People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs • Hacker News Board

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#11

Post by CodeMage » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 12:52 PM UTC

jasonkester wrote: post #10

serichsen wrote: post #2

I think that this study fails to address that they may confuse cause and effect. What is the reason for a telecommuting arrangement? Why doesn't that person just move closer to the job location? The answer is often that he has family ties. I would suspect that telecommuters are significantly more likely to have families, and that may have a pronounced effect on their views of their work life.

I don't know, my reasons for working remotely have never had anything to do with family. Even now that I've got the wife & kid, they're not the reason I'm remote. To put it bluntly, nobody has an office at the beach. Certainly not the beach in the tropics where I want to be. If there was a Google campus on a remote reef pass in the Mentawais, I might consider taking a seat in a cubicle. But there's not. We're living…

I'll add my own bit of anecdata. I love my family fiercely, but trying to work while they're around is very distracting for me (often this is through no fault of theirs at all) and is likely to have an adverse impact on my productivity. That doesn't mean I never choose to work from home based on family-related reasons. It just means that, everything else being equal, I wouldn't choose to work from home in order to be closer to my family; in that case, I'd rather simply spend less time at the office.

Here's what does make me choose to work from home, usually one day a week, in no particular order of importance:

# Avoid driving. Santiago is a jungle on wheels and even one day of not having to deal with it helps immensely.

# Wake up later than usual and/or have a short nap after lunch. It might make me spend less time doing my work, but I'll be a lot more focused on it.

# Listen to the music I want, on my speakers, as loud as I want (within reason, of course). At the office I use headphones, to avoid bothering my co-workers, but it's really not the same thing.

# My coffee might suck compared to Starbucks, but it's a lot cheaper than it. And it's infinitely better than the free coffee at the office.

# My home computer has no annoying web filters. I can hook up my company laptop to its VPN and use my home computer for browsing in those idle moments.

# Hot water! Believe it or not, Chileans don't have a habit of washing hands with hot water. It probably has to do with the fact that they use mainly gas to heat water. Whatever the reason, being able to say "and now I'm going to wash my hands with hot water" is a really pleasant change ;)

In short, it's creature comforts that drive my decision to work from home. Most of that stuff could be improved by living closer to the office or the company providing better "stuff" on their premises, but those solutions seem rather inefficient compared to giving employees freedom to choose to work from home.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#12

Post by talkingquickly » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 12:54 PM UTC

The article mentions "Spending less than 50% of the time in the office," I think the key there is choice. As soon as going to the office every day isn't compulsory, you feel that you have more freedom; very few people respond well to a situation where they're told they "have" to do something (or is it just me?!).

You can also pick your working environment to suit your mood, I find sometimes I want minimal distractions and no commute so I work from home for a bit; after a few days of that it's refreshing to be in the office and around people for a while and then the cycle repeats.

What I'm getting at is I think people who have the option to work from home are likely to be more satisfied rather than people who exclusively do.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#13

Post by vaksel » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 12:55 PM UTC

serichsen wrote: post #2

I think that this study fails to address that they may confuse cause and effect. What is the reason for a telecommuting arrangement? Why doesn't that person just move closer to the job location? The answer is often that he has family ties. I would suspect that telecommuters are significantly more likely to have families, and that may have a pronounced effect on their views of their work life.

I think the biggest roadblock to moving closer to work, is that a lot of people are home owners.

And selling a house is a pain in the ass and is a huge commitment.

Which would be fine if there was job security, but in this day and age, you won't be working for a single company your whole life

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#14

Post by Duff » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 1:08 PM UTC

Note what it actually said:

"Spending less than 50 percent of the week in the collocated office affords more flexibility and aids in the balance of work and personal roles, which teleworkers find satisfying."

Less than 50%. When I was a more of a contributor versus my current manager role, coming into work 2 days a week and getting my stuff done at home would have rocked.

There are also many things that weren't said. I have a 10x16 office with a door and windows. The folks on my teams are in 4-person semi-private pods with plenty of room with attractive color schemes, reasonably high quality furniture and natural light. It's work, but everyone is pretty happy.

In other roles, I've been in 4x4 high-wall cubes in windowless pens with 40 people where the brightest colors in the room were the red nubs on IBM thinkpads. That was a miserable working environment.

