a 4 day or 3 day week.
Its long been a problem with our society that our mark-space ratio for work-time/normal-time is lower than 1, its just ridiculous.
Pretty much since the invention of the plough it has not been true that 1 human = 1 unit of human work. 1 human can do an awful lot thanks to machinery, and where there IS a 1-1 ratio the movement of the economy is dictated primarily by fascism - if you live in China you do a full days work for nothing, effectively fulfilling the job of an assembly robot. If you are a tradesman in a european country (like Australia) you will complain endlessly about having to pay tax but you are also paid far more than you or your time is worth.
These distortions muddy the arguments about the working week, and disguise the basic fact: Its too long, and its killing all of us.
Personally, I'm not a big fan of telecommuting myself, I LIKE having to go to another place to work. Its Modal, it helps me.
But other upright apes are different.
And I have to admit a laptop on the beach is starting to sound mighty attractive too!
But personally - I'd dump SOME of the pay, not 2/5 of it but maybe 1/6, for a 3 day week, and I think that's the more important issue.
I just switched jobs from a full time onsite to a 20% travel telecommute job. I was initially offered a 8% pay cut, but after my interviews was offered a higher salary than my previous one. The ability to walk away for a while, the lack of stress, and being at home really makes this feel more like a vacation than a real job. It's the happiest I have been so far in any job.
Telecompute is so.... 90s. I hate to say it. But we've moved past that.
The future is ROWE. Results Oriented Work Environment. In a ROWE only results matter. Not how you get it done, or where you get it do it.
In essence, if you can get your work done from a tropical island (with good wifi), then by all means do it. You are not paid for putting your butt in a seat, but rather for your productivity.
ROWE treats employees as adults who know how to manage their own time. Telecommuting, "flex time" and the like are just ways of rewarding employees with what they should already have... control over their lives.
ROWE came out of a successful experiment at Best Buy (HQ not retail stores). Its been adopted by a lot of big name companies, including Netflix.
To learn more, check out: http://gorowe.com/
I switched my company to ROWE last year after months of due diligence. And we've never looked back.
David
David Whatley
The price paid for gas (7G/year) and proposed pay cut by one poster (20G/year) is more than I even make in a year!
No...because pharmacists can't telecommute. Doesn't really work.
Easy douchebag. Its called not being a slave for money!
For the last 9 years it has been 4 days a week at home, 1 in the office, $110K, 21 days vacation and 13 days sick leave per year. I'd take a 30% cut to keep on like this, but why rock the boat?
I don't have kids so there are no day-care costs, but I hate commuting 30-45 minutes twice a day. It's not the worst commute ever, but the cost savings in gas and car wear, in addition to being able to sleep in an extra hour a day would make it worth a small cut. Not sure about 10% though... Maybe 5%.
I've worked from home the past 15 years and love it. I go into the office one day a week, sometime twice if needed. I'd gladly take a 10% cut to continue doing this. Yea, you work more hours (trust me on that one) than those in office but travel time, parking, office BS. God I love working at home.
I've telecommuted for years and the company I work for now encourages it. Fact is, I rarely speak with another employee in my division that doesn't work from home even all the managers I know work from home I'm flat out amazed that anyone thinks they would have communications problems. For small groups you can use IM or anyone remember IRC? Hell I used IM and IRC when I was in the office. The team is always on the IRC channel so quick bits are easy and you get to use the hive mind on things very rapidly.
In general I prefer that people schedule a time on my calendar to talk to me. Too often when I worked in an office, people would just "pop by" and waste an hour of my time I had intended to use otherwise. Being home also makes taking international meetings a bit more palatable. Nothing like taking a meeting in you PJs.
Those that say that working from home means your job can be done elsewhere need to wake up! Your job can be done elsewhere regardless! You compete on a world talent market and you shouldn't forget that.
I do work more but I can also leave @ 5pm to go do fun stuff too.
Even if a team of Nobel-prize winning economists would tell me the monetary value of telecommuting, the Chimpanzee part of my brain would reject the proposition that the lower paycheck would be worth the reduced stress, time wasted, less spent on gas money, insurance, car payments, and maintenance.
I emigrated to NZ a couple of years ago and (for all intents and purposes) kept my job, based in London, for a large multinational company.
;). There's obvious stuff like self-discipline, but that's covered adequately by others...
