Working From Home?

ClassicRockr

ClassicRockr

Well-known Member
Now that more and more companies are allowing employee's to "work from home", just how good is it? As a Senior, would you take a part-time job "working from home" on your computer?

Bad: Well, first of all, in using your PC (Personal Computer), the company would have access to your computer. Hummmmm, what about the "privacy" thing?
Bad: If a person smokes, and is trying to quit, "working from home" wouldn't be a good idea because the person could take a "smoke break" whenever they wanted to.
Good: For a person who loves to smoke and has absolutely no intention of quitting, it would be perfect.
Bad: Distractions at home.
Good: No traveling.

I had thought about taking a Data Entry type job, working from our home and my wife said "no way". I realized why she said that and said, "your right".

What do you think?
 

I would love to work from home, and confess that I've not attempted any yet; I'm pursuing 'real' job opportunities at the moment. There are may ways that you could maintain privacy on your PC, and still allow an employer access. Remember P2P file sharing(Napster, LimeWire)...they allowed the whole planet to access just a shared folder, so the same method would work for "at home" jobs. I have several(many, actually) computers as a hobby, so I would designate one for At Home employment, and keep my personal data secure on the others.
The distractions: yea, that would require some determination; I've read that it's best to designate a room to be your home office, and treat that room in the same way as if you were at an employer's workplace. Work while you're in there, leave the room for breaks or personal stuff.

Smoking- That's a tough one. I'm not gonna be preachy, it's goshdang hard to quit, worse than heroin addiction. During a horribly bad flu, I quit smoking 4 years ago, after having smoked for 45 years. I tried all kinds of 'crutches' over the years- all the usual stuff/things. After 72 hours the poison is out of your system(mostly); you'll have less and less 'urges' as time goes on. My view: don't consider yourself as being deprived, instead tell yourself that you have been delivered, resurrected, given a second chance at health. Just my .02, sorry if I got preachy.
 
I know a number of programmers/developers that work from home. The company doesn't have access to your computer-you use a VPN to access their network and then remote desktop to access either a real or virtual workstation.

I do the same thing when I need to access the courthouse computer system-the IT department has me set up with a Cisco VPN to the network, and then I just use remote desktop to a server with profiles on it. That way I can work after hours or during times when I'm not required to be there, yet still have access to everything that I need.
 

In the last company I worked for half the people in my department worked from home. This is very beneficial for all concerned because the employees don't have to make the long commutes, dress up or spend money on transportation, lunches and coffee. The company paid for and set up the company computers, telephone systems and whatever else was required. The workers kept logs of their hours. My son and his friends in the IT field work from home regularly. It's good both for the employee and the company, and the company saves on office space.

I used to work from home for years when I ran a freelance office service. I would work in the evening and have the day to myself. I didn't smoke or eat more and if you have a quiet place to work, there are no distractions. It's happening more and more these days, with people and laptops being so mobile, they can even work from a cafe or park bench.
 
I have worked from home as a freelance writer since 2003. It has its advantages and disadvantages. I appreciate being able to set my own schedule (relatively speaking), but I do have to travel to attend meetings and take photos as part of the workload.
 
Unfortunately, people can do stuff at home, when they are suppose to be working, that they can't do at work. Could be drugs, sex, watch tv, whatever and the company won't know about it.
As far as "keep log of their hours", that could be a very touchy one for some company owners in that some "home" workers will write down anything. On my last job, I was hourly, but everyone filled out a Time Sheet each week and turned it in. There was some people writing down that they left work at the right time, while others left an hour or so early, especially if their Supervisor was out sick or on vacation. The company ended up installing a Time Clock in each area that had Hourly Employee's. Well, that ended the CHEATING on the old Time Sheet!

It is a popular thing, but if I lived close enough to work, I'd rather be at work. In the job that I did, Purchasing and Inventory Management, being at home, I couldn't physically go out to the warehouse and check inventory. I also couldn't look at Purchases Orders (real paper) if I was at home. I guess some jobs "working from home" would work in and others not.
 
