Remote Working Part 1 – The Rough Guide – Summary

Obviously not everybody is able to work remotely as some vocations require people to be at their place of work or travel to undertake their work face to face. But for those of us are allowed to work remotely then I thought it would be useful to share what I have learned and present some practical advice by distributing it online with the sole objective of providing helpful timesavers for adapting to remote working or managing remote workers.

I should warn you that there are groups of self proclaimed ‘gurus’ on the web who will try and sell you e-books for significant sums of cash, trust me you don’t have to do this.

I am privileged to be able to work in whatever location I choose and just about everybody who asks me what I do for a living wants to understand how I am able to work remotely. Don’t get the wrong idea I am still learning about the science of remote working as all of the time I encounter individuals on the web who show me new tricks and I am constantly unearthing new tools and processes that make my life easier and improve my productivity.

Throughout the past seven years I have steadily adapted my working practices to enable me to do just about all of my work remotely with a collection of web tools and robust self discipline. One late night whilst surfing the Internet I found Quickbooks online and this made me think about what just might be possible. The discovery of web based ‘on demand’ small business accounting software was a pivotal moment for me and the beginning of my ‘remote working career.

I must state up front that efficiently working remotely is as much about the tools as it is about self discipline. Working remotely also means educating your colleagues, supervisors and clients as to what they can expect and how they will keep in touch with you.

In ‘Remote Working Part 2 – Things you should know about managing yourself’ I talk about how to focus.