;)
:)
I haven't seen my "output" decrease due to working without supervision, but nor have I seen it increase due to avoiding workplace interaction
Even if you are the most disciplined person in the world, your wife/husband/S.O. will expect you to be able to drop everything to "nip to the shops", "hang out the washing" or "make my laptop work" etc. so it's important to be able to set boundaries. Others have said that working from home induces clients to call at all hours, but this can be easily solved with called ID or by having separate work and home numbers but..you can't do this with your partner, without causing significant problems, so you need their co-operation if you're going to have a stress-free work day. Some lee-way in choosing my hours and the ability to be flexible is one of the few perks I have, but its easy to end up taking orders from a different boss
Also, you are taking on all/most of the overheads that were previously taken care of by your employer. You may or may not have to cover the cost of your computer/network connection and stationery but you also need to consider that you'll have to heat/cool the house during the day, buy a comfortable chair, cover additional wear and tear on the carpet/kettle. etc. etc. So, while you will probably save money on commuting (~£2000/year in my case), there are those costs to consider as well.
I'm contracting now, being paid in pounds, but since I don't get paid for holidays, have no employee benefits, have to cover the overheads running my office etc. etc. etc... I'm marginally worse off than if I'd stayed in the UK but better off than if I'd had to find work in the small town in NZ where we now live. (My wife is from here, and wanted to return home...so I didn't have much of a choice.
I have worked for a couple of very small software companies which did not supply any office space to anyone.
Now, I own my own company and based upon the answers in this thread... not only can I save money by not providing office space, but I can also pay my workers 10% less!
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Not only do I save gas money, I get to spend more time with my kids.
Regarding team communication:
We deal with the communication problem by using GotoMeeting. They provide a VoIP option so there's no need for phone calls (get a wireless head-set for $80). This cuts down on our mobile bills. Also its insanely amazing for client meetings. A lot of time its hard to get-together in person (everyone's schedule is busy and they have to allocate for driving time as well).
Other online meeting tools include Webex. (Gotomeeting is vastly cheaper although lacks some options...so If you need a lean communication tool its the one I recommend)
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As I see more and more job postings and the reqirements to be a programer, a DBA, Windows server expert with just about every microsoft product, a Linux expert, a Cisco expert, PBX expert and doing desktop support for a measley 65k.
The skill level required to soley manage a companies IT dept along with the BS politics does not even come close to what IT admins should be making.
Let's add up the above experience. Hmm looks like 400k a year to manage all that. So let's be realistic because we all know no company won't even come close to that. 100K EASY! that should be the average IT admins take home pay.
They do have to come in for a meeting once a week (which apparently doesn't count as "working in Oregon" - it is a meeting, after all.) I know one of them seems to ALWAYS do a Facebook check-in at some kind of store immediately after the meeting...
Wrong calculation -- the average pay of the 35% who are willing may not be equal to the average of all tech pros. So the 10% cut might be far from the said figure.
I don't know what the going rate is for a masochist/submissive pro nowadays but its a lot more than $7,900!
Seastead this.
I'm an independent, and I've been working from home several years ago. At first it seemed nice, sleeping in and working on my own hours. But there were a couple of things that really started to bother me after a short time: For one, you can never escape your work place, at least not if you're living in a small, 1-room apartment as I did at the time. That, to me, made it very difficult to stop thinking of work and relaxing after hours. Then, there's the problem with the little distractions at home. Nobody's looking over your shoulders, and your friends and family know you're home so they think it's okay to call and distract you, and if you're not disciplined, you might even distract yourself. I've noticed this happens a lot more when working at home. Finally, and this is probably the most important factor for me, I'd miss the interaction with my peers at work. I do not like all of them, but we do laugh a lot and generally have a lot of fun, plus we do exchange a lot of knowledge. And if they're getting too loud or annoying, I just tell them to shut up and it works :)
So, in conclusion, I'd not only not take a "pay" cut to work at home, I wouldn't even do it for more money.
If a train station is a place where a train stops, what's a workstation?
great saying by the Goblins in WoW. but truthfully, i'd have no issue taking a pay cut. that just means, less wear and tear on my car, less gas, maybe even cutting down on my insurance, less chance of getting a ticket and less headaches. probably the only issue for me is just losing some of the immediacy to my coworkers that i enjoy at times. not all the time, but it's good having people around you sometimes like when you're encountering a particularly difficult problem or just want someone to chat with. sometimes IMS isn't a great substitute for a physical sit down.