A lot of my work before retirement involved software development, the rest dealing with customers (not many, but someone had to be there during business hours). I could never get anything done at work because of distractions. Ended up putting in almost double the hours, getting the real work done at home, commuting and logging in mostly wasted time at the office.
 
I love working from home. My company provides to us their own computers, their own OS, their own security; everything. They take no chances on anyone else's equipment or security programs. We must have a dedicated space to work in and the same child care we would need if we worked in the office. They reimburse us for the use of our high-speed internet service.

The benefits are huge. Both the company and the remote worker win.

For my part, I love the savings on gas, wear & tear on tires and car, lower insurance rate for greatly reduced mileage, no more scraping ice and snow of the car before or after work.

There is more time back into life. No long commutes or even short ones; no sitting in traffic. I can sleep longer if I want to, work in my pajamas if I feel like it. I can throw a load of laundry in at lunch time or take a shower and have more time to "play" after work.

The company benefits by not leasing offices, paying for security, not having to provide a nurse on all sites. Of course, we can still visit the nurse if we want to travel to the remaining office.

If more companies could do this, our air would be cleaner due to less emissions, less traffic accidents and less gas consumption.

Not everyone was given the remote worker opportunity. You have to have shown reliability and a good work ethic.
 
I work from home and have done since I retired.

I have several internet businesses that supliment
my pension.

Mike.
 
I doubt this (in red below)!
Control emissions by having Emission Test in order to register a vehicle.
Less Traffic Accidents.......have people SLOW DOWN in snow, ice and rain. Use turn signals. Basically, obey traffic laws!
Less gas consumption? Yea, working from home would work with that.
Actually, a much less population would be the best thing...........but that isn't going to happen.


RadishRose said:
I love working from home. My company provides to us their own computers, their own OS, their own security; everything. They take no chances on anyone else's equipment or security programs. We must have a dedicated space to work in and the same child care we would need if we worked in the office. They reimburse us for the use of our high-speed internet service.

The benefits are huge. Both the company and the remote worker win.

For my part, I love the savings on gas, wear & tear on tires and car, lower insurance rate for greatly reduced mileage, no more scraping ice and snow of the car before or after work.

There is more time back into life. No long commutes or even short ones; no sitting in traffic. I can sleep longer if I want to, work in my pajamas if I feel like it. I can throw a load of laundry in at lunch time or take a shower and have more time to "play" after work.

The company benefits by not leasing offices, paying for security, not having to provide a nurse on all sites. Of course, we can still visit the nurse if we want to travel to the remaining office.

If more companies could do this, our air would be cleaner due to less emissions, less traffic accidents and less gas consumption.

Not everyone was given the remote worker opportunity. You have to have shown reliability and a good work ethic.
Click to expand...
 
So is the company concerned about your work or what you do in the privacy of your own home. If the work is satisfactory what is the company goal?
 
Pappy said:
I would love to work from home. I can't work my part-time job anymore because of COPD. I signed up for several opinion sites when one takes surveys but takes forever to make a lousy 10 bucks. Plus, my mail box was filling up with junk every few days.
Click to expand...

Tried 'em all Pappy since I retired (retarded) 13 years ago. Before I retired I was in construction and earned $45 to $100 an hour and some of those survey companies expected me to work for $2 or less per hour. The one finger salute felt applicable.

Wylie
 
ClassicRockr said:
Unfortunately, people can do stuff at home, when they are suppose to be working, that they can't do at work. Could be drugs, sex, watch tv, whatever and the company won't know about it.
As far as "keep log of their hours", that could be a very touchy one for some company owners in that some "home" workers will write down anything. .
Click to expand...

If an employee of mine couldn't be trusted to be honest and responsible about their time and work if they work from home, the employee wouldn't have been hired or retained in the first place.

