Ideas and Opinions from Donald Trump and TrumpU Faculty.
Management Tips: Trusting Telecommuters
It takes a good manager - and a great employee - for telecommuting to work.
With gasoline prices still uncomfortably high, more companies are allowing their employees to work from home at least occasionally. While that sounds great for the worker, it’s often frustrating for the boss. It requires an unbelievable amount of trust as they hope their charges are actually accomplishing work-related missions and not watching TV, doing the laundry or working on the kids’ science project.
In the end, it should be easy to tell if telecommuting employees are getting the job done. Their work output should speak for itself. But it’s still difficult for a hands-on manager to loosen the reins, especially when it’s someone who is used to walking into cubicles and stopping by desks for meetings all day long.
So there’s a huge trust issue. But if you don’t trust your employees, you shouldn’t have hired them in the first place.
Most good managers know their own personalities and the personalities of their employees. They know which workers are self-starters and have good self-discipline. They know if they can have faith that they’ll actually do what they’re supposed to do if they’re not under the watchful eye of the boss. Likewise, employers know their own personality. They should know if they can be hands-off enough to let employees do their own thing out of the confines of the traditional office environment.
As for me, for the most part, I like to have my employees around me. So much of what we do requires hands-on, in-office interaction. But I believe that the people who work for me would get their work done from wherever they are. I hire good people and I trust them to do their job.
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12 Comments
Time tested business practices would lead me to believe that more work will be accomplished in a hands-on, professional environment. Observation is a learning tool and an effective motivator. When employees are busy doing their jobs, it creates an engine-like effect. All parts are operating as a whole. Like a competitive car race, everyone works together. The spectators (customers who pay money) are more apt to return even if the prices go up due to gas, etc.
I love personal freedom. I must admit I don't accomplish as much as I would like to sometimes, especially when the sun is shining and I get invitations to be somewhere else.
Discipline and commitment to the project, can sometimes be forgotten, when a day at the beach or whatever, seems more attractive. But these occassions are no different than an employee calling in sick, or making up bogus excuses in a structured working enviroment.
How many expenses you have to pay, and the amount of time you have to pay them has a remarkable way of keeping "independents" focused on their work. Productive people usually do more than expected, not less, whether management is watching them or not.
Unless you qualify for a government bailout, your benefits and rewards are up to you. Your responsibilities don't go away whether you telecommute in the comfort of your home, or travel to work in an office somewhere else.
Having an option is ideal. Keeping an open mind is wise.
Thanks for the article Mr. Trump
Greetings from Mexico
Keep things in check...and offer incentives to offset a bad owner who takes credit for their job performance. And get rid of lousy job performace at home or at work. Keep professional standards to measure their performance.. If a 40 hour work place is required are the workers at a base rate or flat salary. A difference and may be more to do with job security.
This said, not all managers trust their employees. For example our manager is constantly worried that his employees are either trying to steal stock or time from him. And he includes every employee in this, even the ones who have worked for him for 5+ years.
Jack Creighton
www.supermarketsoap.co.uk
The managers who worry their workers will be unproductive must understand that time can be wasted anywhere, and regardless of where an employee is located, non productivity will become obvious and you deal with it like you would in any other situation.
Another outdated concept is that one must work 9-5. Again, some jobs require that but many more don't. So what if an employee wants to enjoy a sunny afternoon at the beach with their children/friends/dog? They can do their work just as easily at 7pm at night or on a rainy Saturday. Studies have shown that people are more productive when they're happy and have a balance in their lives. Introducing flexibility into the workplace has transformed companies like Best Buy. They went from high turnover and high levels of absenteeism due to stress-related illnesses, to low turnover and content, healthy employees who get the job done.
Companies still running their businesses like an early 20th century assembly plant have missed the opportunities the information age and its technology offers.
I read your comments on the blog:
"But if you don’t trust your employees, you shouldn’t have hired them in the first place."
"I hire good people and I trust them to do their job."
I just bought your book "Think Big and Kick Ass". What you said in the book contradicts the comments from your blog above.
In you book you wrote that your motto is "Hire the best and don't trust them."
I'm not getting it. So how far can we apply those comments as business owners? Which one is it? Trust them or don't trust them? Or trust them for certain things and don't trust them for certain things? If it's the third option, where does the line start and where does it end?
Thank you Mr. Trump.
We have started working from home a couple of days each week to reduce our cost of commuting. We have set up teleconference capabilities for our meetings with our customers spread all over the country, and now we use the same technology for our meetings with each other.
We also use Skype as our phone system. Skype lets us have video phone conferences via the computer so we can stay in constant contact during the work day. We have also utilized some web based collaboration tools that help us keep track of where each of us is on our projects.
We still find it useful to meet at the office some of the time, but when we don't, telecommuting is the answer for us. . Bottom line we stay just as productive, and cut cost.
The other thing I found difficult was communication. You are right that daily interaction is very productive. Being able to hold one minute meetings or run a quick idea past a peer is much simpler if you are in the same building. I had to schedule weekly meetings, keep lists of questions and ideas, and use phone conferences to keep in touch.
I have also worked in multiple locations. This allowed time back at the office on some days, and time at home. If you are limited in office space, sharing offices allows you to have more employees with less investment in space and equipment.
But sometimes, the team's been there all along, and the manager is new.