Monday September 20, 2004

Productivity impact of Teleworking I recently read an interesting paper on Teleworking that reports the results of a 2002-4 research project on teleworking financed by the European Commission. The whole paper is worth reading but two things stuck in my mind.

One has to do with productivity. Often when I am in a meeting where we are discussing iWork someone will ask about its impact on productivity. Our group has lots of really good data from 8 years of iWork experience but productivity impact is very hard to measure. However, two of the cases in the paper show that exact productivity comparisons can be made if work is monitored electronically. In both cases teleworkers were significantly more productive.

The other had to do with safety. The paper said that occupational health and safety differences between office and home were minor. "The main points were back problems from carrying laptops and joint problems from computer keyboards. Someone also noted that " my office is under the stairs (just like Harry Potter) and I keep bumping my head!" "