I’m not sure exactly what got me thinking about telecommuting a few weeks ago, but whatever it was quickly took my train of thought (note the subliminal ‘train’ message here) down a path that just kept getting more interesting the more I thought about it. In fact, I quickly reached a point where I amazed myself with the potential implications of taking an old idea in an only somewhat new direction.

While I feel certain that I can’t possibly be the only one that stumbled across this concept, I have yet to read anything even remotely suggesting that it should be deliberately and diligently pursued. But before I share more specifics of my latest stream of consciousness, let’s agree on what telecommuting means in this age of instantaneous, yet inexpensive, global communications.

According to Wikipedia: “Telecommuting, e-commuting, e-work, telework, working at home (WAH), or working from home (WFH) is a work arrangement in which employees enjoy flexibility in working location and hours. In other words, the daily commute to a central place of work is replaced by telecommunication links.”

Telecommuting is, of course, nothing new. Lots of us have been telecommuting for a very long time. In my own case, I’m one of the many remote workers who don’t report to an office every day and haven’t done so for years. On the contrary, it’s not uncommon these days for weeks to go by without my making a personal appearance at my office, which is only a 15-mile, 20-minute jaunt. But even the one to two gallons of gas it takes to make that round trip makes a difference now, whereas a few years ago it wasn’t even a consideration. Indeed, if I were to go there everyday, it would easily add another $25 to $35 dollars a week – well over a hundred dollars a month – to my overhead costs, depending on the price per gallon at any given time and the fuel efficiency of the vehicle used.

As we all know, telecommuting is largely made possible by the availability of inexpensive computers and peripherals; really cheap (practically free, actually!) telecommunications options; the Web/Internet and email; and a host of other enabling technologies, products and services. But for most workers, telecommuting is still held out as a privilege, bestowed upon a handful of select individuals that are “rewarded” by not having to come into the office all five days – each week, every week. In other cases, telecommuting is reserved for temporary situations involving out-of-office experiences like maternity leave, sabbaticals, vacations, disabilities, semi-retirement or the occasional remote task force.

Only rarely, however, have companies actively sought out ways for their staffs to telecommute on a routine basis. Sure, there might be a few organizations that have done it pro-actively as part of cost cutting measures, staff relocations or decentralization programs, but for the most part, it remains a privilege reserved for the elite or those management wants to bestow with that special kind of compensation – you know, the kind that doesn’t involve an actual pay increase but that you’re supposed to be really grateful for getting nonetheless!

Before we delve any deeper into this, however, perhaps little bit more background would be useful. In 2000, the most recent Census data available, the average travel time to work was 25.5 minutes, up from 21.7 minutes in 1980 and 22.4 minutes in 1990. Most workers — three out of four — were spending that time alone in their own car. And, the number of people who spend more than 90 minutes traveling to work nearly doubled between 1990 and 2000, from 1.76 million to 3.44 million, according to the Census data.

In fact, an interesting April 2006 article authored by Brandon U. Hansen, entitled, “How To Beat Traffic Mathematically¹,” states that the average U.S. commuter spends about 100 hours a year driving just to work – 20 hours more than a typical year’s supply of vacation. “This personal ‘daily grind’ uses more than 15,000 miles and 1,000 gallons of gas every year, which might not be so bad if much of it wasn’t waste: 1.6 million hours and 8 million gallons of gas are wasted every day in traffic jams across the nation. Traffic even affects your health, raising blood pressure, increasing stress, and producing more Type-A personalities,” says the article’s author.

It then goes on to say: “Average traveling speed, construction and accident information are all available at the click of the mouse, but how to avoid the perpetual web of red during the morning and evening rush hours is nowhere to be found. Obvious answers such as public transportation and carpooling are legitimate, but trends show that Americans are meeting the increase in traffic by using such transportation methods less, not more.”

This is all quite disheartening, considering the magnitude of the problem to say nothing of the cost, which manifests itself in ways that go well beyond the purely monetary considerations. For example, think about the wear and tear on our roads, bridges and other transportation infrastructure. And then, there’s also the plethora of destination issues such as where to park all those vehicles; where to house all of the vehicles’ drivers and passengers after arriving at their destinations; where and how to service the vehicles – both the preventative and the remedial maintenance issues – and, of course, the pollution issues.

But it doesn’t end there. There’s more – a whole lot more. It even gets into social issues, many of which have had an increasingly negative impact on our society as we became more mobile throughout the last century and into the new one. For example, if mom and/or dad are spending that “average 100 hours a year driving just to work,” that’s time that cannot be spent having a family meal, helping out with homework or simply being there when needed.

And how about when all that time on the road leads to an accident – as it almost inevitably does, sooner or later? Even a minor fender-bender adds expenses, lost time and other injuries whether they are physical or not. When you consider the real price we pay for the “privilege” of driving ourselves to and from an office in terms of the snowballing energy, infrastructure, financial, psychological and environmental costs, it literally boggles the mind!

So here’s my proposition: What if instead of making telecommuting a privilege reserved for the few, we made it a policy to be practiced by the many? What if companies all over started deliberately looking at telecommuting as a means of cutting costs, helping the environment and improving the quality of life rather than just awarding it to a handful of key people or letting it continue to evolve passively?

I’m not suggesting that we’re going to start producing automobiles and building office buildings from our homes over the Internet, but guess what… we’ll need a lot fewer of all those things, even if we only apply telecommuting principles to the office workers in our midst. How many hours a week you spend in meetings that don’t really require physical presence and could just as easily (more easily?) be accommodated with a teleconference, especially the kind of teleconference we can create at the click of a mouse these days. How often do you drive to an office to do work that could have been done from home – and perhaps even completed if you didn’t waste 1-3 hours or more a day in the car worrying about having enough time to work on it?

Indeed, today’s Web-based teleconferencing services (e.g., Webex, GoToMeeting, etc.) have finally gotten it right – or at least very close, and whatever is missing is well on its way to being satisfied with currently available technology. I recently sat in on a webinar for one of the more advanced online meeting tools and was extremely impressed with how much more capable and user-friendly these tools have become as well as their simplicity and affordability since my last experience only a couple of years ago.

And while I’m certainly not a proponent of taking the vitally important human factor out of human interaction, I do think we can do much better with how we facilitate its value. There are times when human interaction is an absolute necessity, and to suggest that it isn’t would be, well, just plain silly. But there are also plenty of times when a video conference is every bit as good as being there – sometimes better since you can have all of your support materials at your fingertips and still be at your kids’ soccer game by 7PM.

From a pure energy and environmental standpoint, the savings are huge, the risks low and the benefits are enormous. Think about it, and talk to your employer about telecommuting to see if the ultimate out-of-office experience is right for you.

Behind the Byline
Mike Marullo has been actively involved in the automation, controls and instrumentation field for more than 35 years and is a widely published author of numerous technical articles, industry directories and market research reports. An independent consultant since 1984, he is President and Director of Research & Consulting for InfoNetrix LLC, a New Orleans-based market intelligence firm focused on Utility Automation and IT markets. Inquiries or comments about this column may be directed to Mike at MAM@InfoNetrix.com.
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