Employees Who Work from Home

4. Introducing Teleworking

4.1 Put the groundwork in place before starting to implement teleworking.

• Prepare a teleworking contract (see 5).
• Introduce a training plan.
• Prepare written procedures for the tasks involved.

4.2 Start with a small pilot scheme.

• Include a maximum of ten people.
• Give employees the option of participating. Many employers find they do not need to advertise the scheme and that employees who are interested come to them. Current figures indicate that 70 per cent of employees would like to try teleworking.
• Begin with part-time or casual teleworking.
• Keep costs down. The only significant cost should be for training and home-office equipment.

4.3 The introduction of teleworking needs to be planned and managed like any project.

• This requires formal review and evaluation and measurement.
• The key to success is to manage flexible workers in terms of their output rather than their attendance.Attempting to maintain the same direct control over individual activities is usually doomed to failure.