by Daria Steigman on November 5, 2012
There was a woman I knew in graduate school who could read upside down. Which is a pretty useful skill for a labor negotiator, especially in the days when a lot of the people assumed that the young woman across the table from them was “just a girl.”
Needless to say, she collected a lot of opposition strategy that way.
I was thinking about this the other day after I met with someone who had whiteboard-painted one wall in his office.
I love Dry-Erase boards. Maybe it’s the list maker in me. Or because I need a place to park random ideas for blog posts before they fade away. Or the mini-creative-me who wants to doodle away white spaces. Evernote is great, but it doesn’t stare back at you. (Yes, my to-do list is pretty long this morning.)
But here’s the problem: you don’t always want your strategy in plain sight.
It’s not really about the whiteboard, or the upside-down writing, or even the really clueless people who talk business on mobile phones in airports and coffee shops. Because I’m hyper-aware of this (and, as the daughter of a diplomat, I’m really good at keeping people’s secrets secret), I tend to point out when I see potential competitive intelligence staring at me.
For the record, there wasn’t anything like that on the whiteboard wall the other day. But what about your bulletin boards and whiteboard walls?
Photo by emdot (Flickr).
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Tagged as:
Business,
Data,
Evernote,
Workshifting
by Daria Steigman on July 12, 2011
Do you time your commute?
My latest Workshifting post is up, and it’s about happens when you actually have to leave your home office (or your favorite coffeehouse):
The only problem with short commutes is not having one.
My commute is 10 feet. I get up, wander into my office, reach down and hit the “Start Me Up” button on my desktop.
I do this daily, except for Tuesday mornings. That’s the day of the week I drive 20 miles away for a meeting, the day I leave myself 45 minutes for a trip I hope will take 25.
Commuting sucks, but there are ways for workshifters to make it a little easier. Read the post here.
Photo by Phillip Capper (Flickr).
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Workshifting
by Daria Steigman on June 27, 2011
A new study of workshifting in the United States reveals big growth in the last couple of years–but the percentage of Americans who telework remains very small.
The State of Telework in the U.S. focuses specifically on people who work at home at least part time but are not self-employed. The numbers overall are very small: only 2.9 million people consider their home their primary place of work (versus an estimated 50 million “who want to work from home [and] hold jobs that are telework compatible”).
“The typical telecommuter is a 49-year-old, college-educated, salaried, non-union employee in a management or professional role, earning $58,000 a year at a company with more than 100 employees.”
There’s some great data in here:
- Government workers telework the most. Though the numbers remain tiny, the federal government is leading the way based on the percentage of its own workforce that teleworks.
- Only 5 percent of private companies offer flexible workplace benefits. These are 2010 numbers, so you know workshifters are still at the bleeding edge.
- Baby Boomers are leading the way. As a percentage of their numbers in the workforce, Baby Boomers are far more likely to be teleworking. This doesn’t suggest that Millennials don’t want more flexibility–just that far fewer of them have it.
- A college degree makes a difference. People with college and/or advanced degrees are far more likely to be teleworkers. This also correlates to income (higher-paid employees are more likely to have workshifting options) and to type of job (professional, managerial).
Forget what workers want; here’s the business case.
The State of Telework in the U.S. makes a compelling economic argument for flexible workplaces, from reduced office costs and employee productivity to energy savings to the impact on our carbon footprint.
People want more work flexibilty. The question is: will companies trust their employees enough to grant it?
Bonus Reading: Author Kate Lister has pulled out her own report highlights in The Who, What, Where, and Why Not of Telecommuting.
Photo by Pinoldy (Flickr).
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Tagged as:
Kate Lister,
Workshifting
by Daria Steigman on June 6, 2011
You know those days when you’re hopelessly unproductive?
Endurance runners talk about hitting “the wall.” It’s slow, it’s painful, it’s really annoying — and it’s unproductive. Workers have a wall too, that moment when your brain can’t focus and your neurons are definitely not firing.
My latest Workshifting post is out, and it points out that:
Success [for workshifters] is based on results and not time chained to a desk. Whether you work for yourself or are part of a bigger team, there’s no one tracking your comings and goings. You either get stuff done or you don’t. So why do we so often feel compelled to be “at work” on some variation or other of 9-to-5, Monday through Friday?
Read the post here. There is also some great discussion in the comments (and feel free to add in your two cents).
Photo by Dichohecho (Flickr).
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Tagged as:
Productivity,
Workshifting
by Daria Steigman on May 3, 2011
I’ve been pondering routines lately: why you need them and when to break free.
In a recent Workshifting post, I explored the paradox of the flexible routine:
Working from home (or anywhere else you choose) isn’t about avoiding routine–it’s about being able to set your own routine.
That said, we do spend a lot of time creating systems to keep ourselves focused and on track. They’re safety nets, barriers against the chaos of an unstructured life. But innovation doesn’t happen in 25- or 30-minute chunks. Sometimes we need to stop doing stuff and just concept, create, go with the flow, and see what happens.
Hence, in my latest post I ask: Can you work without a net?
Photo by Joost J. Bakker IJmuiden (Flickr).
Have you grabbed a free copy of Your Social Media Checklist? Download it today to get 9 tips for being findable and attracting the right customers for your business.
Tagged as:
Workflow,
Workshifting
