Telecommuting was once touted as the silver bullet designed to fix everything
from executive burnout and low employee morale to air pollution. In reality
though, very few organizations have achieved a great deal of success through
telecommuting.
One law firm's experience, however, has been quite different. An Australia-based legal practice with international offices has had a successful remote workforce solution in place for about six years now, enabling a team of senior word processing operators to work full time from home. (This firm requested it not be identified by name.) While the system hasn't been without its headaches, it has seen productivity gains of up to 70 percent in some cases; it has enabled the firm to retain qualified, highly experienced staff; and it has provided a superior after-hours service to the firm's partners and clients.
What’s the recipe for success?
What were the critical success factors for this firm, and why have they succeeded where others have failed? The prime reasons are:
- Implementing technology that provides completely seamless network access.
- Selecting employees with the right attitude to make it work.
- Proving to management that "out of sight, out of mind,” does not result in decreased productivity. In fact, it’s quite the reverse.
At the time of the original implementation, the firm had a network of Macintosh desktops (later replaced by PCs) supported by UNIX back-end processing systems for document and practice management. Dial-in access was direct to Shiva Corporation's LanRovers, and all applications available on-site were equally available off-site, unlike some remote solutions that provide limited access to a select range of applications, primarily e-mail.
The dictation and transcription system installed was a Lanier Digital Dictation system. This combination of seamless access to both the LAN/WAN and the dictation system provided a powerful platform for true remote working, and particularly for word processing.
With digital dictation, jobs are managed centrally, but can also be dictated directly to a particular operator, using either a Lanier handset or a digital telephone. This proved extremely beneficial for the firm's commercial lawyers, who worked with clients in different time zones, and traveled frequently. Using a digital telephone from any of the firm's offices, or from anywhere in the world, an on-call remote operator could be telephoned and advised that an urgent job was pending. A lawyer would then assign it to the operator. Once transcribed, the work printed directly to a printer in the lawyer's office, be it Sydney or Shanghai. Alternatively, if the lawyer was traveling, the document would be sent by e-mail, or a document reference would be e-mailed for retrieval via the document management system.
Overcoming initial hurdles
According to the firm's IT manager, the technology was actually the easy part. The major hurdle was overcoming initial management resistance to the project. After all, how could the lawyers and managers be confident that staff was genuinely working and not simply playing with the kids or, worse, lounging around watching Oprah?
To alleviate this resistance, and put things in perspective, a benchmark had to be established. Using the Lanier system, it was possible to track the operators' productivity. Since results were already being collated on a weekly basis for review by HR, this was not seen as an imposition.
A pilot program was then established with a number of proficient operators who would work on a separate floor in the office and use remote dial-in facilities instead of network connections to simulate a home environment. Three months prior to the pilot, an average sampling of transcription was taken to provide a benchmark. This figure was then compared with transcription hours recorded during the pilot to determine productivity fluctuations. The results of the pilot astounded all concerned, with two operators achieving productivity increases of around 50 percent over the on-site operators, and another, a phenomenal 70 percent.
The pilot also enabled IT staff to monitor and assess problems on-site where they were easier to diagnose and resolve. Initially, the level of technical support did not change. Being a high availability site, support was already available 24/7, and with the operators trained in the resolution of common problems before going live, resolving issues proved no more difficult than supporting other remote users.
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