Do NOT work from HOME.

Firstly, working from home works well for many people, organisations and teams. It allows people to cut the commute out of their daily lives, work in quiet environments, among other benefits. There are so many dedicated and hard working people who work from home these days.

Of course work from home works for many. That is not the point I am after.

  If you are career oriented, then working from home is to your career as smoking is to your body. Occasional smoke may not kill you, but enough will. 

Unless of course you mitigate the negatives.

Here are 15 POTENTIAL negatives and risks of working from home to consider.

Out sight - out of mind

1. Besides death and taxes, recessions are also certain in life. For a boss it is easier emotionally to lay someone off who s/he does not see every day in the office. The recession will be here soon enough !

2. Similarly, when a new opportunity for a project arises a person present physically is more likely to get it.

3. Working from home is socially isolating. Tightly knit groups of people are impossible in a work from home environment.

 Productivity 

Some people say they are more productive at home. Though it may be true, nonetheless there is a problem with that statement.

4. We are concerned with the output of the team, not of an individual. Working from home weakens various feedback loops in a team. Read my other post on feedback loops ("Co-workers should be sitting next to each other").

5. Even for an individual it is harder to get questions answered, even to get someone's attention when they are remote.

6. Spontaneous is good for innovation - Ad hoc interactions, quick idea check, trial and error are essential ingredients of innovation. They get sterilized in a remote environment.

Communication

 7. Various electronic tools are a poor substitution for a white board discussion.

8. Studies have shown that people are more aggressive and more cryptic over electronic media.

9. Typing is slower than talking. 

10. Perception and reality of accessibility- Who do you think people will go to, to someone who they see as sitting by oneself, or to someone who they have to write to, and who may or may not respond right away, or for an unknown period of time ?

11. Influencing other people is incredibly hard over electronic media. Physical presence is much better. This triply applies to anyone who holds a position of responsibility.

 Balancing work and home

12. Studies have shown that conflicts at home are more likely when a spouse works from home.

13. When you work from home, your dog barking or a child crying may be cute to many. You however bring a certain image of yourself, unrelated to work, that may undermine the image that you want to project on others. You want to be seen focused on work and objectives, dedicated to the goals. Some may even think that when a call is over you will go attend to your child or dog.

13. Let's not underestimate the power of the refrigerator stocked with food..

14. Stress - People go home to relax. We have a mental switch that allows most of us to turn work off when we leave the office. Finding that switch is very difficult when you work from home.

 Trust

15. Being social, we have a tendency to trust those whose faces we see every day. Working from home is a sterilizer for many human behaviors and feelings - of which trust and appreciation are the worst recipients. The last 20 or so years of communication technology evolution can not undo millions of years of our own evolution. In the end most of us are social creatures.

The trust does not get helped by perceptions of abuse of WFH either. These unhelpful perceptions are a sulfuric acid to one's career. It does not help either that there is some real abuse of WFH that is hard quantify.

If you work remotely, you also have to consider taxation - if your home is in a different state or country from your office. Taxation issues can be very thorny for you and your employer.

Work is not a checklist of items to finish off.

To progress you need to belong.

Do not sterilize your belonging.

Do not sterilize your chances of success.

 Woody Allen said that 90 percent of success is simply showing up. Perhaps he was right ?

I purposely skewed the article towards the negatives to raise awareness.

Communication technology did evolve to the point that some of the issues mentioned are mitigated, if done properly. Mitigation is not elimination, though.

  Interestingly enough, from anecdotal evidence, teams that go completely WFH for every team member seem to be able to eliminate some of the most thorny challenges by creating a level playing field for everyone. Though I have some experience managing a team like that, I do not know enough to opine on this. Some people say this is the future - we shall see.

   The base assumption behind most of the issues listed was a combination of WFH and non-WFH workers. 

Working from home is a reality whether we like it or not. It has become a periodic necessity for some, and the only choice for others.

The companies must work to mitigate the issues. It is not fair to leave it up to WFH employees alone. Companies that are not careful will lose the best talent because of various WFH issues. 

Generalisations are dangerous. There are companies and teams that are able to negate whatever challenges there are, and create an atmosphere and ways for career advancement for remote employees. There are companies out there with virtual offices. Some or many of those produce even non virtual results, and non virtual profits.

As for the individuals, the best mitigation are RESULTS !! If you perform well, it does not matter where you work. Good managers will not judge you by where you work but by what you accomplish. 

In fact, for many types of professions being able to work in the quiet of one's home has definite advantages, issues being outweighed by enhanced productivity. Those are people who do not need to interact with the team they work in very much, or are sole producers. That said, career advancement for these individuals is still a challenge - which is the main point of this article.

It is indeed 2016. Many of us do not have the luxury of being together. We have to work with remote employees, understand their challenges and foster communications and interactions. It is hard but not impossible. My own manager and some of my employees are in different countries, and that's how it has been for the last 5 jobs I held myself. 

It does not matter to me that much if you agree with all, some or none of this post. At least, please agree that smoking is bad. I want to raise awareness of the WFH and remote employee topic. What I would like back are thoughtful and argumented responses.

Final note. The purpose of the headline "Do not work from home" is to make people read. The purpose of the article is to make people think. If I accomplished both, I consider this post successful. If however this article made you angry to the point of accusations of old school thinking, perhaps it is time to go to the office to get the social skills back.

Now comment please - I know this will be controversial :-)