On Wednesday, the Baltimore Sun had an article called “Telecommuting to Extremes“. Apparently, telecommuting has become so commonplace that people are trying to find ways to make it sound exciting again.

Of course, what they call “extreme telecommuting” I call “work”. According to the Sun, telecommuting becomes extreme when the teleworker is in a different state than the company for which they telecommute.

Frankly I don’t think the distinction is that important. I also find it a little funny that they would use the hip young term extreme to describe something they go on to say isn’t really embraced by the younger set. One point they make in the article is that younger workers often benefit from being in the workplace because it helps them strengthen their career path.

I don’t think age has as much to do with being a successful telecommuter as maturity, discipline, and need for regular human contact, but if you are going to generalize I guess it makes sense to say that older folks have more of those qualities than younger ones. I am 33 so I’m not sure in which group people would plunk me.

So maybe it’s just a slow news day. The rest of the article goes on to make all the important points about the pros and cons of telecommuting.

(editor’s note: the Baltimore Sun’s online version of the story has been renamed “Telecommuting Long Distances Works.”)

GovExec.com reports that the VA is cutting back on telework and prohibiting the use of personal computers for telework.

Um… didn’t they already have that rule?

The theft of data on 26 million veterans could have been prevented if existing rules weren’t ignored and unenforced. Period. Punish the people that are flouting the rules and fix the process.

I believe in rules, especially for teleworkers. I believe that if security policies and processes aren’t in place to effectively protect important data, then teleworking shouldn’t occur when that data is required to do the work.

The problem is people are lazy and that is really one thing you can’t be if you work from home. You have to do the job and you have to do it better than people that go to the office everyday and are seen regularly.

Simple everyday technology would have protected the data that was stolen. Encryption is easily implemented on laptop harddrives. VPN and terminal server access could prevent the data from ever leaving the servers in the VA office.

If you run a business or a telework program for your business you have to take security into account when you design your program and set your policies. Just like you have a lock on your front door and an anti-virus program on your computer, encryption will be the next mandatory component for the mobile workforce.

I am currently doing some research on encryption for small business. An article on the topic is on my to-do list.

Here’s an interesting article in the San Jose Mercury News.

Apparently the new CIO has decided that employees are abusing flex time and telecommuting privileges and need to be reigned in and slapped down. He has taken the draconian step of eliminating the option to telecommute for about a thousand IT personnel. This will require employees to commute up to 50 miles a day, relocate or quit (without severance pay.)

This is from the company that was a pioneer in the flexible workplace. A company whose telecommuting program began in the 1960’s. A technology company that makes a lot of the products that enable telecommuting. Hmmm.

So what does this mean? Is this a new trend? Is telecommuting a failure? Will other companies start to follow HP’s lead?

I really don’t think so.

As far as I can tell, this is just poor management. Here are some of the reasons for the decision specified in the article and my take on them:

• Some employees were abusing the system. Frankly, I have never thought it is a good leadership practice to punish everyone for the mistakes of a few. I mean really… this sounds like what the nuns did to us in 2nd grade because Johnny in the back row was talking.
• Poor performers learn better when they can interact with good performers. Ummm… does it really make sense to punish (and possibly lose) the high-performers for the sake of the poor performers.
• “There’s a certain synergy when people are together in a room”. That’s true but there is also a lot more socializing, idle chatter, wasted time, distractions and interuptions. Does everyone need to be in the same room all the time?

I have always found that for telecommuting to work you need an employee with certain qualities and training and a manager with certain qualities and training. Obviously it doesn’t work for everyone. But just as obviously, it really works well for many.

I can’t see this move as anything other than a management failure. It’s sad to see, but I don’t think we will see a large crackdown on telecommuting and flextime from other companies. Of course, my vision may be clouded by my obvious bias but I will be keeping my eye on the situation.

This article on Enron’s Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling made me very happy.

Skilling and Lay were found guilty by a jury of their peers. Okay well sort of… I mean it wasn’t a jury of gazillionaire white-collar crooks that convicted them. It was a jury of real people, with real lives just like the real people with real lives that were screwed by the obscene greediness of these guys.

Okay, but how do I really feel. .

Well the remarkable thing about this conviction is that it actually happened. These guys gave so much money to politicians that they should have been protected… but they weren’t. It could be argued that political contributions simply don’t buy favors and protection. It could also be argued that these guys’ crimes were so outrageous that the millions paid to keep them out of jail simply weren’t enough.

In any case, the conviction couldn’t have happened to a more deserving pair. I know, I know the appeals are just getting started. But let me enjoy the moment.