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Subject:Re: Fear, Loathing, and telecommuting From:Kat Nagel <katnagel -at- EZNET -dot- NET> Date:Fri, 16 Oct 1998 22:27:31 -0400
Anonymous:
" Now as a new hiring manager building a doc group in a startup
company, I am
" shying away from off-site contractors because in the lifecycle of
the
" company we are just not ready for it -- the developers, my
management
" experience, and the company processes included . Hypocritical since
I used
" to telecommute? Maybe. I made this call based on my bad and ugly
" experiences as a telecommuter and where the development group and my
" documentation group is in their maturity. I know that I will miss
out on
" qualified writers but the management and environmental issues
combined with
" a hot TW job market in my area supersede all of those issues. I
believe in
" telecommuting and will hopefully revisit the issue as my doc group
grows
" and the company processes mature.
"
" Some companies are just better equipped for telecommuters than
others.
Amen, Brother! (or Sister, as the case may be <smile>)
I am actively seeking telecommuting projects but, based on similar
experiences, I am becoming more cautious. I'd rather spend some
time on site, getting to know the people and the culture, before
I try to tackle the complexities of a long-distance project.
It's simpler, of course, if the offsite project is close enough
to zip over for an impromptu meeting or to drop in for lunch.
What I miss most of all are the political insights that help me
understand why decisions go a particular way, or that fill in
the background subtext to project discussions. There is no way
to absorb that kind of detail from a phone conversation or an
email message, and it can be critical if the project is complex
or...um...evolving.
Don't get me wrong---I'm definitely in favor of telecommuting.
But I want to make sure I'm on the same wavelength as the
project manager and the rest of the team before I wander off
into the wilderness with my laptop computer and a pile of
interview notes.
"The transformation of calories into words, of words into money,
and of money into calories again are the three cycles in a
freelance writer's metabolism." /Mary Kittredge, _Poison Pen_
