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Legislation on flexible working and company wide green initiatives means that many businesses in Wales will soon be rolling out forms of home, remote and flexible working. The UK government, for example, has announced that it will pass legislation extending the right to request flexible working to a further 4.5 million people. For workers based in remote areas of the country flexible working can also be an opportunity to save a vast amount of money on commuting and also give them a new found freedom as they better balance their home/work responsibilities. However, for flexible working to be a resounding success for employers and employees alike, it is important to know the technological challenges they can expect and best practices they should adopt. Flexible friends - Top Ten Tips on flexible working for Welsh businesses
With this is mind, Paul Lawrence, head of department for ntl:Telewest Business in Wales, gives his top ten tips for flexible and remote working:
1 Broadband – The increasing popularity of working from home has prompted many companies to include home broadband as part of its employee benefits package. Although this must be allocated as a taxable benefit, it does give employees extra flexibility and the chance to choose a high-speed package.
2 Laptops – From being a luxury item just a few years ago, laptops have now become relatively expensive, with many companies choosing to replace desktops with laptops as a matter of course. For mobile or remote workers they are essential items, but if you are planning to give employees remote access to company servers remember to provide adequate training on how to use the equipment and access information securely.
3 Security – Whenever an employee accesses company information, whether this is at home or on the road, they must be able to do this securely to prevent information from being lost or misappropriated. Most companies use Virtual Private Networks, which securely ring fence the information passing between company servers and workers’ computers, to achieve this, and higher levels of security are available.
4 Remote diagnostics – In order for flexible working to be fair across the whole company, employees from every department should be given the means by which to work remotely, including staff that work in the IT department. For IT staff to be able to maintain and repair any problems it is advisable to provide monitoring systems that IT staff can access in and out of the office
5 Using a single contact number for employees – A remote working employee still needs to be contactable. In order to minimise confusion for colleagues, associates and customers, try to route calls to a single contact number, so that they can be reached whether they are in the office, a meeting, the car, or at home
6 Business continuity – With the British weather getting less and less predictable, flexible working can form part of organisations’ business continuity plans, as the same set-up used to allow remote access can be employed to keep companies ticking over if the worst should happen.
7 Hot desking - As companies are looking to reduce costs wherever possible, one option they can consider with flexible working is saving money on their most expensive asset - the space they lease or own. As offices require less space so they can move to smaller, cheaper premises with hot desks available for when workers come into the office.
8 Smartphones – Giving employees smartphones, such as BlackBerrys or even iPhones, can dramatically increase their productivity by reducing the ‘dead time’ of commuting and travelling to and from meetings. The chance to read and respond to emails and make calls keeps workers in the loop and ultimately reduces the time they need to spend in the office.
9 Smartphones II – As well as being great for emails and calls, today’s smartphones can also be used as mini-computers, loaded with the same applications that workers use on their desktops or laptops. This saves time as workers don’t have to return to the office to upload orders, take payments and reduces the burden and errors involved in transferring information between systems.
10 Deciding on a supplier – Ensuring that a flexible working policy works well involves working with the right suppliers to find the solution that’s meets each organisation’s individual needs. The worthwhile providers are those that don’t offer ‘cheapest’ or 'fastest’ as standard, but instead take the time to get to know a business before recommending what it can do to save time and money while helping it to grow.
