Sunday's Washington Post offers an article by Stephen Barr, Making Telework More at Home (Jan. 11, 2004) based on his interview with the Telework Consortium's CEO, Bill Mularie, and a number of folks from organizations involved in telework pilots. Here's a clip on the importance of videoconferencing to teleworkers and their office-based coworkers:

"At the Telework Consortium in Herndon, chief executive William M. Mularie does not play down the importance of face-to-face time between managers and their staffs.

"Most bosses and employees know that body language is just as important as verbal communication when it comes to those difficult moments in the workday. But the personal touch -- smiles, laughter and banter -- does not have to be sacrificed when telecommuting, he suggests.

...

"By going live on the Web, federal managers can see telecommuters at work, and employees can feel they are still in the loop."

At the Telework Lab in Herndon, VA, Washington Post's Stephen Barr (center) inteviews Linda Whitmer, Director of the NetTech Center (on screen from Winchester, VA), Werner Schaer, President of the Software Productivity Consortium (left of Barr), and Bill Mularie, CEO of the Telework Consortium (to Barr's right).

The Treasury Department's Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), one of the Telework Consortium's Development Partners, offers some hard figures that go a long way towards proving the business case for telework:

"About 40 percent of TIGTA's 960-member staff telecommutes three days a week, and 98 percent telecommute one day a month, said Joseph Hungate, the agency's chief information officer. The telework program is helping the agency hold down rental costs in Washington and in Atlanta, where it has saved $100,000 by turning back leased space." 

9:16:17 AM    
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