Virtual Office Resource

Is it too soon to say that telecommuting is no longer a fad, something that would disappear after a few years? The results of several studies on the subject indicate that it’s probably not too soon. The office is becoming the virtual office, and fewer companies debate on the matter of allowing telecommuting, but instead argue about the best way to implement it.

The volume of research on telecommuting has become so great that it has almost become an embarrassment of riches. The New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) found that 45 percent of employees work from home.

GlobalWorkplaceAnalytics.com has compiled additional results: since 1995 regular work-at-home has increased 103 percent. In 2014 alone, the increase was 6.5 percent, the largest annual increase since the 2008 recession.

These results do not include freelancers, which are a sizable group (NJIT places the number at 53 million) but have nothing to do with employer-to-employee workplace trends. By their very nature many freelancers often work from home, or other environments outside traditional offices.

Since the growth of telecommuting is all but undeniable, how do employers make sure the work is getting done and they’re not merely paying employees to post cat pictures on Facebook (News - Alert) or binge watch Mad Men on Netflix?

Inc. Magazine writer Minda Zetlin offers a few useful ideas. Companies should consider software that tracks virtual employee activity automatically. Having employees track their activity manually is less accurate and takes time out of their workday. Companies should also focus on what a virtual employee gets done and not on what time of day they did it.

Several of her other ideas are really just different forms of communication where management keeps virtual employees engaged, gets to know them better, but also sets regular check-in times to keep everyone accountable.

Since telecommuting makes the use of online conferencing a necessity, it is important that meetings are not time-consuming to setup. PCMag.com writer Erik Grevstad recently shared how an HP rep told him that two-fifths of employees’ time is spent in meetings or conference calls and that on average, the first 12 minutes of any conference call is spent resolving technical issues preventing attendees from connecting.

Although such an account is anecdotal, it illustrates that conferencing technology can negate whatever productivity gains telecommuters gain from working at home away from office distractions.

However, such obstacles are technological in nature and will be eventually ironed out over time. They certainly are not going to stop the tidal wave of telecommuting. Millennials expect companies to support virtual offices, and now that they are the largest age group in the workforce, it’s safe to say that telecommuting will soon take over offices across the U.S.