WFH !! does it really benefit ?

In today's world of SFs (oops Short Forms or acronyms), most of us must have heard WTF, but have you heard WFH ?
I guess not, then let me reveal, its a acronym coming from the Corporate world and stands for "Work from Home".

I recently got into a new job which demanded a lot more travel than my earlier job. yeah yeah, i know you must be wondering, how dumb of me to choose a job which has more travel than my existing one. I had my own personal reasons to do so. But yes, i had given a thought to 'Travel' too before making up my mind.
I thought that after all in this world of Technology and Internet, it is too easy to work from home when you got ammunition like "Office Communicator or Lync 2010", "Email Outlook", "Mobile Phones", "IMs like gtalk and Skype", "Webinar, Virtual Meetings", etc. in your arsenal.

Any time worshiper like me must have heard this quote...
"Lost wealth may be replaced by industry, lost knowledge by study, lost health by temperance or medicine, but lost time is gone forever. - Samuel Smiles" and i wanted to use it wisely.

It was really exciting to join new Office (actually my second innings - as i worked in Comverse 2 years back). However the most irritating part was a lot of my time was getting wasted in travelling, all courtesy to Mumbai Municipal Corp a.k.a BMC. Although its a separate discussion altogether to debate on "Why the rate of modernization(oops development) of Mumbai Infrastructure is far below the rate at which corporates are expanding their footprint in this fincancial Capital of India ? and why does it take 2 hours to travel 20kms when ideally it should be taking just 30 mins ?"

I wanted to take control on this dripping tap of time and use my time wisely, that why i decided to experiment by Working from Home today. But question is "did it really help me, did i really use my time efficiently ?", lets see...

Working from Home has its own benefits.

• You get punctual. you can literally start working as soon as you wake up ;)
• You can be available literally 24X7 (flexible schedule) for workaholics like me and work with colleagues across different time zones (like in my situation)
• You save on company resources like desk, AC, printer, etc.
• You help environment, by saving on fuel.
• You start getting richer as you save on time, and time is money. :P
• You are close to your family.
• You get to have yummy home cooked food.

Yes all this was really the case, but after all the bottom-line is "Was i able to complete my to-do list at the same speed and efficiency as i should have done when in Office ?"

Answer in my case is "Today it was No". Yes, i would like to press on the word 'today', as i don't want the 'No' to suppress my such future explorations.

I know, you must be anxious to know why "No". So here are the reasons.

• Firstly, you get lethargic and feel sleepy after having homely food. (unless your mom/wifey is not a real good cook :P)
• Since you have abundant time and no pressure to catch that train and get back home - your pace of getting stuff done slows down.
• TV, Social Media, Home discussions act as the Bermuda Triangle for your work.
• You miss those Office Jokes and Lunch with colleagues.
• Face 2 Face discussions with Colleagues is also important and at times the ammunition i appreciated about cannot supersede F2F.

Lastly i would like to conclude by saying "All depends upon you(me) on whether i work smartly & efficiently at home overcoming the above issues and thereby using time wisely or spending a lot of time travelling. Finally you(i) have to take the call and you(i) am mature and responsible enough to decide this."

PS : Reader's discretion is advised. :P

njoii...

~banji