Will I take a pay cut to telecommute full time? Well, that would depend on a lot of factors, really.
I have been working from home the past almost three years for a wonderful start-up. Before I joined them, I was working at a company I used to drive a long way to every morning in rush hour traffic, only to find crappy places to park cars where I'd risk getting my car bumped or scratched on any given day (lest I paid an unbelievable amount to park my car at some dedicated parking of a hotel nearby, as the company didn't provide parking). By the time I reached the office, I felt completely exhausted and tired. On the way back home, I struggled with the rush hour traffic again, taking anywhere from one to two or more hours to get home completely dead. It was peaceful inside the office, though, with air-cos on 24/7. I didn't have to worry about the sky-rocketing power bills or the ever increasing power cuts (I live in a country that is plagued with problems that make it impossible to get even basic necessites properly at times). However, I completely hated the workstations they had provided. CRT monitors! My eyes would bleed (and as I never miss the chance to bitch about it, they refused my requests to provide me with an LCD, asking me to get a doctor's recommendation letter that said that CRT cause strain on my eyes first). And of course, not to mention the fact that things in the city would turn sour every now and then, creating more problems during commuting safely back and forth.
In contrast to that, working from home has been a bliss. I have a nice set up at home in terms of my work environment. I had to however invest in a power backup generator for the times the power isn't available (which is a couple of hours every day if life is good for us). Because of the hot weather mostly here, I have to keep the air-co running on most times when I am working (because that is possibly the only way to stay sane while working, otherwise the heat gets to you badly). This eventually causes the power bill to go significantly up. The company does contribute, but I'd like them to do so more gratuitously. Of course, I also have to get a good Internet connection for work (Internet is still somewhat expensive over here). So, while the work is enjoyable, and I love working from home, these concerns do bother me all the time. I know that these won't really apply to everywhere or everyone, but for me, these are some of the factors that I weigh in when deciding whether it is better to telecommute. I have not had any issue with communications. We are mostly always on Skype and IM and IRC and of course over email. I think that if I didn't have to worry about the power-cuts, and could run the air-co all the time while working without feeling a little guilty or worried about the power bill, I would be much happier than I am right now.
So you are saying
Telecommuting means employees save money, so its okay for the company to cut pay to allow to telecommute.
I totally agree by your logic. But then they should pay extra to employees who work from farther. For example not telecommuting for your colleague ranked same as you and at the same post in your company could be 12000$ extra. So you are okay with him getting 6000$ extra because he drives a SUV, or lives farther away?
A company should never pay an employee for his lifestyle. Pay and hikes should be paid on work performance. Not how an employee works or from where he works.
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Working from home saves on office space at the employer. Office space at prime locations costs an arm and a leg. Considering that, payment should remain the same or rise actually.
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
I work 3 days at home, 2 in the office. That way I get the best of both worlds, collegue face time for meetings plus at home I get extra hours and save commute costs. My commute is 1.5-2hrs each way so I can start earlier at home, get more done and finish earlier to spend time with my family. It also makes things easier for the rare times I need to work weekends or fix something, no more hours on the train to do a 5 min fix. My employer was quite keen on telecommuting to save having such big buildings to stuff us all in so they pay £500 to let us build our home office (chair, desk etc) then pay a % of the electric/gas bills after that. Or team is all over the place anyway at different sites so it really makes very little difference as most work is done via remote logins, phone based meetings etc.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
My employer already does not compensate me for the hours and days I support their crappy systems. So a big NO I say. Study after study says that bosses with telecommuters do not value or rate employees as well as daily office dwellers. I think those who can not commute get jealous, and if that's your bosses, well your screwed. Saving money is not what IT is all about. Driving money making business is what it's about!
Telecommuting means, literally, commuting at a distance, or remote commuting, just like television means vision at a distance, or remote vision, and telecommunication means communication over a distance.
As such, the word "telecommuting" is a pleonasm and thus nonsensical, the creation of a very confused, uneducated person.
Teleworking on the other hand means working at a distance, or from far away (from the office), and the term that should be used.
