The notion of tele-activity enbraces all forms of distance working carried out by means of telecommunication. One also employs the expression media-based distance working to denote this type of work (Figure 1):
·
distance
working, i.e. work carried out by an individual or legal entity outside the
immediate limits of the site where the results of the work are expected to be
received
·
this
calls for the use of telecommunication tools or telecommunication information
systems (whence the term "media-based").
Figure 1: Media-based distance working (tele-activity)
Tele-activities comprise tertiary activities designed for handling, processing, producing and/or transmitting information (intangible production).
Frequently confused in daily speech with the term “teleworking”, the designation tele-activities covers two different phenomena: teleworking in its proper sense and teleservice. The first term denotes a new form of work organisation, while the second refers to both a new way of supplying traditional services and new services that technological evolution in telecommunications makes it possible to conceive (Figure 2).
Figure 2: Teleworking and teleservice
These two forms of tele-activity differ also in the nature of the contract that links the entity performing the work and the entity exploiting the results of this work.
In the case of teleworking, the relationship between the work perfomer and the work user is of a salary-related nature. The teleworker carries on his activity:
·
either
away from the site where the result of his work is expected, with no physical
possibility of direct supervision by the principal of the execution of the work
·
or with
the help of IT equipment and/or telecommunication tools for transmitting data
for use in achieving the work required and/or for work already completed or in
the process of completion.
Teleworking is carried on by a salaried individual belonging to the firm for which he does the work, at a place removed from the firm's premises. On the legal plane, teleworking constitutes a form of organisation and execution of salaried work. The teleworker remains dependent on the authority of his employer and thus attached to the firm. The difference lies in the greater degree of freedom he enjoys in carrying out his work, according to the terms of his contract.
Where teleservice is concerned, the work is performed at a remote site and provided by one firm for the benefit of another or of an individual who buys the service on the basis of a sales contract. Distance work applies to a legal entity that carries it out on its own premises on the basis of a trading relationship.
In the present document, our analyses will be concerned chiefly with teleworking in its proper sense.
This refers to work at home carried out by a business or public employee in the evening or during the weekend, without this being classified as teleworking. It prolongs the working day or the work sequence and enables those who practise it —usually employees at executive level— to terminate work on their files at home with the help of their own PC. By freeing themselves of the obligation to remain in the office to finish their work, they sometimes benefit from different work conditions (BRE 93).
Provided that this form of work, although tolerated by the employer, is not subject to any special agreement, it may be classified as informal teleworking.
Unlike the previous case —but which could constitute a logical follow-on— this is the principal method of formal teleworking.
It is a practice whereby an individual carries on teleworking (generally from home) on a regular basis during normal working hours for personal convenience and in agreement with the employer.
This type of teleworking is a matter of initiative on the part of employees for meeting individual needs, without it leading to widespread introduction within the firm, although it does imply formal recognition by the firm. Teleworking in this case is not to be looked on by the firm as a strategic tool capable of providing competitive edge.
Here, it is a matter of a step up in the degree of formalisation of teleworking within a business firm or public service.
Flexible organisation can be said to exist when the employer implements a real policy whereby the possibility of teleworking is offered to all or part of the personnel. The difference with the previously mentioned form thus lies in the will of the management to make the work organisation as such more flexible and/or decentralised in line with a "managerial" and/or economic strategy. The competitive or qualitative advantages that can be derived from this form of organisation can be seen by the employer. Teleworking is in this case promoted to the rank of a form of strategic organisation of intangible production.
Teleworking is work carried out entirely or partly outside the traditional office workplace where the results of the work are received. The work tool is generally the computer, while the product is transmitted via telecommunications networks.
Numerous configurations can be envisaged according to the placeand duration of the work outside the normal office.
Teleworking can be carried out in the teleworker's own domicile, in which case it is referred to a home-based teleworking (Figure 3).
Figure 3: Home-based teleworking
Alternate teleworking: this involves working partly at home and partly in the office. The work is carried out on a regularly alternating basis between home and office during normal working hours on the pattern of, for example, two days at home and three in the office.
Full-time home teleworking: although possessing the status of salaried employee, the teleworker carries out his work mainly at home (an activity which does not normally exceed 90% away from the premises of the employer – work without any direct contact whatsoever with the employer is extremely rare)./p>
Independent teleworking (SOHO): although this falls within our definition of teleservice, independent teleworkers (one-man businesses) established at home who carry out their work on a sub-contract basis are often likened to home teleworkers. For it is in conditions comparable to those of a salaried employee (they often depend on a single principal or group of principals for whom they work on a shared-time basis) that they perform tasks which a full-time salaried teleworker could also carry out at home.
Example 1 [QVO 91]
The Los Angeles County in California provides an example of home teleworking. In April 1989, a project for implementing teleworking was approved by the county's Management Council with a view to saving work space, raising personnel hiring capacity and keepingemployees, limiting congestion and reducing the level of absenteeism and sick leave.
During the first phase of the programme, 300 employees from 15 different administrative departments volunteered to work alternately at home and in the office according to a flexible work schedule whereby they would work at home between one and four days per week.
The employees saw teleworking as a means of
cutting down travel time and costs and obtaining greater flexibility so as to
better reconcile work demands with family requirements.
Example 2
The INTEL France project (Paris) arose out of the observation that the company's sales engineers were wasting a great deal of energy and time in travelling every day to the office (up to two hours a day). In addition, INTEL saw that its heavy office overheads could be reduced with the help of a home working formula for some of the employees.
