Flexibility, telework, core hours, etc. It's revolution time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My federal job allows telework and flex time and my manager will not approve anyone on his team to do either agency approved program. It is really bad moral but also other agencies/groups do allow it so that will be a consideration in making long term career plans.

I'm a former Fed manager (26 yrs.).

Are you in a bargaining unit? If you are you should get your union involved, that manager is a clueless idiot unless there are bona fide mission needs (unlikely) that support his position to forbid all telework & flex time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It would be difficult for me to work from home more than one or two days a week because my job (gov attorney) is very paper-centric. Many of our files are not electronic, and even if they were, we'd still have to cite to the official paper file with its tabs, page numbers, and other info that doesn't get transferred when the file is scanned. I can't haul home 6 or 7 files every day, at least not on the metro. Maybe if I drove I could do it, but I don't. And to take a week's worth of files home would be insane. Plus, I really like the office atmosphere and comparing notes with my colleagues -- probably because so much of what we do is solitary. I do like the flexible hours though. We have to do 80 hours in a 2-week period, but when we do them is largely up to us. The one thing I wish we had was the ability to split our time -- 6 hours at work and 2 hours at home in the same day, for example. We can telework, but it's an all or nothing proposition -- an entire day in the office or an entire day at home. No splitting.

Former Fed manager here again.

Your bosses do not understand what Episodic Telework is. It certainly permits a split day like that for ad hoc (not "regular") telework days. If you're in a bargaining unit, get in touch with your union reps, some of the idiotic managers in govt. won't follow the rules unless they are forced to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My company allows complete and total work life balance with virtually no limitations. People work from the beach, or the mountains, or even while "psuedo vacationing" at length somewhere else (i.e. people who go see family in Europe for 1 or 2 months at a time), many of us work from home 3, 4 or even 5 days a week. Myself included. I work from my beach house almost every Friday and Monday, and usually only go to the office Tuesday or Wednesday.

Hours are what you want them to be - some people work oddball hours cause that suits them, others work a more standard 9 to 5, several work split schedules - come in at 10am, work till 3pm, go home hang out with the kids, sign back on at 7m, finish up. One guy I know even spent a year working from 5pm to midnight because it suited his schedule better.

We have unlimited sick and a take what you need vacation policy. Nanny not in? No sweat. Kid sick? Stay home. Got drunk last night and feel a little hungover? Sleep in. Want to change office locations? Pick up your stuff and move across the country. Don't ask your boss, don't' even tell your boss if you don't want to. Want to live in NYC and work on a team based on Seattle? Go ahead.

People REALLY struggle with this when they first join... what do you mean I dont have to ask to take a day off? What do you mean I can come in at 10am if it suits my daughter's drop off schedule? What do you mean I can just go shopping or take a 2 hour lunch if I want to? It takes people time to accept that this is really OK....

And its how I run my team as well: I tell them that they will get zero credit for working 80 hours in the office; in fact, doing that usually raises questions about your ability to manage your time in your performance evaluations. As long as the work gets done and the results are there, no one cares. Do good work and I'll make sure you get a big fat bonus, work your ass off and achieve nothing, you'll get nothing. Results is all I care about.

And you know what? People appreciate it a ton. They feel empowered, they feel valued, they feel autonomous. They love that face time, age, and office politics are almost entirely stripped away from performance evaluations. If we have a late night because of some project, no one puts up a stink because everyone knows it just means they'll cut off a few hours early the next day, or whatever extra they put in this week, they'll get back next.

I make about $200K a year now and I figure I could make $250K if i left, but it just doesn't seem worth it.

Which company is this?

[Anonymous]

A friend of mine works at a production based job. His job is very flexible but what happens is that some employees end up doing as little as possible to make their quota. So quality goes down while output goes up.

[Anonymous]

Attorney here...I work for a corporation doing transactional work and from home as much as I want. My management and the rest of my team are based all over the country and my boss doesn't care where we work from. The GC encourages telework at our global company. My work is measured in monthly reports of what I have done including how long it takes me to turn around assignments. Also internal clients would make it known if their needs were not being met. I try to go in at least one day a week, though sometimes it is more like three times a month. I earn $265k to $380k a year depending on the bonus.
This arrangement really opens up the options of where you can live also. I have not tried to move outside of the DC area but probably could make that happen as long as it was near one of our major offices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My company allows complete and total work life balance with virtually no limitations. People work from the beach, or the mountains, or even while "psuedo vacationing" at length somewhere else (i.e. people who go see family in Europe for 1 or 2 months at a time), many of us work from home 3, 4 or even 5 days a week. Myself included. I work from my beach house almost every Friday and Monday, and usually only go to the office Tuesday or Wednesday.

