Talk to me about...

[houseelf]

Talk to me about...working from home. Sue and Nellie, I know that you have done this. I'm going to propose telecommuting one day a week to my boss in exchange for coming back from maternity leave before my six months is up. This way I would only do daycare two or three days a week and battle traffic less.

If she says no, I'm going to counter offer working four short days a week so that I can get to my kids in the afternoons. I'm just trying to explore all the options. Even though I only work 3.5 days a week, I have to battle traffic 4 days a week, get all of us dressed and out the door 4 days a week. In other words, it will be a pain in the a**. If I can swing it, I'd like to go in two days and telecommute 1.5 days.

I'm sure this is a jumbled ramble, but this has been on my mind lately. Anyway, I want to hear your thoughts on working from home: advantages and disadvantages please!


Kelly

Well....I'll see if I can offer a few suggestions.

The time/traffic bonus is huge. And you can wear fleece, have your hair sticking out in 15 directions, and cereal stuck to your chin and no one is the wiser (not that you would do that, of course). But, don't give up your daycare yet. It is hard to work with kids at home -- in fact, it never worked for me and was hugely frustrating. While Kendall is doing 2 naps/day, it might work out. With the "work" (related to in-laws) I'm doing right now, I'm having a hard time getting much done while Anna is awake. I think it would help your sales pitch to your boss to say that your kids will be in daycare while you are working. If you are mostly independent in your position and can cover the time on evenings/weekends as need be, that might not be an issue. If she is the type that likes to be able to get in touch with you whenver she has a question, it would help if your kids weren't at home.

Does your office (division, etc) support telecommuting? Is it easy to log in to your email remotely? If so, that is a huge help. I'm not sure what your day-to-day work looks like, but it is nice to have a DSL connection or 2nd line for dial-up so that you can take calls and review email documents at the same time. If you are on the phone much, a headset helps a lot too. (I telecommuted a bit in my corporate life, too and was on the phone a lot. You'll get a nasty kink in your neck without a headset). That or a speakerphone. I had both in my office and didn't realize how helpful they were until I went without.

Do you know of anyone else in your office or general area who has done this successfully? Always helps when someone else sets the precedent. If they are managing well, use them as an example.

And my best advice? Send a lot of emails on your day working at home. It convinces them that you are really working.

More power to you!

[SueC]

Nellie had a lot of good advice. I do think you should consider having some type of childcare for the days you are working at home, unless you can put your time in during non-business hours. A lot of my work happens when the kids are asleep, but I do find it difficult to accomplish the things that can only happen during business hours (such as calling insurance companies). That said, if I'm super-organized I can make it work without any childcare for the baby and minimal childcare for the girls. It is really stressful at times, but I have nothing to compare it to since I have only worked from home since we've had children. I have a good friend who telecommutes one day a week and she is really enjoying this arrangement. She has an au pair (she's got 3 one year olds and believe it or not, this was the cheapest way to provide childcare for 3 babies) so she does have help if she needs to be on a conference call, but I also know she often adjusts her hours on those days so she can take the kids to the zoo, etc.
What I do love about working from home is that I can be casual (jeans and sneakers), I don't have to go through the rigamarole of getting all the kids out the door in the morning, and I have complete autonomy over my schedule. I think either arrangement you are proposing sound like a pretty good deal, so I hope you are able to get something worked out.