Always On:
Homeworking Overhaul
By Gary Arlen
Contributing Skepthusiast
from the June 18, 2001 issue of Broadband Week
Nearly 80 percent of broadband households have at least one telecommuter. That means telecommuters are about twice as likely as the "average" U.S. home to sign up for broadband service, according the Parks Associates study, which also found that broadband households have multiple PCs at three times the national rate. Based on these findings, it's not surprising that more than one-third of broadband homes already have installed some kind of computer network, compared to 4 percent of all U.S. homes.
In other words, telecommuters are prime targets for broadband service providers. Maybe they're THE critical market segment for broadband success.
We're not talking about employees who occasionally (or even consistently) bring work home. Telecommuters are the 11 to 24 million people whose regular schedule involves remote working. This is a large and very needy audience. Home workers are demanding ever-greater capabilities, especially in the broadband environment. They are pulling in the extended functionality that applications providers are introducing to meet their demands. For example, Microsoft's new Windows Messenger service includes video and audio conferencing, the kinds of features that can bring remote employees into closer, even "always on," contact with their co-workers.
To be fair, telecommuting has been promised as "the next big thing" for nearly two decades. Broadband may be the ingredient that makes it viable. At the same time, telecommuting is such an ill-defined category that insiders cannot agree on its scale. The International Telework Association and Council claims at least 16.5 million regularly employed workers telecommute at least one day per month, and more than 9 million U.S. workers telecommute at least one full day per week. Some estimates put the telecommuting body count at nearly 25 percent of the labor force by 2005.
Whatever the actual number, it's big enough for broadband providers to chase this variegated workplace, especially in this coming summer of discontent. The looming energy chaos could trigger spurts of network demand if employees choose to--or are encouraged to--work from home for days or weeks at a time. On the other hand, company downsizing may spur some traditional teleworkers to spend more time in the office, knowing that "out of sight" (at home) may be out-of-mind when it comes time for the boss to make lists of expendable employees.
Typically, an opportunity such as the broadband/telecommuting connection is viewed as a hardware/network vendor package. But this is an extraordinary case in which outside forces--i.e. the real world--may be more significant than the mere challenges of hooking up hardware and telecom systems.
Moreover, telecommuting is not just a matter of personal work style, kids in the background or household distractions. The serious business of working at home increasingly involves network security, online reliability and even privacy protection. For example, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act requires that unauthorized persons must not have access to private medical data. That's not usually a problem within a workplace environment, where a supervisor can monitor who sees specific medical files or how such confidential data is distributed through the corporate network.
But home workers, specifically those in the health/medical care or insurance sectors, pose an entirely different dilemma. One report paints a scenario of telecommuters working on health care files when a family member (let's say a child or spouse) walks into the room. That would expose a patient's personal medical data to an unauthorized outsider, which is illegal under the new law. The home worker (or his company) could be liable for fines or even jail sentences.
Add to this the possibility that remote workers might opt to store such data on their home computers, which could make it accessible through those home networks. Such issues already are being addressed by home firewalls and other corporate policies for telecommuters to assure both security and privacy. Nonetheless, an explosion in teleworking could strain or compromise some of these assurances or put a burden on the broadband networks delivering these services.
Then there's the nasty little issue of monitoring employees who work remotely--either by checking their files, or in some jobs, by keeping track of computer keystrokes to ascertain that they're performing the minimum daily requirement. Although those are functions of the parent company's hardware and the home computer's tracking capability, the intermediary ingredient is a reliable network that can provide such snooping strength. Like it or not, it's be part of the teleworking package that broadband must support.
This becomes even more significant if corporate Instant Messaging (especially video IM) becomes as widespread as envisioned, whether provided through Microsoft's new XP software or another vehicle. Ad hoc remote videos are the virtual equivalent of the water-cooler conversation or the gab over the cubicle wall. This is what inter-office video is supposed to be--a corporate communications tool, moving beyond the formality of videoconferencing.
Again, such systems require security and user restraint. They also need flexible bandwidth if the video instant messages are to attract loyal users.
All of this adds up to a rich opportunity for broadband suppliers who can cater to the security, customizability and bandwidth needs of telecommuters. This demanding category of homeworking customers is shaping up as a group that could accelerate and validate broadband providers who cater to the telecommuters' needs.
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