Mobile Workforce interview with Eric Lesser

Transcription

1 Mobile Workforce interview with Eric Lesser January 2006 GEORGE POHLE: I'm George Pohle, global leader of the IBM Institute For Business Value, which is part of IBM's Business Consulting Services. We're here today to discuss a survey that was recently conducted to examine the issues associated with managing a mobile workforce. Joining me is Eric Lesser, an associate partner with the IIBV. Eric is responsible for conducting research and developing thought leadership on a variety of Human Capital Management issues. Welcome, Eric. ERIC LESSER: Thank you very much, George. GEORGE POHLE: Can you tell us a little bit about the key issues that you surfaced when you were conducting this survey? ERIC LESSER: Sure. We saw a number of very important issues arising from the study. This study was conducted looking at about 350 mobile workers across Europe, looking at workers that were over 29 countries. And found five very unique and important points. One is the rise of the number of employees who have begun working in a mobile environment. We found that 48 percent of the people we surveyed have been working mobile only since about 2002 and about 15 percent started this year GEORGE POHLE: That's a significant change. ERIC LESSER: Absolutely. We're also finding some of the big challenges and difficulties that mobile workers are facing We found that over 50 percent found it was difficult to participate in meetings while working remotely while just under 50 percent found it was difficult to collaborate with other team members. One of the major concerns that came out of the study was from individuals fearing that they're becoming disconnected from their informal networks that they used to share knowledge and identify opportunities within the organization. GEORGE POHLE: So there's no more water cooler? ERIC LESSER: The water cooler becomes much, much more difficult and people use that term specifically. WWe found that it's not just simply people sitting around in their pajamas working but that there are some challenges. ibm.com/bcs 1

2 And then, lastly the critical nature of having a reliable, easy to use technological infrastructure. One of the things that we found is people fighting to get online to retain their connectivity. All of those things were definite detriments to people working in a mobile environment. GEORGE POHLE: So you conducted this survey in 29 European countries. Would these findings apply to other geographies as well? ERIC LESSER: I think absolutely. I think certainly in the North America we'll see very similar results. In Asia Pacific there's been less, interest in the realm of mobile working simply because of some of the cultural challenges, also some of the physical space makes it prohibitive but even there we are seeing some further interest in this area. GEORGE POHLE: So you talked a little bit about work life balance being an issue. Can you say a little bit more about that? ERIC LESSER: Sure. In some ways it was a very interesting dichotomy. On one hand people said that, yes, mobile working certainly was an important work life benefit. Over half our survey positions said that a better work life balance was among the most important benefits of mobile working. Three quarters particularly liked the flexible hours afforded by mobile Where we saw a challenge was that almost two thirds of the workers found it was difficult to separate their home and their work life. And when we dug a little deeper on that, we found that there were two primary reasons for that. The first one was is that mobile working enables people to work pretty much anytime of day or night and essentially people did and found it difficult to quote-unquote switch it off. But there was another important theme and that was that mobile workers felt that their colleagues did not trust that the mobile workers were working as hard at home. About 40 percent believed that they needed to be more available to their colleagues and 38 percent believe that remote workers suspected of not (use not from above) doing their own full share of work. GEORGE POHLE: One of the areas that the respondents indicated was a critical success factor was having good reliable mobile technology. Can you say a little bit more about what they meant by that? ibm.com/bcs 2

3 ERIC LESSER: Sure, absolutely. Over 60 percent said that better technology would help them be better mobile workers More frequent mobile workers, those who work more than once a week at home and those who had been mobile workers longer than five years were more likely to report that better technology would improve their experience. A lot of companies don't have help desks that are geared to deal with remote workers. Thirty-eight percent said that the need for better help desk resources, particularly at the non manager level. Over half of the people felt that being able to troubleshoot your own technological problems was an important skill for a mobile worker. GEORGE POHLE: Oh, yes. ERIC LESSER: And I think that's a very dangerous, a very dangerous skill because typically you want people doing their work. You don't want them trying to figure out the bugs in their system. GEORGE POHLE: Sure. Well, you also indicated in the survey that people found it difficult to make connections and to build trust when they were working remotely. Can you tell us a little bit more about that? ERIC LESSER: Sure. one of the interesting quotes we saw from the study was I worry quite a lot about being disadvantaged because of the lack of company information and gossip around the office that I don't get when I'm working hard at home. Almost half of the people in the survey believed it was more difficult to develop relationships with work colleagues in a mobile environment. More than 40 percent indicated that they couldn't hear about developments and opportunities within the company; and almost a third believed that they were being left out of key meetings and decisions. So they said that coffee machine conversations and networking just don't happen and working at home can be isolating. That can be particularly dangerous for companies because what we find is people who don't feel that they are connected to their organizations, who are operating on the periphery are much likely to leave their organizations after a while. ibm.com/bcs 3

