In my last blog I wrote about the basic analysis steps needed for determining how telecommutable a job is. The objective was to show how you might lump your tasks together in ways that maximize your work-from-home time and effectiveness. But we may need to more closely define the edges of telework; where it’s feasible and where it isn’t.

So, let’s concentrate on identifying those conditions that are more conducive to  working at the office.

Full time in the office 

Working full time in the/an office is best for:

Employees who are young, new to the workforce, or new to the types of jobs they are required to do.  In those cases full-time work is needed for the employee to become familiar with the job, with co-workers, with resources and the organizational culture. After mastering these criteria, which may take from weeks to months, the employee can consider teleworking.

Employees whose job constantly requires access to special resources, large machines or otherwise unique and expensive equipment, or work in physically secure facilities. That was my position in my rocket science days when I was usually doing highly classified tasks in physically secure buildings.

Employees whose work group is in the process of being (re)organized or is meeting some special challenge. This applies for the duration the excitement. Once matters calm down, telework can resume. Each such period can last from a few days to longer in extreme situations.

Employees who do not have a suitable home office for reasons of limited space, family schedule conflicts or the existence of  perpetual external noise and sources of interruptions that are in excess of what is in the office.

Part time in the office (hybrid work)

Hybrid working arrangements are best for:

Most employees who do not fall in the list above. Use the guidelines listed in my recent blog for details.

Full time at home

Full-time home-based telework (WFH) is best for:

Employees whose work does not depend on frequent face-to-face communication with others. Actuaries, for example. We had one in the State of California project who worked very well for years in this mode. Some programmers fit into this category. The author of this blog is another example. The criterion here is whether the employee’s work is consistently acceptable and there is no need for face-to-face communication except occasionally.

Summary

I expect that from 4% to 10% of employees can work well essentially entirely from home.  At least half to two-thirds of the employees in most information-intensive organizations can successfully work in a hybrid mode at the current levels of information technology. The remainder are still most likely to be essentially full-time in-office workers. As information technology continues its development pace, enabling even more diverse types of work arrangements, the full-time fraction may continue to shrink.

From an environmental perspective I should add that split-time days should be discouraged since an employee working at home for a few hours and going to the office for the rest of the day (or vice versa) is still likely driving to and from the office that day. If the employee is using mass transit or driving an electric vehicle, then this warning can be ignored.