by Jason Davis on Tuesday, July 6th, 2010 | No Comments »

The recent recession has been a significant game changer for business in a lot of ways.  There were the obvious changes, specific to the recession, such as a significant power shift to the employers.  We all watched (and some of us, unfortunately, participated) as hordes of qualified candidates piled out of the workforce and into applicant tracking systems where companies could be selective about who they hired, and at what cost.  Then there are the more long term game changers – the things that have the traction to outlast the recession and continue to be a major part of business strategies moving forward.  Amongst those – the significant increase in the use of the virtual workplace.

The virtual workplace isn’t a new concept – for the last decade industry analysts and organizational change management consultants have been hypothesizing about the benefits of virtual teaming and the best ways to manage the virtual global workforce.  Their findings are well documented and at a high-level can be summarized like this: identify if a virtual workplace fits with your corporate culture and organizational objectives; identify jobs and individuals that work in a virtual model; modify processes to manage and engage remote employees; keep a razor sharp focus on evaluating effectiveness and continuous improvement of the program.

In 2007, Gartner reported that by 2011, 46.6 million corporate employees globally will spend at least one day a week teleworking, and 112 million will work from home at least one day a month.  This pace has been accelerated further combination of the recession, the emergence of ever-improving document management and collaboration platforms.

This all means that chances are good that you will find yourself working virtually at some point in the near future.  In the last three years of consulting with SEI, I have worked virtually at least 50% of the time – both in support of my clients and in collaboration with our other offices in Cincinnati, Atlanta, Phoenix, and Dallas.  I have found that working virtually can be even more productive than working in cubicle-land if you employ a healthy dose of organizational discipline.  Here are some of the approaches that work for me:

1. Use your ‘Commute time’ to get organized. One of the biggest benefits of working virtually is the ability to recover your commute time.  For some people, this could mean an additional 3 hours added to productive time in your day.  For me, this is the time I use to brew up a nice pot of Dunkin Donuts, prioritize my task list (beginning of the day commute time), and then note any follow-ups for early the next day (end of day commute time).  Know what the first thing you want to work on the next day is.  Don’t sleep through this time, you will leave an opportunity on the table.

2. Learn to manage your inbox(es). When working virtually, your computer is your command center.  It’s impossible to know what you need to focus on if you have 1,600 unread messages and nothing is flagged for follow-up.  Personally, I use three flags – personal, SEI, and client, and then prioritize accordingly.  Once you close an e-mail, file it in the appropriate folder and repeat.  I like to keep my inbox to 50 e-mails or less.  Find out what your sweet spot is, and try to stick with it.

3. Prioritize your work by the 80/20 rule. There is always a small percentage of your work that will yield a larger return.  Identify those items, and nail those first.  Do the 20% of work that gives you 80% of your results. Remember, excuses don’t matter.  What matters are results.

4. Take a Lunch Break and Reward Progress. Virtual work is loaded with distractions.  Laundry waiting to be done.  Playstation 3 and Modern Warfare.  Facebook.  Twitter.  If you are disciplined about the way you structure your day, you can use these distractions to your advantage.  Take a lunch break and knock out a few non-work related things while you eat.  Reward the fact that you are absolutely slaying your to-do list.  Trust me, manage this right and you will waste less time at home than you do around the water cooler at the office.

5. Establish a ‘Virtual Hierarchy’ that allows you to close issues. When working virtually, it’s very easy to fall into the trap of getting into an endless e-mail conversation on issues without seeing any real progress.  I like to apply time-frames and a sanity check on these issues, and then immediately schedule a teleconference to discuss if I don’t feel like progress is being made.  This includes knowing who the stakeholders are, what the escalation path is, and documenting when documents come in and go out for review.  At the top of this hierarchy – that’s right – a good old fashion face-to-face.  Nothing beats it.  Ever.

This is a short list, and many bullets and sub-bullets can be added even to these.  Are you working virtually or have you worked virtually in the past?  What’s working for you?