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Episode 10 of “The JoyPowered™ Workspace Podcast,” combines our popular “The Growing Trend of Working Remotely” and “Work from Home Technology” episodes and is eligible for one credit. JoDee and Susan discuss the benefits, problems, and common concerns of working remotely. Special guest Bob from Polycom explains some of the technology that makes working from home easier.

Only about 23% of the US population say they work remotely, but 80% say they want to work at home at least part of the time. JoDee and Susan have loved having the option to work from home during their careers, but many employers are wary of the trend. Some employers fear losing control of the security of company information and employees becoming disconnected from each other. On the other hand, benefits of allowing employees to work from home include cost savings, increased productivity, and more engaged employees.

To successfully work remotely, you need to be able to take charge of your schedule and figure out what works for you. Knowing what times of day are best for meetings vs. individual work or creating “Theme Days” like days for invoicing or client appointments may help you focus. Most jobs can be done remotely, you just need to make it work for the organization’s and your personal needs.

Special guest Bob Knauf from Polycom discusses several technology solutions that can make working from home easier, including audio technology that filters out background noise, applications that run on tablets and phones, virtual meeting rooms, VPNs, and virtual time clocks. Just make sure your team is comfortable with the technology, otherwise they won’t use it and your program will be unsuccessful.

If you want to start working remotely, you can search out companies specifically for their work from home policies. If you want to stay with your current company, start slow; work a few days from home, gradually adding more over time, instead of immediately moving to another state and working from home full-time. Show you’re equally as good at home as you are at the office, and always be available during business hours, even if that just means checking your cell phone when you take your kid to the doctor.

In this episode’s listener mail, Julia asks about convincing her boss to allow her to work from home, and Edith wants to know how to address her boss about his long meetings about every issue (big and small) that rarely end in decisions.

Mentioned in This Episode:

• Purple Ink, the HR consulting firm JoDee owns
• Susan Tinder White Consulting, the HR consulting firm Susan owns
• JoyPowered, JoDee’s book
• Dropbox, the file storage system Purple Ink uses
• “You’re 87% More Likely to Love Your Job if You Work from Home”, a Forbes article about telecommuting
• Flexjobs.com, a website that has lots of meaningful job opportunities that you can do from home
• “Actively Disengaged and Staying”, an Aon Hewitt study that discusses disengaged workers staying at their jobs
• StrengthsFinder, an assessment that JoDee and Susan promote
• Polycom, the communication technology company where guest host Bob works
• Facetime, a video call solution available on Apple products
• Skype, a video call solution
• Remote.co, a resource for finding remote jobs
• Microsoft Office 365, a system that (among other things) will allow administrators to track what the users are doing with it
• Carlson Wagonlit Travel, a company that’s successful at allowing their employees to work from home from all over the US
• Zoom, a video conferencing solution
• BlueJeans, a video conferencing solution
• WebEx, a web conferencing solution
• PGi, a web conferencing solution