Not all jobs that involve telecommuting can be outsourced. I do a three month call rotation. When on call, I'm available 24x7. The 5% of the problems that require a site visit require me to get there within 2 hours. Try that from India! The two hours a day I drive to work and back are gone from my life forever. What a waste, sitting in a car.for 2 hours a day, every day for your entire life. Gone forever.
Please mod me 1 or troll. It's where the truth is these days, even on Slashdot. Beware the power of moderators everywh
No way. Not since our stupid government (Denmark) decided to add a tax on the ability to bring your work laptop home. They figure it's just like getting a PC for free. Except it's not, because my home PC contains all kinds of things that have nothing to do on a work PC (including porn), my personal stuff (including porn) takes up more hard drive space than I have free space on my work laptop, and then there's the whole thing about any development I do on my work PC might belong to the company, even if it's personal stuff.
And then the assholes decided to make May 2nd official "work from home day", to incite more people to work from home. How about repealing the tax instead, and get all those people to work from home again, who gave up the privilege when they started taxing doing so.
Telecommuting costs the company LESS than having offices, why should you take a pay cut? If anything, you should be getting a small raise!
~Syberz
It all depends on the workplace policy for telecommuting. Where I'm currently at, we offer telecommuting and flextime. I don't participate in either since being the sysadmin if something blows up, you have to come in anyway no matter what your schedule is.
That being said, I wouldn't mind working from home a couple of days a week since the majority of my day is monitoring systems or researching, I can do that easily from my couch. But that is where the catch is in our organization. To remote work or telecommute, the person needs to have a dedicated workspace to just their work related activities, a secured location to save work materials, and "isolation" from the rest of the house. So as a number of other people have mentioned things like saving on daycare and such, if it is discovered that your kids are playing on your work system or you are supplementing daycare by working at home those are grounds for revoking the teleworking if not a full firing.
Sure there are holes in the system, like managers that want to stay the employee's friend and not enforce the policies. I have several employees that we know for a fact are supplementing daycare or out golfing when they are "telecommuting." Unfortunately there isn't anything that can be done about a manager that refuses to enforce their own policies.
My average commute is 15 miles each way. For a 5 day work week (not counting oncall trips due to failed hardware), that's 150 miles a week. I have a Jeep Wrangler that gets about 15 miles per gallon - but it's paid for (no car payments) - so that's roughly 10 gallons of gas per week. At $3.80 (in Minnesota) my average fuel bill is $38.00 per week. There are 4.33 weeks in a month, so I can expect to spend no less than $164.54 a month on gas just for work. The annual cost would be $1,974.48.
If I didn't use the car for anything else, I could factor in the maintenance costs, but since I do use it for other things, the only expense I can legitimately use is fuel.
I can save some money on laundry, but that is pretty much peanuts. And besides I know technical people that don't know you are suppose to wash your clothes (and body) occasionally. So, we cannot deduct that.
Sitting around my home office in my underwear (or nothing at all) is not a deductible expense - a nice perk for some people, but not an expense.
So, bottom line, the savings are a little less than $2,000.00 a year. I could, therefore, only justify a 2% pay cut. Forget it.
Yo dawg, we heard you like computers, so we put a computer in your computer ...
This mostly depends where you live. If you live in the suburbs and are like a 20-60 min drive away, then yes telecommuting might make sense.
If your like me, I bought my house specifically close to work so I could walk every day. I got a smaller house that isn't as new (1915 VS 0-20 years old). I am close enough I even walk home for lunch most of the time. I bought a new car in 2002 and have a under 65k on it so far.
So while sure you could have your employee makes these options and decision for you, or you can decide on your own what is important to you. Personally I can't imagine spending more than 40min each day commuting to work, added up over time its crazy. I would rather live closer to work, and all that it entails. As an added bonus its great for the environment, and so far as carbon foot print is pretty hard to beat.
I worked from home for several years.
On the whole, I think it's overrated, especially by the younger crowd. When people drool over 'working from home' what they really mean is flexible hours.
You can sleep in, start "working" when you feel like it. You can do odd errants or family stuff as required without really interrupting your work... and for some reason there seems to be a glamour aspect of saying "i work from home"... BUT
You almost completely lose out on the daily office interaction and politics which, while in the short term may seem nice, has a big impact on your career in the long run. In short, if you work from home, your job is going nowhere. If you're a young IT type or code monkey, this might not seem immediately obvious or important; but it is.
