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Why Won't Yahoo! Let Employees Work From Home?By Claire Suddath on February 25, 2013Last Friday, a leaked memo sent from Jackie Reses, Yahoo!’s executive vice president of people and development, announced that Yahoo (YHOO) employees would no longer be able to work from home.
“Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home,” Rese, who was hired last fall by Chief Executive Officer Marissa Mayer, explained in the memo, which was later reprinted by the Wall Street Journal‘s AllThingsD blog. She then went on to explain that all employees with “work-from-home arrangements” will have to start coming into the office every day and that when other employees find they have to “stay home for the cable guy,” they should “use your best judgment.
”According to AllThingsD, only “several hundred” of Yahoo’s 11,500 employees work remotely, although an untold number may work at home one or two days a week. Bloomberg Businessweek asked Yahoo how many people it expects to change their schedules as a result of this new policy, but a spokesperson said the company does not comment on internal matters.
That’s too bad, because with this announcement, Yahoo seems to be undoing all the benefits associated with allowing employees the freedom to work from home when they need to.“What’s really troubling about this is that a technology company can’t figure out how to collaborate remotely,” says Kate Lister, president of the Telework Research Center. “[This decision] runs counter to worldwide trends toward more remote work.” According to Telework Research Center’s analysis of the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, telecommuting increased 73 percent from 2005 to 2011.
An estimated 20 million to 30 million Americans work from home at least one day a week.When Mayer joined Yahoo last year, much was made of her pregnancy and subsequent childbirth (for which she took only a two week maternity leave). It’s tempting to view this don’t-work-from-home mandate as a dig at other working parents. But according to a June 2012 article in the Monthly Labor Review (PDF), not only is telecommuting just as popular among childless employees as it is among parents, mothers are no more likely to work from home than are fathers. “It’s kind of a shame that it gets made into a mommy thing because it’s families in general who need this flexible time,” says Lister.In fact, what’s most telling about this decision is that it highlights Yahoo’s apparent inability to keep tabs on its employees unless they’re physically at their desks.
While Rese’s memo implied that employees are unproductive at home, several academic studies counter this claim. For example, a recent study from Stanford University (PDF) found that when a Chinese travel agency let employees work from home, they were 13 percent more productive than when they worked in the building, ultimately saving the company $2,000 per year.
Perhaps more important, employees seemed to appreciate the freedom of choice so much that they had a higher job satisfaction rate and were less likely to leave the agency.Employees who telecommute aren’t happy because they’re working less. In fact, they’re probably working more. A 2010 Brigham Young University study found that office employees can work only 38 hours a week before they find it hard to balance their professional and personal lives; those who worked from home were clocking 57 hours of work before they felt stretched too thin.
So a flexible work policy leads to happier workers, who voluntarily give the company more time.From a company’s perspective—especially one that’s struggling to reestablish its Internet relevancy—you’d think that would be a good thing.http://www.businessweek.com/articles...work-from-home
“Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home,” Rese, who was hired last fall by Chief Executive Officer Marissa Mayer, explained in the memo, which was later reprinted by the Wall Street Journal‘s AllThingsD blog. She then went on to explain that all employees with “work-from-home arrangements” will have to start coming into the office every day and that when other employees find they have to “stay home for the cable guy,” they should “use your best judgment.
”According to AllThingsD, only “several hundred” of Yahoo’s 11,500 employees work remotely, although an untold number may work at home one or two days a week. Bloomberg Businessweek asked Yahoo how many people it expects to change their schedules as a result of this new policy, but a spokesperson said the company does not comment on internal matters.
That’s too bad, because with this announcement, Yahoo seems to be undoing all the benefits associated with allowing employees the freedom to work from home when they need to.“What’s really troubling about this is that a technology company can’t figure out how to collaborate remotely,” says Kate Lister, president of the Telework Research Center. “[This decision] runs counter to worldwide trends toward more remote work.” According to Telework Research Center’s analysis of the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, telecommuting increased 73 percent from 2005 to 2011.
An estimated 20 million to 30 million Americans work from home at least one day a week.When Mayer joined Yahoo last year, much was made of her pregnancy and subsequent childbirth (for which she took only a two week maternity leave). It’s tempting to view this don’t-work-from-home mandate as a dig at other working parents. But according to a June 2012 article in the Monthly Labor Review (PDF), not only is telecommuting just as popular among childless employees as it is among parents, mothers are no more likely to work from home than are fathers. “It’s kind of a shame that it gets made into a mommy thing because it’s families in general who need this flexible time,” says Lister.In fact, what’s most telling about this decision is that it highlights Yahoo’s apparent inability to keep tabs on its employees unless they’re physically at their desks.
While Rese’s memo implied that employees are unproductive at home, several academic studies counter this claim. For example, a recent study from Stanford University (PDF) found that when a Chinese travel agency let employees work from home, they were 13 percent more productive than when they worked in the building, ultimately saving the company $2,000 per year.
Perhaps more important, employees seemed to appreciate the freedom of choice so much that they had a higher job satisfaction rate and were less likely to leave the agency.Employees who telecommute aren’t happy because they’re working less. In fact, they’re probably working more. A 2010 Brigham Young University study found that office employees can work only 38 hours a week before they find it hard to balance their professional and personal lives; those who worked from home were clocking 57 hours of work before they felt stretched too thin.
So a flexible work policy leads to happier workers, who voluntarily give the company more time.From a company’s perspective—especially one that’s struggling to reestablish its Internet relevancy—you’d think that would be a good thing.http://www.businessweek.com/articles...work-from-home
They've called us in the middle of the night, Eastern Time, to effect emergency repairs. But Mr Witchy doesn't get overtime. He only gets straight hourly pay. 
They're quite used to me cussing them out, by now. I really, truly wish that California would just hurry up, and crack and fall off the rest of the continent and sink into the ocean, never to be seen again, already. Honestly!
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