I have been working from home a little over 3 years now. I have lived through the ups and downs of this type of work and I can share a few things that I have learned in that time.
This began out of necessity. The company that I work at is a small consultancy. We provide data and data related services primarily for the oil industry. We are also an internet company which means that the primary way that new clients find us is through the internet. Due to the structure of the industry this also means we have mainly international clients.
Being in this type of sales environment means that I rarely meet the people that I deal with face to face. At most I may Skype with someone but mainly it’s emails and phone calls. The largest deal I negotiated was a six figure deal with an Asian client based on the strength of 4 emails and to this day I have never even spoken to the guy on the phone.
Commuting 25 miles each way to an office and spending 3 hours in traffic every day made no sense for me. My boss decided it made no sense for the rest of the company either. Rather than signing another 3 year contract with the building he had everyone work from home and share online space. Add in a virtual phone service and we had a company based on the internet and spread out between 4 cities.
So I packed up my desktop, a printer, some office supplies and headed home. I bought a new desk and set myself up in a spare bedroom, had a new phone put in and I had my own home office.
Isolation
Suburbs can be eerily quiet during the day. They mostly evacuate during the weekdays and in the back bedroom of my house you see nothing and hear nothing. As I was in sales I had to be there. The production guys could set their own hours and work after dark if they wanted to but I had to be tied to the phone in case someone called in.
At first I was spending 22 hours a day in my house. My morale was crashing and I quickly put a stop to that. I forced myself to go out and do things. Didn’t matter what but I needed to be around people, any people.
Temptation
Even before I started working from home I knew I had to get away from temptations like the TV, radio, or whatever. That’s why I got set up in a separate bedroom rather than my own bedroom. The office is just that. An office, Nothing to distract, nothing to interfere.
Sedantary
You never realize how much you run around and do things in an office. You constantly jump from office to office, you walk down to the bathroom, you walk to lunch, you go to meetings, etc. Not so when it’s all contained in one house.
But worse as you’re alone without someone looking over your shoulder you get lazy. There’s a kitchen full of food just downstairs, lean back more in your chair, no one is watching. Why shave? no one is around to look at you.
That implied social whip that curbs our actions is no longer there. You have to provide your own discipline.
It’s not for everybody. I have known folks that have quit after 2 weeks due to a variety of factors. But once you do get things sorted you find that you are not tied to 9 to 5 business hours, you can put in that extra work without having to drive miles out of your way. You can address business emergencies on the weekend. The hassle of commuting is a long distant dream now.
I now consider myself lucky to be able to draw a salary and to do something I like without having to go into an office to do it in.
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