Career and Kids

Getting remote access to the office

by mike on November 1st, 2006

I have a potential project coming up with a client that will let me work remotely. It looks like it is pretty guaranteed that I will be put on it at least for a little while starting next week.

I have had a handful of days where I did some basic work from home because there was not an open desk for me in the main office, but I have never really worked on a real project from home.

If the assignment really does happen, I’ll have to make the choice between working remotely from our main office or remotely from home so I have been thinking a little bit about which I would prefer and have a little list of pluses and minuses.

Working at Home Pluses

• I never work less than a half hour from home, so my daily free time will increase by at least one hour and I won’t have to pay for gas.
• Easier access to music, TV, and reasonably healthy snacks.
• During breaks I can go play with the kids.
• Avoid frustrations that sometimes occur in the office.
• If I want to stop and play with the kids for an hour in the middle of the day, I can make up the time after they go to bed. This particular project should not involve meetings or coordinating my schedule with anybody else.

Working from the Main Office Pluses

• Easier to ask somebody else to take a look at the project when I get stuck on something.
• Sometimes easier to get focused on working when I have to actually get ready for work and commute and sit down in the florescent lighted office.
• I get to listen to Howard Stern on my Sirius Radio in the morning drive (but I guess I could listen on line from home, too)

Work from Home Minuses

• Kids running around the house playing, laughing, and crying are very distracting.
• Forced to spend most of my day locked in the computer room in the basement.
• Harder to draw the line between when I should be working and when I should stop and turn back into normal parenting role. I am afraid I will either slack off all day, or wind up working on the project for a couple extra hours just to get that one last thing done before I forget what I am thinking about.

Working from the Main Office Minuses

• It is cold here in the Midwest and I end up needing to scrape my windows most mornings.
• I end up spending money that I should not spend on candy, chips and drinks.
• Traffic. I will regret getting stuck in traffic if I knew that I could have worked from home.

I think that if the opportunity presents itself, I will try working from home and see how it goes. Plus, I think the software that I will be working on will not need an internet connect, so maybe I’ll spend part of the day at a coffee shop or library or even right in the middle of where the kids are playing and actually get some productive use out of this laptop.

Do any of you have the choice between working in the office or at home? Which do you choose?

Technorati Tags: careers, computers, kids, Remote Access, working from home

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POSTED IN: Career and Kids