Analysis v_2.0 of the article “Chief, I want to work from home”
Recently, I attempted to analyze the article “Chief, I want to work from home,” published on Habrahabr. The key aspects of the choice of an article are the high demand for the topic itself and the high rating of the article, in particular.
In my publication, I tried to draw attention to the fact that it is necessary not only to state the facts from personal experience, but it is also desirable to carry out some analysis, finding out why this result was obtained and whether it is a special case or a system. I also took the liberty to question the exceptional positiveness of remote work in IT projects for business, and offered to analyze the pros and cons, which caused genuine anger from the remote community.
As a result, the rating of my article was divided almost in half, 37 "against" and 39 "for", having collected more than 200 comments, which in itself confirmed that the topic was in trend.
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First of all, I would like to thank everyone who took part in the discussion.
And summing up, I have to admit that I was unable to qualitatively uncover the topic, causing ambiguous judgments and attributing to me what the article did not discuss, trailing the seditious thoughts of the authors who had raised this topic earlier. I repent, I approached the writing of the article carelessly, wrote it in 5 hours, it was an experiment, I admit it was unsuccessful.
In connection with the foregoing, I want to make another attempt and somehow rehabilitate myself in the eyes of the community.
Since for the second version I now have feedback, I’ll begin to sound, what seemed to me important and what surprised me:
Once again, I’ll try to convey the theses of my article about remote work more tolerantly, taking into account the fair comments made in the comments. I will try not to give an assessment of the use of remote work, leaving it to your discretion.
A workplace (including a remote one) is, first of all, a resource (performer), equipped with technical tools (computer, printer, scanner, etc.), software tools (software), communication tools, provided with living conditions for works
Figure 1.1 - the “Workplace” model
"Workplace" can be considered a special case of the system, which is included in the higher level system - "Team".
Accordingly, to assess the quality of the workplace, including remote, you can use the following indicators:
1) The level of technical and software equipment;
2) Quality improvement workspace;
3) Quality of communication with the rest of the team;
For a job in the IT field, you can identify the following roles and stakeholders:
These data will be useful to us to further define the functions of the "Workplace" in order to consider its use from different points of view.
First, consider the functionality of the workplace, from the point of view of the Contractor. The contractor must provide conditions for:
Now let's take a look at the functionality of the workplace, from the point of view of the Manager. The manager must provide conditions for:
In general, it immediately catches the eye of the difference in the capabilities required from the system - the “Workplace” to the performer who enters this system on the one hand and the manager, who is part of a more general system — the Team, on the other.
The manager most often himself can act as a contractor at his “Workplace” in an even larger system (project, functional unit, etc.), and accordingly his requirements for his workplace will repeat the requirements of the workplace of the contractor.
Separately, I would like to dwell on the control function, since it caused a keen interest in the discussion, although I did not mention it in the first publication. Let's deal with the control. There is such a function in management that is very important, standing on the same level with planning, organization, communication, goal-setting and other activities, which simply cannot be neglected. To avoid any discrepancies, I’ll clarify right now that this is about monitoring the process of completing tasks, and not by the performer.
Taking into account the comments to the first publication, I will analyze one of the possible options for the development of the situation, in the absence of control over the implementation of tasks, in more detail. The manager on the basis of requirements or TK, as lucky, prepares the schedule of the project. It shows the terms of a phased, step-by-step execution of tasks by the performers. Tasks are interconnected, that is, one task for its start can expect the execution of another task, another executor. Therefore, the displacement of the dates of one task may entail a chain of displacement of the start of other tasks. If the resources (performers) were allocated in a certain work schedule, then this schedule will be violated. Moreover, if the contractor participates in several projects at the same time (discretely), then a shift in the schedule in one project may entail a change in plans in other projects. And the sooner the manager becomes aware of these changes, the easier and more efficiently he will be able to adjust plans. Therefore, when the manager controls the progress of work, he reduces the risks of failure in the work schedule and increases the manageability of the project resources as a whole. Also, the manager can, for example, control the process of responding to requests to the developer from executors of other (related) teams, since he has certain powers to impart acceleration to this process. There are many more different options for the useful application of the option to control managers over the processes in a project.
