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Years after its introduction, teleworking still hasn't caught on enough in federal agencies, private companies Date published: 9/25/2005
WHAT'S BETTER than Perhaps you are one of the few who are fortunate enough to have an alternate work schedule, putting in nine or 10 hours a day in exchange for a day off every two weeks. Better yet, you may be counted among the elite who get to telecommute one or more days each week instead of making the long journey to work each day. We've heard a lot about telecommuting over the years. It makes a lot of sense to be able to work from home or a telework center, without having to make a long commute. But in the federal world, many managers still have not fully grasped the concept, fearing that they will lose control of their employees' time and attention. I think the same is true in the private sector. Telecommuting is being done by some employees, but not enough to really make a difference in office space or energy costs. But be that as it may, President Bush is encouraging federal employers to increase telecommuting programs to help reduce gasoline consumption while the nation recovers from the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina. To meet that goal, the General Services Administration has offered to open its telework centers at no charge to federal agencies through the end of the year. We have three telework centers known as the Fredericksburg Regional/Woodbridge Telework Centers right here among us, and they're covered by the free-space offer from GSA. The Fredericksburg Center is located at Southpoint in the Massaponax area of Spotsylvania County; the Stafford Center is just off State Route 610; and the Woodbridge Center is on Minnieville Road. These centers have been in operation for several years. In fact, when I looked at them for a column back in early 2003, they were doing a little better as far as overall utilization rate goes. During fiscal 2002, the overall utilization rate for all three centers was about 63 percent. Currently the average utilization rate is about 48 percent. So as you see, telecommuting hasn't exactly caught fire.
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