This link is inspired by a conversation I had this morning about a boss who demanded his people work 8 to 5 in the office OC's philosopy and I think one that a lot of companies should adopt (Best Buy got a lot pub for doing so) is it is not where or when you work but how good that work is and that it is done on time. Though I must admit it gets lonely in the office sometimes.
Yeah, he mentioned it was frowned upon to leave right at 5.
If you are going ask your employees to put in extra hours, the least you could do is let them work where they are comfortable.
And to disclaim, some people like to work at an office (I do for one). Second, sometimes it is very helpful to have everyone in the office. When we are putting the finishing touches on a project for example.
But treating people like adults and giving them some freedoms seems like a good idear to me.
Hey. Some people like two shifts 12pm-5pm and 12am-3am, or some such. Apparently I'm one of them. Although, I set my alarm for 7:45 every morning and generally wake up an hour or two later. What the he|| I do for 2-3 hours each morning is beyond me. But, I think in the last 5 years I've averaged well over 40 hour work weeks and have far more 'atta boys then awe shits.
Here's to flexible schedules.
Using the network as the platform, this can easily be achieved these days using a typical teleworker solution. You can get your employees a home cisco router that is VPN'd into the corporate network and a cisco phone to connect to it. No one would be able to tell the difference between them being in the office or at home (unless they actually wanted to see them) but you can always get them a camera for the PC to see them when you are on a call ;-)
Great intro for my shameless plug! THanks bear ;-)
Jimmy, why don't you push to start a new division at Cisco's who's market focus is the tele-commuters and the companies that hire them.
OC will do all the online marketing for this division.
Thanks for the chance to make the pitch.
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One of the last companies I worked for (and who knows it might be the same company as above) had an owner who not only thought you should be there between 8 and 5 but if you left right on the clock he would come down on you big time. Needless to say a lot of people "played the game". The funny thing is since I have started my own company I do have odd hours and often they are more but I'm not tied down to just my office but have the freedom to work in multiple locations as the need calls. It's not the hours. It's the passion.