Personally, I'd rather work in my current environment than home. On the other hand, I'd rather work in my basement sitting on a stool and using my furnace as a desk than previous, crappy office environments/cattle pens.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#15

Post by gexla » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 1:24 PM UTC

Duff wrote: post #14

Note what it actually said: "Spending less than 50 percent of the week in the collocated office affords more flexibility and aids in the balance of work and personal roles, which teleworkers find satisfying." Less than 50%. When I was a more of a contributor versus my current manager role, coming into work 2 days a week and getting my stuff done at home would have rocked. There are also many things that weren't said.…

Right, there are lots of factors.

I prefer working from the office, but I imagine I would have a different opinion if working from the office requires a long commute or scraping ice off my windshield in the morning. I also work for myself, so it's MY office. ;)

I also somewhat enjoy the feeling of being among the hustle of downtown. There is energy there. So many people doing their thing to carve out their slice of the pie and I'm among the relatively happy and successful. That's motivation and energy that I don't feel at home.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#16

Post by cmurdock » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 1:44 PM UTC

CodeMage wrote: post #11

jasonkester wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, my reasons for working remotely have never had anything to do with family. Even now that I've got the wife & kid, they're not the reason I'm remote. To put it bluntly, nobody has an office at the beach. Certainly not the beach in the tropics where I want to be. If there was a Google campus on a remote reef pass in the Mentawais, I might consider taking a seat in a cubicle. But there's not. We're living…

I'll add my own bit of anecdata. I love my family fiercely, but trying to work while they're around is very distracting for me (often this is through no fault of theirs at all) and is likely to have an adverse impact on my productivity. That doesn't mean I never choose to work from home based on family-related reasons. It just means that, everything else being equal, I wouldn't choose to work from home in order to be…

Bleh I find most coffee to be better than starbucks. Barring of course the free coffee I get in my office. That stuff tastes like hot mud.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#17

Post by rglover » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 1:55 PM UTC

gexla wrote: post #9

I have gone full circle. At first I loved the idea of working from the house. Years later, I love the office. The best mix is a combination of freedom of being able to pick your hours and working from home but still having that work place to go to.

I like this idea. There should be some sort of "base" that you go to, though, it shouldn't be a requirement that you be there all the time. I feel like humans respond better to changing environments and being able to jump between the home, office, or wherever influences a much better mood and willingness to be productive.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#18

Post by agj » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 1:57 PM UTC

davidw wrote: post #3

I'm going a bit bonkers working from home, to tell the truth. The biggest problem is the fuzzy line between work and home.

This hits the nail on the head, for me. I thought staying motivated would be my primary problem before I started, but what's definitely worn me down the most is the lack that delineation -- both in my routine and in the physical separation of work and home.

I've tried to remain positive -- and have for the most part -- but after time, and especially when I have projects at work accumulating, it's extremely easy to feel trapped at work/home.

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#19

Post by ams6110 » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 2:03 PM UTC

CodeMage wrote: post #11

jasonkester wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, my reasons for working remotely have never had anything to do with family. Even now that I've got the wife & kid, they're not the reason I'm remote. To put it bluntly, nobody has an office at the beach. Certainly not the beach in the tropics where I want to be. If there was a Google campus on a remote reef pass in the Mentawais, I might consider taking a seat in a cubicle. But there's not. We're living…

I'll add my own bit of anecdata. I love my family fiercely, but trying to work while they're around is very distracting for me (often this is through no fault of theirs at all) and is likely to have an adverse impact on my productivity. That doesn't mean I never choose to work from home based on family-related reasons. It just means that, everything else being equal, I wouldn't choose to work from home in order to be…

I'm not following the logic on the hot water issue. What does heating it with gas have to do with it?

Re: People who work from home are more satisfied with their jobs

#20

Post by ams6110 » Thu, Jul 21, 2011, 2:06 PM UTC

junto wrote: post #6

I worked from home for years until our first child came along. Now I've started renting office space and I am happy to have a natural separation between work and home. When I switch the computer off and go home, I switch off and relax. I now realise that this separation is important for your long term health and relationships.

Yeah I'm working at home a lot right now and it's not everything I hoped it would be. There's the nagging feeling all the time that "I could be working on X right now, the computer is right over there..."

It helps to have a real home office, a place you use for work and nothing else, in a separate room if you have the space. It also helps to set "work hours" otherwise you feel sort of like you're always (at least potentially) at work.