And I also want to dwell in detail on one of the aspects that has been vigorously discussed in the comments. These are problems of big projects. If a project interacts with many teams, with its technologies, methodologies for developing and managing knowledge, there may be problems in communication between the contractor and the centers of competence of other teams, which should provide him with the necessary information. This is due to:
Figure 3.1 - Model of team interaction in the project
Accordingly, to assess the quality of the workplace, including the remote one, the following indicators can be added:
4) The possibility of high-quality reporting to the performer of all aspects of the tasks;
5) The ability to organize an effective discussion team (part of the team): problems, issues, solutions, etc .;
6) The possibility of prompt receipt of clarifications, clarifications of tasks by the performer, including in various centers of competence;
7) The possibility of operational control of the deadlines for the execution of tasks, in order to comply with the project schedule;
8) The ability to promptly receive reports on the time spent by the implementers to complete tasks, in order to determine the costs of projects, phases of work, types of work, etc.
Since one of the main functions of the contractor is constant communication, it is necessary to take into account the influence of the social component on the organization of the workplace. It is characterized by such factors as: the size and structure of the team, level of education, communication style, habits, traditions, work ethic, etc. All these aspects have an impact on the attitude of the contractor to the functions performed by him, discussed in the previous section, as well as on the requirements of the workplace organization.
The impact is not only intra-team communication, but the macro. For example, social networks, the exchange of views on various professional sites, such as this, etc.
The next factor is the attitude of people towards work and quality of life that has been formed over the years of life, customs in society, values shared by people, mobility of people or readiness to relocate, cash incomes and peculiarities of their use.
These are all scattered, background factors. And there are also active. Like any social organism, an organization engaged in its development purposefully influences the formation of the opinion of its employee towards the quality criteria for arranging his / her workplace. Exposes social filters, emphasizing positive factors for it and obscuring negative ones.
Accordingly, to assess the quality of the workplace, including the remote one, the following indicators can be added:
9) The preferences of team members to the form and methods of business communication;
10) The degree of influence of the organization on the perception of the workplace by the performers;
Thus, to select the best way to organize a workplace, including a remote one, for example, you can create tables for SWOT analysis. Indicate the indicators we have identified as measurement arguments. The tables are compiled for the option “Office work”, “Work remotely from home”, “Partially remote work from home”.
In my publication, I tried to draw attention to the fact that it is necessary not only to state the facts from personal experience, but it is also desirable to carry out some analysis, finding out why this result was obtained and whether it is a special case or a system. I also took the liberty to question the exceptional positiveness of remote work in IT projects for business, and offered to analyze the pros and cons, which caused genuine anger from the remote community.
As a result, the rating of my article was divided almost in half, 37 "against" and 39 "for", having collected more than 200 comments, which in itself confirmed that the topic was in trend.
')
First of all, I would like to thank everyone who took part in the discussion.
And summing up, I have to admit that I was unable to qualitatively uncover the topic, causing ambiguous judgments and attributing to me what the article did not discuss, trailing the seditious thoughts of the authors who had raised this topic earlier. I repent, I approached the writing of the article carelessly, wrote it in 5 hours, it was an experiment, I admit it was unsuccessful.
In connection with the foregoing, I want to make another attempt and somehow rehabilitate myself in the eyes of the community.
