Χρήστης:Glavkos/Τηλεργασία

Τρέχουσες τάσεις

Ομοσπονδιακή Κυβέρνηση ΗΠΑ

Αν όλοι οι ομοσπονδιακοί υπάλληλοι που είναι επιλέξιμοι για τηλεργασία πλήρους απασχόλησης περνούσαν σε αυτήν, η Ομοσπονδιακή Κυβέρνηση θα πραγματοποιήσουμε οικονομίες $13.9 δισεκατομμυρίων σε κόστη μεταφορών ετησίως και θα εξαφάνιζε 21.5 δισεκατομμύρια λίβρες ρύπων από το περιβάλλον κάθε έτος.

Recent events have pushed telework to the forefront as a critical measurement for the U.S. federal government. Telework relates to continuity of operations (COOP) and national pandemic preparedness planning, reducing dependence on foreign oil and the burden of rising gas prices, the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission (BRAC), and a focus on recruitment and retention.

During a keynote address at the September 12, 2007 Telework Exchange Town Hall Meeting, Lurita Doan, at that time the Administrator for the General Services Administration, announced an aggressive commitment goal to increase agency telework participation. Her challenge will enable 50 percent of eligible agency employees to telework one or more days per week by 2010. Currently 10 percent of eligible GSA employees telework, compared to 4.2 percent for the overall Federal workforce. Her goal is to increase participation to 20 percent by the end of 2008, 40 percent by the end of 2009, and finally 50 percent by 2010.

A 2007 study of National Science Foundation employees indicated that approximately one-third participated in telework regularly, characterized staff satisfaction with the program, and noted savings in employee time and greenhouse-gas emissions as a result of telework.

Rep. Sarbanes (D-MD) introduced the Telework Improvements Act of 2009 in March 2009. Co-sponsors of the bill included Reps. Connolly (D-VA), Wolf (R-VA), and Capito (R-WV). The bill requires each executive agency to establish a policy under which employees may be authorized to telework to the maximum extent possible without diminishing employee performance or agency operations. At the same time in the U.S. Senate, Sen. Akaka (D-HI) introduced the companion bill, along with Sens. Landrieu (D-LA) and Voinovich (R-OH).

On May 24, 2010 the Senate passed the Telework Enhancement Act (S. 707) sponsored by Sens. Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii) and George Voinovich (R-Ohio). The bill grants Federal employees eligibility to telework and requires Federal agencies to establish telework policies and identify telework managers.

On July 14, 2010 the House passed the Telework Improvements Act of 2010 (H.R. 1722) with a vote of 290-131.

The U.S. Senate passed the final version of the legislation by unanimous consent on September 29, 2010 and the House passed it with a bipartisan vote of 254-152 on November 18, 2010.

On December 9, 2010 President Obama signed H.R. 1722, the Telework Enhancement Act of 2010, into law.

Κέντρα Τηλεργασίας

Telework centers are offices that are generally set up close to a majority of people who might otherwise drive or take public transit. They usually feature the full complement of office equipment and a high-speed Internet connection for maximum productivity. Some feature support staff such as receptionists. For example, a number of telework centers have been set up around the Washington Metropolitan Area: 7 in Maryland, 8 in Virginia, 3 in Washington, D.C. and 1 in West Virginia.

Telework centers allow people to reduce their commute yet still work in a traditional office setting. Some Telework Centers are set up by individual companies while others are established by independent organizations for use by many organizations. Telework centers are attractive to people who do not have the space or inclination to work from home. They offer employers the ability to maintain a more formal structure for their workforce.

These work arrangements are likely to become more popular with current trends towards greater customization of services and virtual organizing. Distributed work offers great potential for firms to reduce costs, enhance competitive advantage and agility, access a greater variety of scarce talents, and improve employee flexibility, effectiveness and productivity. It has gained in popularity in the West, particularly in Europe. While increasing in importance, distributed work has not yet gained widespread acceptance in Asia.

Απομακρυσμένα Κέντρα Γραφείων

Ο Απομακρυσμένα Κέντρα Γραφείων, είναι διάσπαρτα κέντρα για leasing γραφείων σε άτομα από πολλαπλές εταιρίες. Ένα Απομακρυσμένο Κέντρο Γραφείων παρέχει ένα επαγγελματικό επίπεδο δικτυακής πρόσβασης, τηλεφωνικό σύστημα, σύστημα ασφαλείας, σημείο αλληλογραφίας και επιλεκτικές υπηρεσίες με επιπλέον κόστη. ROCs are generally located in areas near where people live throughout population centers, so that workers do not have to commute more than a couple of miles. The telecommuter works in a real office but accesses the company network across the internet using a VPN just as in traditional telecommuting.

This type of arrangement does not share fully in the benefits of home-based telecommuting, but can address the needs of employees who are unable or unwilling to work from home.

In September 2010, Plantronics surveyed over 1,800 team knowledge workers and published "How We Work: Communication Trends for Business Professionals." This report found that 90% of U.S. respondents work remotely at least some of the time.