I certainly wouldn't take a pay cut, as I rather like the money I make... but I wouldn't even really want to always telecommute if I could do it for free. We have a developer on our team who for other reasons has to live in another city. He's great as his job, the team is glad to have him, and sometimes I have to ask him for help on something, but I'm always happier when I can ask someone else instead - it's far easier to explain things in person than over IM. I can't even imagine that being me off by myself, having to only talk to coworkers via IM. Not to mention, I'd be distracted like crazy by the internet and stuff, working on the same computer I goof off with at home.
I could imagine doing it maybe a couple times a month if I had the option, but not every day.
I work in London but originally from SA. If the rule is work from home then I will take it literately and go home with a UK salary :)
I've been full time telecommuting for 5 years now ... or "ROWE" if you must call it that ... ... Fucked up beyond all recognition, be prepared for a living hell.
It all boils down to the same thing "get it done, no matter what".
That's just FINE if you work in a situation that is NOT fucked up.
If, however, you work at a company that is, as 99.999% of companies are
The best analogy I can think of comes from the second season of Lost. ... the dude in the bunker who had to push the button every 108 minutes or the world would end?
Remember Desmond
Welcome to your new telecommuting wonderland.
It's not that it starts out that way ... it just inevitably winds up that way. ... this means ... since you work from home that obviously you won't mind taking calls at 5 in the morning from Europe ... then taking 11pm calls from Australia *in the same work day* ... day in ... and day out.
The reason is that people don't *see* you working, and as such they presume that you are *not* working, or that you have infinite capability to take on more work. If you work for a global organization
Telecommuting is a double edged sword. It has some really, truly great advantages.
I don't waste 4 hours out of every work day in traffic. I'm here when my kids get home from school, I even know what they look like. I have indeed folded laundry on conference calls and worked in my pajamas.
I also spend almost *every waking moment* (save an hour here and there with my family), working. ... and by extention ... *by the cheapest competent person they can find in the world to do it, regardless of location*.
Because when i moved into a telecommuting position, I made it crystal clear to my company that my job can be done *from anywhere*
3 out of 5 of my co-workers will be replaced by offshore development resources (i.e. cheap mo-fo's who'll do the same thing for 1/8th the cost) by the end of the year. So now I have to *zero* leverage to push back when things get overwhelming.
Yeah, telecommuting (or ROWE or whatever) can be great ... but like I said ... it's pandora's box.
considering the $ per foot in my office building , i'll take a pay RAISE for them not to have to pay rent for my cube space
And I would not go back if you paid me more!
Ok, it was kind of forced upon me. I got laid off and the best job I could get as the job market started to tank was a telecommuting job for a company that had no offices. It had to take a $20K salary cut but I was employed when my peers were not and was able to make ends meet. I'm still not back to my former salary but frankly, I'm turning down better offers just because I'd have to commute ~2 hours a day.
What's two hours of your life worth?
Aside from day care costs (which I have none), or the cost of commuting, or your pay rate... What is your time worth?
What is your blood pressure worth?
Getting in urban traffic and fighting with idiots with licenses to endanger lives is not my idea of a healthy endeavor. Forget about the financial cost of fuel, insurance, payments... driving is stressful!
I could go on and on but then I'd just be a bore. There is certainly a down side that should not be ignored. Telecommuting is not for everyone. It takes more self discipline than most of my former co-workers have (you are the only one keeping you off facebook all day). The hardest discipline is actually ending your work day. When the computer is just around the corner it's all to easy to "Just do that one task that's bothering you". I think the hardest part is a lack of social interaction. Try not talking to anyone at work about non work stuff for the next month (I give most of you a week at best). It's easy and healthy to chat over the cube walls while still tuning an ugly bit of SQL code. you don't get that opportunity when telecommuting. Chatting with your co-workers over IM about last night's game takes your attention away from your task resulting in longer less productive days so you eventually stop doing it (or go looking for a new job). Lately, I've taken to absconding the company conference line when not in use just so we can chat over the virtual cubicle walls. My boss would surely shit if he knew but I see it as a mental health hour.