It's simple to monitor the number of hours an employee is logged in. And it's not hard to monitor the employees production output-it should be no less than an employee working in the office and is often more. One of the developers who lives not far from us works for a company that gives him a lot of latitude about his work from home schedule. He's a conversion developer in an agile environment. When he is in the middle of a large project he may work well into the night, when he's not in the middle of a project it's not uncommon to see him out on the tractor mowing for a couple of hours in the afternoon. It all balances out, and the company trusts the employee to get things done on time. How and when he does them is his choice.
 
ClassicRockr said:
I doubt this (in red below)!
Control emissions by having Emission Test in order to register a vehicle.
Less Traffic Accidents.......have people SLOW DOWN in snow, ice and rain. Use turn signals. Basically, obey traffic laws!
Less gas consumption? Yea, working from home would work with that.
Actually, a much less population would be the best thing...........but that isn't going to happen.
Click to expand...


Yes, let's have them slow down, use turn signals, and obey traffic laws. Until that happens, the remote worker is a little safer traveling less. On the flip side; when your numbers up, its up I suppose.
 
I think working from home would be great in many situations. My son is a computer engineer and he works from home and really likes it. I have worked from home in our own business for many years, but now, it is getting very lonely, so I am driving into town, to visit with my friends, and talking to everyone on facebook, and email, and this forum is great also, but it does not replace a real person to talk to, and so I am going to try to improve my computer skills, to be able to talk on the internet to a video of a real person talking, though most of my friends are as computer-illiterate as I am, but I will keep trying, haha! Isolation, they say, is a killer, and I can attest to that; is one of the down sides, I believe, of working from home, the interactions, chats, etc., between people, that you would be missing. Oh, I forgot to say, listening to music is helpful; my favorites are Roy Orbison, Patsy Cline, Buddy Holly, Frankie Vallee, etc. Sometimes I even dance while I work, ha!
 
Working from home could go both ways for or against the employee. In the corporate world after some trials many employees started complaining because they felt their careers had stalled by not being in a office and well quite frankly brown nosing or making daily contact with the person that might promote them. Also a lot of information is divulged at meetings and/or the workplace even if not part of a formal presentation or memo.

I think the IRS wants a dedicated work area and there are questions of workmens comp like if rushed to answer the work phone in your own home and fell should one get the same benefits like workmens comp like it happened at the office. Also many companies that provide service make technicians log or call in from home and there are disputes like do they get paid from the call/log in, a regular starting time OR arrival at the first job.

Work at home now a days is probably very cookie cutter if you are not self employed. Should be anyway.
 
My daughter works at home. The days of "work-at-home" schemes stuffing envelopes or making doo-dads for next to nothing are long gone, and there are hundreds of legitimate companies these days.

My son is an independent contractor who's been working from home for many years...maybe 20+?

The way I see it, the only risk is to the careless user with limited IT knowledge whose computer is unprotected. For anyone who isn't computer literate, working from home is downright foolish.
 
Well, specifically, my husband set up our whole computer system, years ago, so it is very protected, and if my son has time, he helps me with any large problems. I had wanted to to do video chatting, or video conferencing i guess you call it, so that is where my friends and I are falling down. More research, and then when I do talk to my son, I will know a little bit of what I am talking about, haha! Now I just do mostly paperwork, like bookkeeping, and I use anything with macintosh, which seems to be much safer, after talking to several people who had their computers compromised, when using another system. I guess working from home does have its ups and downs. The lack of personal contact with other people, is one of the worst, if not the worst down sides, to my mind.
 
It's tough to fly a jet sitting in the comfort of one's home, so no, I never worked at home.
 
That is funny, oldman! My dad used to have a side job, and he also could not work from home. He was a flight instructor, for small planes; his teaching plane was a very small 2-person plane, though, nothing larger than that. He would take me up sometimes, and we used the a dirt airstrip the crop dusters used, or just a field road; pretty exciting, for a kid! I can hardly imagine a jet!
Petula
 
Wouldn't it be nice if I could work from home? It would be hard to dust and polish and mop and vacuum, and if it could be done from home it could be done remotely from wherever. My clients wouldn't need me because they could do their own cleaning from their offices. And it wouldn't get me out and about, either, which is the whole reason I do it!
 

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