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ASP Forum
Office Closures and Telecommuting
"We occasionally have to close our offices because of heavy snow.
Most of our employees have PCs and can keep working from home,
but a few don't. I don't feel it's fair to dock the pay of the
people who can't telecommute, but it also doesn't seem right to
pay them for not working when everyone else is being productive.
Advice?"
—Matthew from Milwaukee
Matthew—
My team was facing a similar issue about two years ago. Morale
problems surfaced because my support team has to maintain business
continuity during inclement weather issues while the rest of the
campus can take a free day off. The morale was further impacted by
those on the support team who did not have the equipment available
to work from home.
We solved this problem by rolling out a Work From Home (WFH)
program for my team. We started out by allowing participants to work
from home 1 day per month. We established expectations that by
participating in the WFH program, the employee would agree to be
available during inclement weather or for business continuity
purposes. We also positioned the program as a benefit (not a right).
Participants must have an available PC, phone line and broadband
internet connection. We do not provide the equipment nor reimburse
for these costs.
We purchased licenses to enable our reps to connect to our ACD
system from home, so they do not incur any long distance charges
when making outbound calls. They can also field incoming calls as if
they were in the office. We also made sure all reps had access to a
VPN connection so they can remotely connect to their work PCs from
home. This means they do not have to install any additional software
or tools to troubleshoot issues with customers. They can simply
connect to their station and access everything they would normally
access while in the office. We also enabled the staff to view our
real-time call display information using a free web-desktop sharing
tool.
Upon first roll-out, the initial participate rate was about 50%.
We were able to work out some technical kinks over a period of 3
months or so. We increased the frequency to bi-weekly and several more
people joined the program. We checked to see if there was a noticeable
drop-off in productivity but all levels remained the same. Several
people were holding out from participation until we went to a weekly
cycle so they could justify the cost of upgrading their dial-up ISP
service to broadband. After another 6 months or so we increased the
frequency to weekly and more people joined the program.
We noticed no decrease in productivity as a result of the program. In
fact we found that people were more likely to work OT during busy
season if they could do it from the comforts of home. Rather than
spending time getting ready for work and commuting, they could use
those precious minutes to connect in and work.
The morale issues of old are long gone. All participants realize that
they get to WFH up to 50 times a year with the trade-off being that
they MIGHT have to WFH 1-3 times a year during inclement weather while
others have a free day. With the rising cost of gas these days, this
is a win-win for all the participants. We do not have 100%
participation because there are some people that do not have a
suitable WFH environment or they just prefer to be in the office, but
we are very happy with the results of our program and so are the
participants.
One of the other added benefits to our WFH program is that whenever
we do call our business continuity plan into action, agents do not
have to scramble and re-learn how to connect remotely to our system
because they are already well versed in the process through their WFH
participation. Prior to having a WFH program, whenever we had an
inclement weather day, I spent much of my morning fielding calls and
emails from my agents asking “how do I” questions to just get
connected to the system. This is a non-issue now.
Also, the WFH program gives us some added leverage to extend extra
WFH days to participants after the roads have been deemed clear to
drive on. In the past we had an employee try to make his way into
work after we gave the ‘all clear’ to come in to work because the
‘ice had cleared’. While driving, he slid off the road causing some
damage to his car. Luckily he was not injured, but he ended up
turning back to go home because it was clearly not safe for him on the
roads he was using. He ended up ‘wasting’ a day just to get his
insurance and car matters taken care of rather than being safe and
productive for the company in the comfort of his home. Now, we let the
staff make their own decision to come into the office after they feel
it is safe to come in (within reason).
Hope this information helps.
—Charles D. Alvear charles.alvear@sage.com
Sr. Manager, Customer Support, Nonprofit
Solutions
Sage Software
949-923-3953
What’s wrong with purchasing some low cost laptops that can be
sent home with those who don’t have PC access? You should have an
indication of snow days at least 24 hours in advance. It’s easier
to track, let’s the people without PC’s know that they are important
to the company and during non-winter months can be used for extra at
home work.
—Jesse Green
Pinger
We had a similar problem (unreliable public transportation that
affected bus riders but not people who drove cars). We gave the
employees who couldn't make it to work a choice—either take
a paid personal day or arrange a makeup today. Since most employees
wanted to save their personal days for other purposes, most asked
for the makeup choice. We mostly scheduled them on weekends and
holidays, when it was sometimes hard to find volunteers to man the
phones. No complaints about fairness, at least so far.
—Anon.
"Just wait a few years and global warming will solve your problem."
—Al Gore
[Any other advice on this question? Please send an email to
membership director Jane Farber at jfarber@asponline.com, and
we'll post your feedback.]
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