4 GEORGE POHLE: Right. So what would you recommend to organizations that have those sorts of issues? ERIC LESSER: Well, I think there are a couple of things that companies can do. Some companies actually put in strict guidelines and say that people who have worked under a year in the company cannot be mobile workers. That forces them into an office environment where they get to know people and start to build their initial contacts. Companies also should have both formal and informal events for mobile workers, where they can have face-to-face conversations GEORGE POHLE: Consulting and services organizations seem to be on the cutting edge of this sort of a mobile workforce. Is that true and what do you see as some of the other companies or industries that will be adopting this sort of a mobile workforce approach in the future? ERIC LESSER: Well, I think you're going to see lots of organizations who are making this transition from purely being product-based companies to more servicesor solutions-based companies, are going to be having a great uptake, on mobile working. The primary reason is because they want to get closer to their customers. They want to work at their customer locations, they are going to be spending more time traveling and sort of embedding themselves into their customer organizations. But as a result they still need to be able to maintain those types of connections back to the organization GEORGE POHLE: So besides the closer customer contact, what other types of benefits are achieved when you adopt more mobile workforce approach? ERIC LESSER: Well, one thing. Given the upcoming labor shortage that we're seeing, particularly in more maturing economies, the ability to tap into people who perhaps don't want to commute on a regular basis. GEORGE POHLE: Right. ERIC LESSER: Who are willing to work at home two to three days a week. Retirees may be another pool of people who just don't want to do the nine to five every single day but are willing to work in alternative work schedules. ibm.com/bcs 4

5 We're seeing major airlines, for example, having all of their reservations agents that are now working out of their homes GEORGE POHLE: Okay. What else do we need to talk about? ERIC LESSER: Let's talk about the four things that companies can do to increase the productivity and working experience. GEORGE POHLE: So you talked about one of them, right? ERIC LESSER: Which is increasing the reliability and functionality of remote working technology. GEORGE POHLE: Yes. ERIC LESSER: You need to make the technology work. In some ways it's a necessary if not a sufficient condition. But if people don't feel that the technology that they're working in is reliable, that they can connect to their networks, that they can use collaborative and virtual tools that enable them to work more effectively with their colleagues, they're going to get very frustrated and be very difficult to work in a mobile environment. Another thing is enabling the skills of both employees and their managers. In many organizations that we have found that people do not provide training for people to become mobile workers. And as a result they're not prepared for the differences in how do you run a virtual meeting, how do you collaborate with people that you can't see on a regular basis, how do you develop trust and relationships for people when you're not interacting with them on a daily basis. When we ask people what the critical skills were for mobile workers, about 80 percent said that being able to work independently, just about 80 percent said be able to organize their work tasks and just about two thirds said this importance of being able to collaborate in a virtual environment. Another very critical piece is to be able to develop what we call an outcomes-based performance management system which levels the playing field before...between remote and office-based workers. So really the importance of being able to evaluate people not on how many hours they're spending in the office, but actually what they've accomplished -- having them sign up for goals and then to be able to measure them based on that output, rather than just simply using face time as a criteria of how late people are staying in the office. ibm.com/bcs 5

6 [DIRECTION / DISCUSSION] GEORGE POHLE: You talked about the importance of reliable technology supporting the mobile worker, but what are some of the other critical success factors that make a difference in managing the mobile workforce? ERIC LESSER: Well, one of them clearly is corporate and managerial support for mobile working. It's their performance, not their geography that should be the criterion for judgment. You're trusting people with millions of Euros for their business' and brands' reputation, yet companies are not trusting them in how they manage their time. So it's really about corporations making their commitment to mobile worker visible and recognize that people who are mobile do make an important contribution to their companies. So judging them based on the deliverables that they produce, their interactions with customers, their responsiveness to inquiries but all things that can be measured in terms of what people actually do rather than how they appear. GEORGE POHLE: Those are the highlights. Great. Thanks, Eric... GEORGE POHLE: Thanks very much, Eric, for talking with us today about the mobility study. Where can people access the material that you referenced? To get a copy of this study and other thought leadership, please go to GEORGE POHLE: Great. Thanks very much for coming today, ERIC LESSER: Thanks, George. Copyright 2006 IBM Corporation. All rights reserved. IBM and the IBM logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Other company, product and service names may be trademarks or service marks of others. References in this publication to IBM products and services do not imply that IBM intends to make them available in all countries in which IBM operates. ibm.com/bcs 6