Regardless of whether you take a cut now to telecommute, unless everyone, or nearly everyone, at work telecommutes you will find you won't get the raises that you would have working physically close to the ones that make the decisions about pay. This is really untestable, and there are bound to be exceptions, but I think it is probably the case most of the time. The other thing to note is that it's harder to move up the org chart if you are telecommuting. That said, I have been a happy and distant telecommuter for almost all of the last 20 years.
I'm also guessing that anyone who leaves a child to "free range" won't object when you're spending your retirement money to bail him out of jail in about 10 years......
Just more lame parents who think plugging their kid in to a an electronic device or turning them out for everyone else to deal with is a fine idea.
And people wonder why I despise OPC (Other People's Children). It should be legal to slap the parents when the kids are being a brat in public.
Examples from my recent experience - While out having dinner a nice restaurant, I am assaulted by a child who is about 8 years old and who is busily clearing his parent's table by throwing everything from food to the condiment containers - mostly in my direction. When the salt shaker lands in my plate of food, I ask them to have him stop. Do they say anything to the child? Oh no! Instead, I get some crap about how he's expressing himself. I tell the father that if he doesn't want me to "express myself" he needs to get his ugly squealing brat under control because I'm pay just as much to eat there as he is. While I am dealing with the parents, the little miscreat has left her parent's table and moved to my table where she is now eating off my plate. At this point, the parents have the nerve to tell me "Oh, look she LIKES you." My response was, "Good, because you just bought my dinner. The veal and lobster really are quite good here."
While waiting in the ticket line at the movie theater, a couple and their children walk up behind me. They have two boys who are playing with yo-yos. Now that doesn't sound bad until I tell you that their "idea" of playing with the yo-yo's is to try to clock each other in the head with them. All the thrashing around, shoving, and fighting results in me be whacked with the yo-yo's. When I ask the boys to please stop because they're not just hitting each other, the mother starts screaming at me that I can't tell her children what to do. At that point, I tell her that she can either make it stop or the yo-yo's are going to end up in a very uncomfortable spot for her.
At a completely different movie theater and parents bring a toddler - barely walking - to Grindhouse. The poor child was so frightened she screamed though the entire movie and was still screaming as her parents sedately waddled back out to their car. OMFG! Who takes a child to Grindhouse????
HDGary secures my bank
I have a few reasons why I would not. A) The fridge is too close, B) Too many distractions such as cutting the grass, painting a room, C) I need a social life that working provides. The A) and C) are the most important reasons to explain why I would not telecommute. It is important to be with a real person, rather than an image of a person via skype or whatever,
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
I'm in the process of doing exactly this right now. Which is hilarious, since my current boss and closest coworker both telecommute, so instead of phoning and emailing them from home, I drive 60 miles each way to phone and email them from my employers while the department head yaks at us "We don't want to be spending money on desk space for you if you don't want to be here physically, as long as you get your work done" but the boss says "Oh gosh no, it isn't up to me, its my boss who says no you can't." That uberboss being directly under that department head who said yes you should. I wonder sometimes if they're actually trying to get me to leave the department or maybe just go crazy. Either way, maybe then they can hire somebody who will take 10% less, AND drive in to the office every day.
I was almost given the opportunity to stay at home for a considerable pay cut today ... luckily I kept my job ...
Sure enough, the cow costume was hanging up next to the superhero outfit and sailors uniform. (S,Spud)
"free range" does not mean what you think it means in this case. It means giving your child the tools and discipline to act appropriately and independently without having to worry that they'll behave as you describe. "free range" does mean wild. It means capable and allowed to grow given the right tools and parameters. It means meeting your neighbors and exchanging phone numbers and other information. Free Range kids means guidance and empowerment, and lots of good consistent parenting, while not being over-protective. It does not mean abandoning a child in the way you describe.
Operator, give me the number for 911!
I work from home. I've outsourced my job, well actually I work for three different companies full time, so I've outsourced my jobs to 4 contract programmers in India and Thailand.
When I get an assignment from any one of my employers, I task one of my contract workers with the actual work. When he's done he ftp's the file(s) to me, and I peer review and then commit the work as me.
I pay out one of my salaries to the 4 contractors, and keep two. It's like this:
1. Establish telecommuting.
2. Get multiple gigs
3. Hire cheap contract programmers to do the work. ----normally this is ????
4. PROFIT!
See subject line above.
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Best telecommuting
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