Telecommuting

British Telecom defines teleworking as: "Working away from the office on a full-time or part-time basis, and communicating with it electronically [i.e. telecommuting]."

The populists, theorists and other spouters of crap have predicted that, by the turn of the century, about half of all employees will spend at least part of the week working from home. In theory, for many types of work, it should be possible to telework today.

To set yourself up as a teleworker, in addition to the hardware and software you are using now, you'll need a source for contracts or for full-time work. An up-to-date selection of these can be found in UseNet's job groups; here is a selection of some of the better known ones:

uk.jobs.offered

misc.jobs.offered

misc.jobs.contract

Employment can also be found through one of the on-line job agencies; some of the better ones are listed below:

British

Papyrus Media

Jobserve

The Employment Network

Hunterskil

BCL

Global/American

Although these employers are obviously "net-aware", most (99%+) advertise for people to work in a specific physical location, very few are interested in teleworkers and those that are almost invariably insist on employing their own nationals. There are good reasons for this. Although the Internet is an international phenomenon, teleworkers are likely to be restricted to working within their existing national boundaries; the regulations governing work permits, pay and taxes ensure that this will be the case for some time to come. For example, is an American software house allowed to use, say, Spanish teleworkers in preference to American employees (teleworkers or not)? Will our Spanish worker expect to receive an American-size salary? Which government collects the income tax? The USA? Spain? Both? Neither?

At the time of writing, this is a rather cursory look at the field of teleworking. With the help of my visitors I hope to expand this page, in the meantime, if you wish to pursue the subject further, the following links may be of some assistance:

Telecommuting Jobs Web Page

PS Enterprises On Telecommuting

AT&T and Telecommuting

Smart Valley Telecommuting Guide

Telecommuting, Teleworking and Alternative Officing

The Institute for the Study of Distributed Work

Telecommunications and Travel Research Program

Telecommuting


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