ways2work > How to do it > Re-thinking commuting > Reducing commuting through ICT > Essential steps to creating teleworking > Equipment and support
Equipment and support
What equipment teleworkers need is an area where existing organisational practice largely determines what is needed and what is not, and so general advice is difficult to give.
However, the Department of Transport survey of teleworkers found that ideally, teleworkers wanted a laptop together with printers / scanners, software allowing remote access to their employer's network and broadband connectivity.
The incomplete list of ICT services required included remote access, conferencing and instant messaging. There was wired and wireless capability, and people used a range of ICT devices from ranging from landline phones to mobile phones, PDAs, laptops and computer accessories such as web-cams. (A range of ICT-based communication tools ranging from email to video-conferencing are described in the business travel section).
The BT Business Remote Manager's Toolkit suggests the employer may provide items of office furniture including a desk, chair and a lockable filing cabinet. Perhaps also a shredder and a data storage device?
Support or logistics for people working at home is often troublesome because corporate procedures are optimised for supporting office workers. Often the problems are ones that the organisation doesn't know it doesn't know when planning a telework programme. However, three issues can be anticipated:
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Teleworkers' lifeline is their ICT and networks. Reliability of ICT and connections are amongst the top issues of concern raised by teleworkers. Providing good ICT support for home workers is one of the necessary costs of a telework programme
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How nearly-full-time teleworkers get office supplies? Do they pick up supplies at the office, or buy their own?
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How are nearly-full-time teleworkers to receive their post? They probably don't want to advertise their home address to clients, so need some way to get paper mail
There is a page about logistics in the BT Business Remote Manager's Toolkit. Also look at the helpful page of "Other Practical Considerations" in the Hampshire County Council MATISSE toolkit.