Telecommuting Meet Career Advancement

Brian Reid, a.k.a RebelDad, writing for the WashingtonPost about this survey, asks a couple of good questions. "So if this is an arrangement that could work for so many, why the conviction that telecommuting is a career-imperiling choice? Is this just a matter of changing attitudes, or is there some hidden truth to the anti-telecommuter argument?"

I guess it depends on your definition of what a career is. If you're a writer, or columnist, and you get to work from home, are you going to be able to go up the food chain and become an editor if you still stay at home? Publishers expect their editors to report to the office and make sure that everything's hunky-dory. Let's say that you and one of your co-writers, who continues to commute everyday, both apply for an editorial position. All other things being equal, who's the one with a better chance of being promoted?

Your job definition may be to perform a set of particular tasks, but there are some things which you necessarily have to prove you can do, before you get promoted. One of them being the ability to take care of stuff which falls above your pay grade. That is something which you can't do or generally won't do, if you're sitting in your mom's basement. I mean, a telecommuter's notion of a job is to complete assignments. You have no idea what's going on, or what problems who is facing in the office. How are you supposed to help out if you have no idea that something needs to be done, which is not being done, and which you can do.

End of the day, a telecommuter's future prospects are limited because you do not take the time to listen to your boss. Listening might involve being at the receiving end of a tantrum, offering support over personal problems or just offering to help out with something. This is something which a telecommuter is unlikely to do. So, if you're a writer, a writer you will remain. Unless you develop a close working relationship with your immediate boss and your co-workers, which enables you to tackle all the above mentioned points, in your pyjamas.

So now you what you need to be, in addition to being a telecommuter, if you expect to get that raise....An agony aunt.