The Telecommuter Manifesto

Since most telecommuters are used to being at home for normal work days, they may be dissuaded from ever taking a sick day.  Don’t fall into that trap.

There are two main reasons why you should take sick time when you need it:

First, working when you’re sick will cause both your health and your work to suffer.  Even if it’s just a mental health day, if your body is telling you it needs a break, you should listen.  Ask yourself whether you would stay home if you worked in an office.  If the answer is yes, keep your work computer and phone turned off, and give your body the time it needs.

Second, many companies hire employees under the lure of total compensation.  That means they sell you on the entire package of benefits, not just the money they pay you.  If you want to take full advantage of their compensation, then you should use one of those benefits (sick days) when you need one.  Particularly if you work for a company where unused sick time is lost at the end of the year, not taking a necessary day off is effective lowering your salary.  Though some may read this to mean that you should take all of your sick time, whether you’re sick or not, my point is just that sick time is there for your benefit and should be used when it’s needed.

A day off when you’re feeling down can allow you to return refreshed and more productive.  Taking a single day to get over a cold may actually detract from your progress a lot less than plugging along at diminished capacity for many days.  Even though you don’t run the risk of infecting coworkers if you telecommute sick, it is still in your — and your company’s — best interest to take any and all necessary sick time.

Even if you fully embrace the telecommuting lifestyle, other people in your life might not fully understand it.  That means that friends, neighbors, and even family members might stop by during the workday as if it were the weekend.

I ran into this situation when my new home was being completed.  We had already moved in at that point and were waiting for a few last minute details to be finished.  The builder’s assistant knew that I worked from home and rarely kept appointments as a result.  He’d schedule to arrive to complete a task at say, 9:00 AM, and then call to say that an emergency at another site was keeping him away.  If it happened a few times, it would have been one thing.  But it happened every time.  When I finally confronted him about it he admitted that since I was home all day anyway he didn’t feel bad blowing me off for other customers.  He failed to realize the value of my time, or that I too had to plan my day around the scheduled time.  I tried to convince him of these points and though he kept appointments from then on, I don’t feel he truly understood my situation.

Being able to help out a friend or neighbor in an emergency is one of the nice features of telecommuting.  It’s important to make everyone realize what constitutes an emergency though.  Your goal should be to get these people to ask themselves “would I call him at the office to help me with this problem?”  If the answer is yes, then by all means call me up or stop by.  If not, respect that during the day I am at work, even if I am still in my house.

Another trick that can work well in certain situations is to use a signal.  You might open a window shade during your lunch break, or if you could handle being interrupted.  In other cases, you should only be disturbed in the most dire of circumstances.

Often, you’ll become adjusted to your life as a telecommuter before others around you truly understand it.  As they learn, give them a little slack, but remain firm to ensure your time and work get the respect they deserve.

One of the main ways that telecommuting improves efficiency over working at an office is by eliminating the many workplace distractions.  Few office workers have a place where they can get away to focus on their work.  Without an office and an accompanying door to close, they are just a moments notice away from the next interruption.  It can come in the form of a colleague wanting to go for coffee, a manager who drops by with a “quick” question, or a nearby conversation too loud to ignore.  In my old office the cleaning crew even came by and vacuumed our cubicles during the work day!

Working from home certainly has its distractions too, but you are much more in control of whether or not they will effect you.  Workers who turn on the tv, pay bills, or straighten up the house during the workday aren’t long for the telecommuting world.  The benefit of telecommuting is that you tend to be alone.  If you need a quiet hour to concentrate and get some work done, you can simply turn off your ringer, close your email program, and get the work done.  You are in control of your environment, so you can shut out the distractions that would otherwise hinder your productivity.