Since for the second version I now have feedback, I’ll begin to sound, what seemed to me important and what surprised me:
- The problem must be considered from different points of view, at least from the point of view of the executives and managers. Since their goals and priorities are very different, the performers are clearly unwilling to plunge into the problems of managers, which is generally logical;
- Unexpectedly for me there was a very large number of commentators who said that they have not only the desire, but also the opportunity to organize and develop at home, the office is as comfortable and efficient as possible in terms of performing work. Including standard offices superior in these parameters. There was even a point of view that most developers are able to organize a workplace at home better than in the office;
- Suddenly, almost everyone, even the managers, reacted sharply negatively about the control function, although there was not a single mention of this option in the article;
- Many focused their attention on the factor associated with the employee's distraction from work by colleagues in the office. In particular, many expressed a sharply negative attitude to rallies, meetings and other noisy campaigns. But in general, this topic has caused controversy;
- Most agreed on the alternation of visiting the office with work from home. What was the way, and the original article was analyzed by me.
- In a small percentage, but still there was a question of assessing the performance of the developer in general and remote in particular.
- There was confusion in determining the issues of interaction with a remote workplace and a remote office.
- There was a misunderstanding of the difference of work in multi-team projects with different centers, tools, management practices, etc. And accordingly in the complexity of communication in such projects.
- The issue of self-discipline for employees working remotely was discussed.
Once again, I’ll try to convey the theses of my article about remote work more tolerantly, taking into account the fair comments made in the comments. I will try not to give an assessment of the use of remote work, leaving it to your discretion.
1. Definition of the concept “Workplace”
A workplace (including a remote one) is, first of all, a resource (performer), equipped with technical tools (computer, printer, scanner, etc.), software tools (software), communication tools, provided with living conditions for works
Figure 1.1 - the “Workplace” model
"Workplace" can be considered a special case of the system, which is included in the higher level system - "Team".
Accordingly, to assess the quality of the workplace, including remote, you can use the following indicators:
1) The level of technical and software equipment;
2) Quality improvement workspace;
3) Quality of communication with the rest of the team;
2. Analysis of roles and stakeholders
For a job in the IT field, you can identify the following roles and stakeholders:
These data will be useful to us to further define the functions of the "Workplace" in order to consider its use from different points of view.
3. Functional analysis of the system “Workplace”
First, consider the functionality of the workplace, from the point of view of the Contractor. The contractor must provide conditions for:
- Getting the job in the most understandable form;
- Task performance;
- Creation of requests for the assignment and receiving answers, clarifications, clarifications;
- The transfer of results obtained in the course of the assignment, the author of the assignment;
Now let's take a look at the functionality of the workplace, from the point of view of the Manager. The manager must provide conditions for:
- Transfer of tasks to the performer, ensuring a clear understanding of the essence, timing, priority, etc. Coordination of the planned deadlines for the implementation of the task;
- Discussion or organization of the discussion team: problems, issues, solutions, etc .;
- Promptly receiving requests from the contractor with questions for clarification, clarification. Prompt transfer of responses to the performer. Forwarding questions to other team members (centers of competence) who have the necessary knowledge. Control of the timely receipt by the contractor of a satisfactory response to the request;
- Control, observance of the agreed deadlines;
- Getting from the performer the results of his work;
- Receive a report on the time spent on tasks;
In general, it immediately catches the eye of the difference in the capabilities required from the system - the “Workplace” to the performer who enters this system on the one hand and the manager, who is part of a more general system — the Team, on the other.
The manager most often himself can act as a contractor at his “Workplace” in an even larger system (project, functional unit, etc.), and accordingly his requirements for his workplace will repeat the requirements of the workplace of the contractor.
Separately, I would like to dwell on the control function, since it caused a keen interest in the discussion, although I did not mention it in the first publication. Let's deal with the control. There is such a function in management that is very important, standing on the same level with planning, organization, communication, goal-setting and other activities, which simply cannot be neglected. To avoid any discrepancies, I’ll clarify right now that this is about monitoring the process of completing tasks, and not by the performer.