The implementation of alternating teleworking was based on the following objectives: greater flexibility (freedom in organising working time), time saving and increased productivity.
The operation involved equipping sales personnel (product manager, market manager, technical support managers) with a laptop, a modem and communication software. Each one was asked to arrange a special office space in their home, to be fitted out by the company. In the company's premises, their work space is contained in an extensive common area shared on a part-time basis by the teleworker "population" (open-plan office with a large-sized table fitted with connector sockets).
This is a working unit comprising professional premises where a group of people distance-working for their employer.
It should carefully be noted that this is no longer a question of home working, even though the telecentre is often built close to the homes of the employees concerned (neighbourhood office). There are various types of telecentre.
Satellite centre: this term is used when it is a matter of relocation by one and the same firm. In this case, the teleworkers are all salaried employees of the this one firm.
Shared telecentre: there are cases where the premises accommodate employees belonging to different firms. The teleworkers share the premises with its IT equipment (computers and peripherals) and telecommunications networks that enable distance-working.
Figure 4: The telecentre
Example 1 (satellite centre)
French mail order company La Redoute tested its first telephone ordering office ("Allo commande" centres) in 1970 in the Paris region. By the early 1990s, there were over 80 such centres spread throughout the country.
The personnel is entirely female and recruited on site. Customers are dealt with exclusively by telephone. All the hostesses work on a terminal connected to the main computer at head office for verifying files, delivery times and prices and keying in the orders.
This organisation in telecentre form is part of a programme aimed at establishing closer contact with the customer (shorter times for placing orders, minimisation of communication costs, establishment of a local presence, etc.). As a follow-on to traditional mail ordering services, telephone order-taking (currently being extended to ordering over the Internet) was quick to generated an appreciable increase in company's revenues. This form of organisation has thus developed in separately, leading to a reorganisation of the mail order service.
Example 2 (telestation)
A teleworking demonstration project in Hawaii was officially launched on 14 July 1989. It was funded by a $125 000 grant from the State of Hawaii and equivalent contributions by local business firms. The telestation is situated in the Mililani High-Tech Park, some 15 miles from the centre of Honolulu. 16 workstations and space for an administrator were arranged on the site. At the start of the experiment, 8 of the teleworkers were civil servants, while the other 8 were employees of private businesses. All lived in the neighbourhood community.
They were working in the tax,law, planning and programming sectors and on other peripheral jobs. All these sectors are heavy consumers of information.
An evaluation of the results after one year of operation showed the project to be highly successful. Travel costs for the teleworkers had gone down by 80%. There was increased productivity among the executives and clerical personnel. Among the employees, there was much greater job satisfaction and a vast improvement in the quality of life in general.
These results generated a project for the setting up of around 100 telestations spread around all the inhabited islands of the Hawaiian archipelago [QVO 91].
This primarily concerns professionals whose work calls for a great deal of travelling (sales executives, for example) and who with the help of electronic communication means can maintain contact with the head office wherever they happen to be (in any means of transport, at their hotel, with the customer, at home, etc.) and whenever the wish to communicate with their company (both in and out of normal working hours).
Figure 5: The mobile teleworker and his workplaces
Example
Because the company functions are not all represented on the various sites around the world where INTEL is established, a number of senior company executives are compelled to travel very often. To enable them to put the results of their work on to a real-time basis, they are equipped with a laptop and a modem (with a set of connectors to cover all different standards). With this equipment, they can also work from home.
In the preceding configurations, teleworking is based on the explicit or implicit hypothesis that somewhere there is a centre representing the power, the supervisory system, the management or simply the physical office. Nevertheless, communication technologies also make it possible for a physically dispersed team to work in collaboration, irrespective of any form of hierarchy. In this case, the term networked teleworking– or group teleworking - is employed.
Supporting this type of teleworking is a structure based on fluid networks by means of which teleworkers with specific skills become members of scattered groups built up around particular missions or projects [QVO 91]. Sometimes referred to as "online communities", these groups are not subject to any limits of time or space.
A common project or mission and a single electronic communication network are the federative components of this type of organisation (Figure 6.)
Figure 6: Networked teleworking
Example 1
The best illustration of networked group teleworking is provided by scattered groups of scientists working in the same area of research and communicating via the Internet.
Example 2
Numerous large-scale corporations and multi-site establishments such as France Télécom, EDF-GDF, Anderson Consulting, etc. have set up scattered expert groups gathering together on a virtual basis (by various means of electronic communication) those members of their personnel known to possess a skill in a given sphere (generally in the domain in which they usually work) and able to make complementary contributions to a specific case being dealt with. The members of the team belong to different units (productive or functional). The work teams take shape or disintegrate as the cases submitted for their attention come and go.
Telecottages are a variety of telestation with the special feature of being open to passing people or to those not necessarily possessing the status of teleworker. A telecottage or Community Teleservice Centre(CTSC), may be described a resource centre situated in a geographically remote zone —rural or insular— or in a disadvantaged urban area. It provides the local population with access to computer and telecommunications equipment on a shared use basis [QVO, 95]. As in the case of certain telestations, this type of structure also accommodates individual businessmen serving their customers on a distance-working basis.
These are premises made available to a company's nomadic personnel, visiting the establishment where the premises are installed. The transit office is equipped with one or more computer workstations and sometimes other office automation equipment. Each workstation is available for use on a temporary basis by the authorised nomadic personnel.