Σχετικοί Όροι / Έννοιες

Office Hoteling

Some companies, particularly those where employees spend a great deal of time on the road and at remote locations, offer a hotdesking or office hoteling arrangement where employees can reserve the use of a traditional office, at the company headquarters, a Remote Office Center, or other shared office facility.

Coworking

Coworking is a social gathering of a group of people, who are still working independently, but who share a common working area as well as the synergy that can happen from working with talented people in the same space. Coworking facilities can range from shared space in formal offices to social areas such as a coffee shop.

Κατανεμημένη εργασία

Distributed work entails the conduct of organizational tasks in places that extend beyond the confines of traditional offices. It can refer to organizational arrangements that permit or require workers to perform work more effectively at any appropriate location, such as their homes and customers' sites - through the application of information and communication technology. An example is financial planners who meet clients during lunchtime with access to various financial planning tools and offerings on their mobile computers, or publishing executives who recommend and place orders for the latest book offerings to libraries and university professors, among others. If this type of distributed work replaces the workers commute, it would be considered telecommuting. If it did not, it would be considered telework.

Jellies

Some telecommuters and teleworkers form local groups that gather at coffee shops and other locations to socialize, collaborate, or just reduce the isolation of working on their own.

Ενδεχόμενα πισωγυρίσματα / Ανησυχίες

Skill variety has the strongest relationship with internal work motivation. Jobs that allow workers to use a variety of skills increase workers’ internal work motivation. If teleworkers are limited in teamwork opportunities and have fewer opportunities to use a variety of skills, they may have lower internal motivation towards their work. Also, perceived social isolation can lead to less motivation. It can be argued that without a work climate or manager nearby, the ability to motivate oneself is even more important when telecommuting than when working in an office.

Though working in an office has its distractions, it is often argued that telecommuting involves even greater distractions. According to one study, children are ranked as the number one distractions, followed by spouses, pets, neighbors, and solicitors. The lack of proper tools and facilities also serves as a major distraction, though this can be mitigated by using short-term coworking rental facilities.

Face-to-face interactions increase interpersonal contact, connectedness, and trust Therefore, 54% of teleworkers thought they lost out on social interaction and 52.5% felt they lost out on professional interaction in a 2012 study. Teleworking can hurt working relationships between the teleworker and their coworkers, especially if their coworkers do not telework. Coworkers who do not telework can feel resentful and jealous because they may consider it unfair if they are not allowed to telework as well. However, despite fewer interpersonal actions and professional isolation, a meta-analysis of telecommuting did not find support for negative telecommuter-coworker relationships or telecommuter-supervisor relationships.

Employers' largest concerns about telecommuting are fear of loss of control; 75% of managers say they trust their employees, but a third say they'd like to be able to see them, "just to be sure."

Employees who telework may feel pressure to produce more output in order to be seen as valuable, and reduce the idea that they are doing less work than others. This pressure to produce output, as well as a lack of social support from limited coworker relationships and feelings of isolation, leads to lower job engagement in teleworkers. Additionally, higher-quality relationships with teammates decreased job satisfaction of teleworkers, potentially because of frustrations with exchanging interactions via technology. However, coworker support and virtual social groups for team building had a direct influence on increasing job satisfaction, perhaps due to an increase in skill variety from teamwork and an increase in task significance from more working relationships.

The inconsistent findings regarding telework and satisfaction may be explained by a more complicated relationship. Presumably because of the effects of autonomy, initial job satisfaction increases as the amount of telecommuting increases; however, as the individual telecommutes more, declines in feedback and task significance lead job satisfaction to level off and decrease slightly. Thus, the amount of time teleworking influences the relationship between telework and job satisfaction.

Barriers to continued growth of telecommuting include distrust from employers and personal disconnectedness for employees. In the telework circumstance, employees and supervisors have to work harder to maintain relationships with co-workers. An isolation from daily activities arise of the company and may be less aware of other things going on to the company and a possible hatred from other employees arises from other employees who do not telecommute.

Telecommuting has come to be viewed by some as more of a "complement rather than a substitute for work in the workplace".

Security must be addressed for teleworkers and non-teleworkers as well. In 2006, a United States Department of Veterans Affairs employee's stolen laptop represented what was described as "potentially the largest loss of Social Security numbers to date." While he was not a telecommuter, this incident brought attention to the risks inherent in working off-site. Ninety percent of executives charged with security in large organizations feel that telework is not a security concern. They are more concerned with the occasional work that's taken out of the office by non-teleworkers because they lack the training, tools, and technologies that teleworkers receive.

In other studies regarding Job Characteristics Theory, job feedback seemed to have the strongest relationship with overall job satisfaction compared to other job characteristics. While teleworking, communication is not as immediate or rich as face-to-face interactions. Less feedback when teleworking is associated with lower job engagement. Thus, when perceived supervisor support and relationship quality between leaders and teleworkers decreases, job satisfaction of the teleworker decreases. The importance of manager communication with teleworkers is made clear in a study that found that individuals have lower job satisfaction when their managers telework.

