Let's Be Invisible!

One of the often-toted disadvantages of working from home is that coworkers lose the personal interaction and face to face discussions that make us feel connected as a team. 

To this I say, hogwash.

Nothing makes me bottle up my thoughts on a discussion like sitting in a room with people staring at each other or stopping into my desk space to talk.  I’m an introvert.  The former feels like an interrogation.  The latter feels like an invasion of my personal space. 

Phone calls, webinars, teleconferences, emails and chat messages have improved my ability to open up and contribute to the team.  I can plan ahead for a phone meeting because I have agendas or topics in the invites.  When the leader of the call asks for a report or questions each of us by name, I have my information ready to go, my questions at hand, and a computer to reference if I need it.  If I am writing emails or chatting, I can backspace and edit the message until it sounds just right.  When I instruct with webinars, I never feel the eyes burning a hole through me. 

But there is one aspect of working from home that frightens me.  The Webcam. 

That little lens pointed right at a close up of your face, shown always either in over or under exposed lighting, is just not enjoyable.  Having one trained on me for an hour long meeting is downright torture.  And then there are the background distractions.  Kids, pets, the doorbell, having to get up and grab a bottle of water for your parched throat, or wondering about a person's taste in decor based on the movie poster behind their back are just not apropos. 

Fortunately, the rest of my team seems to avoid the webcam as well.  We all have them, we all are quite capable of using them, but we never, ever mention turning them on.  We know what we all look like.  We even know each other’s voices.  I’d rather they hear my voice and picture me mentally in a jacket and blouse, or a business casual sweater.  Because I am sure I wouldn’t put across a professional message if they saw my puppy pushing her toys in my lap midway through a demonstration ;)

Here’s a tongue-in-cheek College Humor video on working from home with webcams.  Enjoy!

Real Jobs You Can Do From Home!

I hear a lot of wistfulness when I mention that I work from home.  I did my time in office settings, complete with long commutes, frequent meetings, presentations, and so forth.  Now I still do all those things, save the commute, and in trade I often have extended “business” hours.  I think it is a good tradeoff! I both love what I do, and I love where I do it.

 

So, I thought I would share a couple of real work-from-home careers that you might enjoy as well…

 

 

Customer and Technical Support -  There are some companies that will hire work from home support agents.  These agents usually log into a central ACD (Automatic Call Distributor) and a type of incident tracking software that they record their interactions with you in as a record of actions taken on the call.  These companies may hire workers as either an employee of the company, or as an independent contractor.  As an employee, the companies may pay for things like your computer, phone and internet connection. Typically these positions pay by the hour.  As an independent contractor, you may be required to furnish your own connections and computer system. They may also be paid by the incident, rather than by the hour.

 

 

Search Engine Optimization - There are companies that pay for the way you search the web, and reviewing your results with them.  Then you assist them in adding your key words to their site to bump up their company in search results.  If a company wants to be the first result for anyone looking to buy, build, design or install a pool, that company may employ a search engine optimizer.  The downside to this is the position is that it is usually contractual, and you will be looking for new assignments from different companies when your current assignment ends.

 

 

Wedding/Party/Event Planners - Perhaps you enjoy designing the perfect event for others to enjoy?  This is a career you may be able to do mostly from home.  You will still need to meet with your clients, show them venues, share catalogs or your visions, and likely even be there on the special day to coordinate activities, but you do not necessarily need to have an office job feel to your work.  You can do a lot of planning and sharing by email or phone.  A downside? Expect phone calls outside normal business hours.

 

 

Writing!  What position could be more solitary than a writer?  You could find a great career in freelance writing of articles, sports events, concerts, writing fiction, short stories, children’s books, travel guides, and so on and so forth.  The downside is there are a LOT of wannabe writers in the world.  Getting your feet wet in collaborative writing, editing, or copywriting could be a good start, but working from home might be a percentage of the time rather than all the time.

 

 

Accountants - Especially tax accountants. While the demand is seasonal, some companies farm out their work to home-based tax preparers who bury themselves in a part of the house somewhere around the beginning of the year, and do not see the light of day until after April 15th.  If this sort of hibernation appeals to you, the rewards can be lucrative.  You could use those tax skills later in the year independently to assist people who were audited in a much-reduced pace, and plan a few vacations.

 

IT - Specifically, software engineers, computer scientists, programmers, and system administrators often have work-at-home job postings.  In fact, this is where I fall in.  I administer systems that are quickly moving to “the cloud”, so I can access them anywhere with a broadband internet connection and a good computer.  My company pays for both of those, so the where was up to me.  There is a little travel involved to work on projects or with my team members, but on the whole we are all independently situated and there is no office.

In the comments, feel free to add other careers you think could work from home!

Pass a (Virtual) Pint

 

 

I work in E-Commerce, that virtual storefront world where you pick items off web pages, click Add to Shopping Cart, and then Check Out with your order.  In fact, we are just emerging from the development of our new storefront product. 

Today is a bright, shiny moment for our team’s project. 

Today, I flipped the switch “on” for our first real live site, and sent an email to the team to say we are ALIVE!

It was exciting!

It was new!

It was the pinnacle of all my team has worked so hard for these past months.

It was…

…super quiet in my office. 

Even the dogs were napping.

Minutes passed.  My husband poked his head in the door as he does from time to time.  I grabbed him, and showed him my first live site.  I beamed with pride, pointing out how everything was working and ready for business. 

He told me he didn’t understand what it was, but he was happy I was happy.

Not the reaction I had hoped for.

I went back to work in my quiet room.

Three hours later, and we had a sale!  I felt like I’d caught a trophy fish on the line.  I grabbed a screen capture of our first sale, and threw it in an email to the team.  I was smiling like the store owner who frames his first dollar bill.

Tick

Tick

Tick

Three more hours, and I get an email back from our happy director.  And another from another team member's email response comes in shortly thereafter.  That was it for the celebration of all the late nights and long weekends thus far. 

I chat up a teammate late in the evening about the day’s victories.  When you work from home, and you leave your chat app running, you are always fair game to an incoming message.

From seven states away, she says it best.

“Wow I wish we could all meet up for happy hour. We need to celebrate this one!!!”

I agree, feeling that unusual but occasional ping of sadness that our team is so spread out. We’re really a good group of people, lots of fun when we get together too.

I joking write back, “phone cams in our local pub of choice?”

Pass me a (virtual) pint of whatever goes best with success in absentia

So...Do You Want to Work from Home?

Hi, I’m Jenn. 

I work for a very large global company. 

I had worked out of our office in Upstate New York for over a decade, making the back and forth commute from home to work and work to home, spending hours in a cubicle and passing shoulder to shoulder with hundreds of coworkers.  I dressed in office casual, met face to face with managers and coworkers frequently, and even volunteered for the employee activity committee and food drives. 

This was my main building.

 

 
This was (sometimes) my commute :P

 

Almost one year ago I changed career paths in my company. The new position location said, “This position is virtual and will office remotely”. 

Now, I work from home.

In my previous surroundings, I had a cubicle existence where computers, printers, binders, and other desk doodads had their happy place and I could reach everything with ease. 

People who hear I work from home assume I am a neat, organized person with everything at my fingertips and a place for everything.  While I strive for a nice, clean desk...

...things often de-evolve to this.

I become congested by everything I might need in my day. 

And there is no housekeeping.  Nobody vaccuums the floor at night, or dusts the light fixtures.
 

 
So I eventually go on a rampage, throwing out old clutter and chasing dust bunnies out of nooks and crannies.

But yes, you can wear slippers to work if you want...

 

...and sometimes....

...I do.

 

Welcome to Living in My Office

- a true blog about working from home -