Why Working at Home is a Lie

The CEO at Yahoo Marissa Mayer has ended the practice of "working at home" at the California headquarters and  field offices. This reversal of a popular trend is raising the hackles of many layabouts and con artists who pretend to be working at home.

Everyone knows that you cannot get anything done at home. 

Anyone who has tried doing administrative "office work" from home realizes that when no one is watching, you tend to be less effective in your use of time.  The phone rings with non-business purposes. The neighbor sees your car in the driveway and drops by for coffee.  If you have a window, you look out into the yard or street and darned if there isn't something more interesting out there than the boring report you are supposed to be working on.

Many working moms and dads claim that the flexibility of working at home permits them to avoid the stress of having to rely on daycare or babysitter.  Fine,when the kids are infants,  but we all know that it is impossible to get any office work done when there are toddlers running around, screaming and breaking stuff. 

With the TV only a click away, there is a temptation to check the weather report, and then maybe a few breaking news headlines.  Before you know it, you're watching "Judge Judy" or one of the many repeats of "How I married your Mother".

There are so many more distractions at home.  You look up idly from your desk and see unfinished tasks everywhere. You decide to rearrange the bookcase, or replace that burned-out light bulb.  Maybe you go out for a breath of air, while you're out, you may as well  jump in the car, go to the market or even the library.  Walk the dog, change the litterbox. Nap on the sofa, scan through the seed catalog that came in the mail.  Check on car rental prices for your upcoming getaway trip...This is how the day goes when you are working at home.

News articles suggest that there have been studies that conclude that home workers are more productive.  The only one I've seen cited, was done by Stanford University.  They studied a group of Chinese Call Center workers.  I would argue that such results for hourly workers whose every action is captured and measured, is not relevant to the American salaried work at home refugee from the cube farm. 

Any who argues that they get more done, or that they actually spend more time working at home is delusional.  They may be fooling themselves and maybe even the boss.  But if they are honest, they know I'm right. 

The exception to this rule: people who get paid for results  - commissioned Salespeople, who can be counted on to be working no matter where they are. Or writers who get paid by the word. Most of these people goof-off much of their time at home, but they make up for it by being intensely productive under the pressure of a time deadline.

So, my advice is: Get back to the office and get something done.