Managers may view the teleworker as experiencing a drop in productivity during the first few months. This drop occurs as "the employee, his peers, and the manager adjust to the new work regimen." The drop could also be due to inadequate office setup. Additionally, a 1999 study claimed that "70 minutes of each day in a regular office are wasted by interruptions, yakking around the photocopier, and other distractions". Over the long term, though, surveys found that productivity of the teleworker will climb; over two-thirds of employers report increased productivity among telecommuters, according to a 2008 survey. Traditional line managers are accustomed to managing by observation and not necessarily by results. This causes a serious obstacle in organizations attempting to adopt telecommuting. Liability and workers' compensation can become serious issues as well.

Weaker relationships between job dimensions and job outcomes, such as job performance and absenteeism, may explain why the results regarding performance and telework are conflicting. Some studies have found that telework increases productivity in workers and leads to higher supervisor ratings of performance and higher performance appraisals. Thus, similar to job attitudes, the amount of time spent teleworking may also influence the relationship between telework and job performance.

Teleworking can negatively affect a person's career. A recent survey of 1,300 executives from 71 countries indicated that respondents believe that people who telework were less likely to get promoted. Companies rarely promote people into leadership roles who haven't been consistently seen and measured. A decrease in productivity due to continual procrastination with a lack of supervision will result to a poor performance in the quality of work of the employee. These factors are part of the negative influence that telework may have on a person's career.

Απάτες στην Τηλεργασία και την Εργασία απ'το Σπίτι

Οι απάτες γύρω από την εργασία στο σπίτι και την τηλεργασία είναι συνηθισμένες. Κάποιες απ'αυτές τις προσφορές δουλειάς είναι απάτες που απευθύνονται στο κοινό του "γίνε γρήγορα πλούσιος" αλλά στην πραγματικότητα απαιτεί μια επένδυση ως προκαταβολή χωρίς βέβαια εξόφληση της στο τέλος. Το πρόβλημα είναι τόσο έντονο που το 2006 η αμερικανική Ομοσπονδιακή Επιτροπή Εμπορίου (FTC) δημιούργησε το Πρόγραμμα Πλαστές Ελπίδες, ένα ομοσπονδιακό και κρατικό πρόγραμμα επιβολή τους νόμου που στοχεύει τις πλαστές επαγγελματικές ευκαιρίες και τις μορφές εξαπάτησης εργασίας στο σπίτι. Η καταστολή αφορούσε περισσότερες από 100 δράσεις επιβολής του νόμου από το FTC, το Department of Justice, το United States Postal Inspection Service, και υπηρεσίες εφαρμογής του νόμου σε 11 πολιτείες. Σε τέσσερις από τις νέες περιπτώσεις μόνο του FTC, οι καταναλωτές έχασαν περισσότερα από $30 εκαττομύρια. "Οι πλαστές επαγγελματικές ευκαιρίες ποδοπατούν το Αμερικανικό όνειρο της οικονομικής ανεξαρτησίας," είπε η Πρόεδρος της FTC Deborah Platt Majoras. "Εάν μια επιχειρηματική ευκαιρία υπόσχεται μηδενικό ρίσκο, μικρή προσπάθεια, και μεγάλα κέρδη, τότε είναι σχεδόν βέβαιο ότι πρόκειται για απάτη. Αυτές οι απάτες υπόσχονται μόνο χρήματα, όπου ανεξάρτητα από το πόσος χρόνος και χρήματα επενδύονται, οι καταναλωτές ποτέ δεν επιτυγχάνουν τα πλούτη και την οικονομική ελευθερία που υπόσχονται." Το FBI προειδοποίησε για τέτοιες κομπίνες τον Φεβρουάριο του 2009, επίσης.

Οι περισσότερες από τα 3 εκατομμύρια καταχωρήσεις στο διαδίκτυο που εμφανίζονται με την αναζήτηση των όρων "work at home," τα περισσότερα από το 95% των αποτελεσμάτων είναι απάτες, σύνδεσμοι προς απάτες, ή άλλες αδιέξοδες καταστάσεις. Οι απάτες σχετικά με την εργασία στο σπίτι αποφέρουν περισσότερα από $500 εκατομμύρια το χρόνο. Ο λογαριασμός από την άλλη των απατών των επιχειρήσεων από το σπίτι υπολογίζεται σε άλλα $250 εκατομμύρια το χρόνο. Ακόμα και ιστοσελίδες που ισχυρίζονται ότι δεν έχουν σχέση με απάτη συχνά προβάλλουν ads που έχουν συνδέσμους προς απάτες.

Σύμφωνα με την Christine Durst, υπάρχει ένα ποσοστό εξαπάτησης 48 προς 1 από αγγελίες για εργασία στο σπίτι που δημοσιεύονται στο internet. Οι στατιστικές αυτές έχουν καλυφθεί δημοσιογραφικά από μέσα ενημέρωσης όπως Good Morning America, CNN, Business Week, και The Wall Street Journal.