Taking into account the comments to the first publication, I will analyze one of the possible options for the development of the situation, in the absence of control over the implementation of tasks, in more detail. The manager on the basis of requirements or TK, as lucky, prepares the schedule of the project. It shows the terms of a phased, step-by-step execution of tasks by the performers. Tasks are interconnected, that is, one task for its start can expect the execution of another task, another executor. Therefore, the displacement of the dates of one task may entail a chain of displacement of the start of other tasks. If the resources (performers) were allocated in a certain work schedule, then this schedule will be violated. Moreover, if the contractor participates in several projects at the same time (discretely), then a shift in the schedule in one project may entail a change in plans in other projects. And the sooner the manager becomes aware of these changes, the easier and more efficiently he will be able to adjust plans. Therefore, when the manager controls the progress of work, he reduces the risks of failure in the work schedule and increases the manageability of the project resources as a whole. Also, the manager can, for example, control the process of responding to requests to the developer from executors of other (related) teams, since he has certain powers to impart acceleration to this process. There are many more different options for the useful application of the option to control managers over the processes in a project.
And I also want to dwell in detail on one of the aspects that has been vigorously discussed in the comments. These are problems of big projects. If a project interacts with many teams, with its technologies, methodologies for developing and managing knowledge, there may be problems in communication between the contractor and the centers of competence of other teams, which should provide him with the necessary information. This is due to:
- The need to search for more information, well-structured, but requiring skill to navigate through it, as well as limited access to members of external project teams. May require the interaction of managers of different teams to optimize the process of obtaining the necessary information;
- Employment of resources of external centers of competence and failure to provide in connection with this the required information, with the direct appeal of an external contractor. May require the interaction of managers of different teams to organize the interaction of performers with each other;
- The lack of understanding in which center of competence is necessary to apply for obtaining the necessary information. For example, when developing distributed systems communicating via WEB services. May require the interaction of managers of different teams to search for the center of competence and the organization of interaction with it.
Figure 3.1 - Model of team interaction in the project
Accordingly, to assess the quality of the workplace, including the remote one, the following indicators can be added:
4) The possibility of high-quality reporting to the performer of all aspects of the tasks;
5) The ability to organize an effective discussion team (part of the team): problems, issues, solutions, etc .;
6) The possibility of prompt receipt of clarifications, clarifications of tasks by the performer, including in various centers of competence;
7) The possibility of operational control of the deadlines for the execution of tasks, in order to comply with the project schedule;
8) The ability to promptly receive reports on the time spent by the implementers to complete tasks, in order to determine the costs of projects, phases of work, types of work, etc.
4. The influence of the social component on the organization of the workplace
Since one of the main functions of the contractor is constant communication, it is necessary to take into account the influence of the social component on the organization of the workplace. It is characterized by such factors as: the size and structure of the team, level of education, communication style, habits, traditions, work ethic, etc. All these aspects have an impact on the attitude of the contractor to the functions performed by him, discussed in the previous section, as well as on the requirements of the workplace organization.
The impact is not only intra-team communication, but the macro. For example, social networks, the exchange of views on various professional sites, such as this, etc.
The next factor is the attitude of people towards work and quality of life that has been formed over the years of life, customs in society, values shared by people, mobility of people or readiness to relocate, cash incomes and peculiarities of their use.
These are all scattered, background factors. And there are also active. Like any social organism, an organization engaged in its development purposefully influences the formation of the opinion of its employee towards the quality criteria for arranging his / her workplace. Exposes social filters, emphasizing positive factors for it and obscuring negative ones.
Accordingly, to assess the quality of the workplace, including the remote one, the following indicators can be added:
9) The preferences of team members to the form and methods of business communication;
10) The degree of influence of the organization on the perception of the workplace by the performers;
5. Identification of the optimal variant of the organization of the workplace
Thus, to select the best way to organize a workplace, including a remote one, for example, you can create tables for SWOT analysis. Indicate the indicators we have identified as measurement arguments. The tables are compiled for the option “Office work”, “Work remotely from home”, “Partially remote work from home”.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/339318/
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