Hours are what you want them to be - some people work oddball hours cause that suits them, others work a more standard 9 to 5, several work split schedules - come in at 10am, work till 3pm, go home hang out with the kids, sign back on at 7m, finish up. One guy I know even spent a year working from 5pm to midnight because it suited his schedule better.

We have unlimited sick and a take what you need vacation policy. Nanny not in? No sweat. Kid sick? Stay home. Got drunk last night and feel a little hungover? Sleep in. Want to change office locations? Pick up your stuff and move across the country. Don't ask your boss, don't' even tell your boss if you don't want to. Want to live in NYC and work on a team based on Seattle? Go ahead.

People REALLY struggle with this when they first join... what do you mean I dont have to ask to take a day off? What do you mean I can come in at 10am if it suits my daughter's drop off schedule? What do you mean I can just go shopping or take a 2 hour lunch if I want to? It takes people time to accept that this is really OK....

And its how I run my team as well: I tell them that they will get zero credit for working 80 hours in the office; in fact, doing that usually raises questions about your ability to manage your time in your performance evaluations. As long as the work gets done and the results are there, no one cares. Do good work and I'll make sure you get a big fat bonus, work your ass off and achieve nothing, you'll get nothing. Results is all I care about.

And you know what? People appreciate it a ton. They feel empowered, they feel valued, they feel autonomous. They love that face time, age, and office politics are almost entirely stripped away from performance evaluations. If we have a late night because of some project, no one puts up a stink because everyone knows it just means they'll cut off a few hours early the next day, or whatever extra they put in this week, they'll get back next.

I make about $200K a year now and I figure I could make $250K if i left, but it just doesn't seem worth it.

Which company is this?

Financial services firm. You can probably figure it out with 2 minutes of googlin'. There are few of them here.

[Anonymous]

Best Buy stopped their ROWE program earlier this year.

[Anonymous]

Along with many others on this post, I would love this type of work environment but find that it is hard to find. Anyone know of a list of companies that allow flex schedules/tele work? Or do we just go by blind luck and hope during the interview process that we end up at a company like this?

[Anonymous]

I know of two - The Motley Fool (might be where PP worked) and American Society of Clinical Oncology.

[Anonymous]

Accenture

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My federal job allows telework and flex time and my manager will not approve anyone on his team to do either agency approved program. It is really bad moral but also other agencies/groups do allow it so that will be a consideration in making long term career plans.

I'm a former Fed manager (26 yrs.).

Are you in a bargaining unit? If you are you should get your union involved, that manager is a clueless idiot unless there are bona fide mission needs (unlikely) that support his position to forbid all telework & flex time.

Thanks. I'm new enough to not want to get the union involved, but it may impact my analysis of some other options that I have. It is crazy to me that management doesn't "get" that others similarly situated jobs do offer this flexibility.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Accenture

I hope you mean that as a joke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Accenture

I hope you mean that as a joke.

they do allow telework
I interviewed with them for a legal position and it allowed for 3 days a week of telecommuting and after meeting with many of the people who worked there, several said they came in less frequently because they have a shared office arrangement in the Reston office and office space was often not available
You had to preschedule days you wanted to use the temporary offices
As a consulting firm, it seemed to be a large part of their culture

unless something has changed since I interviewed about 5 yrs ago

I know two attorneys currently working there

That said, they all mentioned how they were on call all the time and often expected to work into the evenings since they were home

The telework options sounded great...the pay...not so much

[Anonymous]

Used to work at a company with flex schedules, telework and some other nice benefits but it didn't always make sense who got these. But I guess it depends on your position if you agree or not--maybe this is like how one would feel about taxing the wealthy. For example, employees with the most benefits in terms of flexibility and pay had the best office locations. But because they had the most schedule flexibilty, they were almost never at the office. But other employees in lower positions, who worked long hours in the office everyday, shared office space in tiny windowless rooms. The company also provided tuition assistance to those higher up and although the degrees were related to the job, it didn't make any sense for the company to offer this benefit because it didn't help the employees with their job or career.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Accenture

I hope you mean that as a joke.

they do allow telework
I interviewed with them for a legal position and it allowed for 3 days a week of telecommuting and after meeting with many of the people who worked there, several said they came in less frequently because they have a shared office arrangement in the Reston office and office space was often not available
You had to preschedule days you wanted to use the temporary offices
As a consulting firm, it seemed to be a large part of their culture

unless something has changed since I interviewed about 5 yrs ago

I know two attorneys currently working there

That said, they all mentioned how they were on call all the time and often expected to work into the evenings since they were home

The telework options sounded great...the pay...not so much

Accenture moved its offices to Arlington about a year ago and they have even less space for Legal than they used to. Many of their lawyers telecommute 90 or 100%-time and I know of at least one lawyer there who works part-time.

I think their pay is about average for in-house positions.

My friend who works there is happy with her setup. She goes to the office a few times a month.