Dynamic Work : commuting

Missing the First Pitch

brucelynn — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 15:13:28 GMT

The Washington Post carried a poignant illustration of the more subtle, but very palpable social costs fixed work schedules which not only constrain family coordination, but also concentrate use of shared community resources, namely roads. It described in detail the challenges of families sharing a simple activity of school sports.

“Late-arriving parents and coaches show up in suits instead of shorts, their hands clutching BlackBerrys instead of mitts. Kids, who wear their uniforms to school and can imagine nothing as terrible as a rainy day, are robbed of pregame practices and must wait to play until as late as 7:30 at night -- almost a half-hour after the first pitch is thrown out for Nationals games at RFK Stadium. The children's games end at or past bedtime, leaving little room for homework and -- worse to Little Leaguers -- the traditional after-game trip for pizza or ice cream. And leagues struggle to sign up coaches, volunteers and umpires who can commit to arriving on time.”

Energy Flows

brucelynn — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 17:35:00 GMT

The benefits to Dynamic Work are economic, ecological and social. One area of business that affects all three is transportation. Commuting and business travel cost money, cost carbon (and other environmental impacts) and cost time away from family. Showing both the scale and connection of the costs of transport in the overall economy is a truly stunning diagram by the Department for Business & Enterprise Regulatory Reform.

The left hand side shows the relative proportions of energy inputs to the UK economy with petroleum almost as large as the others combined. These are then ‘flowed’ to their respective uses with transport dominating in size. We can all switch-off lights at home and turn down the thermostats, but unless we change our commuting ways, we are not going to have much of a dent in our petroleum consumption. The more detailed chart below focusing just on the petroleum element underscores this with ‘Road’ usage of petroleum being more than all other uses combined. Lots of people are targeting the environmental costs of air travel, and this is certainly a cost, but it is a fraction of the petroleum consumed (and therefore the carbon released) versus road travel.

(Thanks Chris)

The Costs of Commuting

brucelynn — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 19:21:53 GMT

The Transport Studies Unit at the University of Oxford has released a study on “The Costs of Transport on the Environment – The Role of Teleworking in Reducing Carbon Emissions” which looks comprehensively at empirical macro-economic data on workers and commuting. Its conclusions include...

Empirical studies of teleworking show that it typically results in substantial reductions in car mileage for the day on which teleworking takes place.
Teleworking can save energy at the worksite – providing working practices change accordingly.
Teleworkers typically have longer than average commutes but this does not necessarily mean that teleworking encourages more remote living.
Mobile working has fuelled a recent growth in teleworking.
The majority of teleworkers are self-employed or unpaid.
Teleworking has a wide range of benefits for employers, employees and communities. It has been linked with lower absenteeism, improved recruitment and retention, higher productivity, good work-life balance and good quality of life. Teleworkers tend to work longer hours than non-teleworkers, and identify this as one reason for their improved performance, but see reduced stress and better concentration as more important factors. Greater autonomy and flexibility in work planning and performance appears to be a key reason for improved work-life balance. Teleworking has also been linked to better health. There is evidence that teleworkers become more involved in their own communities and spend more on local services.

An example of the research cited is Microsoft’s own Tickbox.net survey (April 2007) on the benefits and profile of remote and flexible working. The study is really a comprehensive review of latest thinking and research in the UK which underscores the imperative and increasingly critical economic benefits to reforming the conventional modes of work and stripping out much of the synchronous commute to our knowledge worker factories.