Remote Working No Longer Remote Possibility.

According to an AT&T Point of View, based on a survey conducted among 254 global senior business executives by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), just 34% of respondents say that almost none of their staff works remotely — a number that declines from 46% in 2003. When asked to choose the three business functions best suited for remote working, survey respondents note sales first and foremost (64%) followed by customer-service staff (49%) and marketing-related functions (40%).

The study also determined that 20% of businesses worldwide use VoIP to make remote working possible, and a whopping 79% say they will use VoIP by 2006.

As for the concerns business executives have with the adoption of remote workers, the survey determined that over 40% of respondents cite each of the following issues — the difficulty of monitoring output of remote workers and the loss of the perceived benefit of face-to-face interaction. Furthermore, 33% say that working remotely at their firms means not having full access to all network applications and content while 30% say the cost of remote access to the firm’s network still hinders remote working.

In its report, The Remote Worker, eMarketer estimates that there were 26.6 million teleworkers in the US in March 2004. The number represents 19.2% of the total number of employed Americans.

Ben Macklin, eMarketer Senior Analyst and author of the report, notes, “Teleworking is not a new phenomenon but advances in technology have made it possible to vastly greater numbers of people. The US mobile and remote workforce is growing at twice the rate of the overall workforce, according to International Data Corporation (IDC), and organizations need to plan and build for this change.”

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