As a professional in design who works remotely, you’ve got your daily to-do list ready and a few Skype calls lined up for the day. You glance up idly and can’t help but feel awestruck for a moment — and deeply grateful — for the lifestyle and work environment, you’ve been able to create for yourself.
It’s not all sun, sand, and surf, though — working independently and remotely comes with its own share of hard work and grit. So how do you figure out if working remotely is for you?
It all starts with deciding if working remotely makes sense for you. There are a few factors at play here, and one size does not fit all. Here are a few questions you can ask yourself to get to figure it out:
- Are you prepared to trade a steady paycheck for the flexibility and independence of freelancing?
- Is it possible to work remotely with your specific skillset and training?
- Are you willing to adapt, diversify and expand your knowledge base depending on the requirements of different clients?
- Would you prefer to freelance or work full-time from home?
- Are you willing to invest time and energy in earning work from your professional network as it exists today?
- Do you have the necessary communication skills to secure work, and are you willing to take an initiative to communicate?
- What are your time management skills like, and how much do you need to work on them?
- Are you willing to consistently create high-quality work?
Take your time to answer these questions, because this lays the foundation for your career as a professional who works remotely.
Also, consider the pros and cons of working remotely before you take the plunge. Weigh it out for yourself.
On one hand, we have the pros of being a remote employee or entrepreneur:
- Freedom from the cubicle and dress codes. Your workplace, on any given day, can range from a quaint little cafe, a library, a park, or your own workstation in the drawing-room. Take your pick!
- Collaborators can afford to have a better standard of living since proximity to the office ceases to be an issue.
- You learn new skills and develop a versatile outlook to life and work management, that allows you to grow as an independent professional. You constantly push yourself to aim higher, and do better.
The cons, on the other hand, are:
- Working remotely is like being a one-person army. A host of minor tasks which an office typically provides for have to be handled yourself.
- Striking a balance between work and life at home is a line that tends to get blurred when one is working remotely. Especially for people working in different time zones from their employers, it might mean staying in on a weekend for that early-morning team meeting the next day.
- While work from a remote location may make it more informal, it does not make it any less professional or demanding.
Why Remote Work is the Future
Let’s take a moment to look at the numbers and statistics about remote work.
In April 2019, Google Inc. published a study that was conducted over two years, which revealed that around 30% of the meetings of the company involved two or more time zones, and around half of the meetings involved people in different buildings.
This study by Google is the latest in a series to conclude that they found no difference in the effectiveness of the teams which coordinate with members across locations, as compared to teams that include members working out of the same office.
Today, top corporations such as KPMG, SAP Labs, Phillips and PwC also offer their employees a few ‘ works from home’ days in a month. It has been merely a decade since this trend has been rapidly growing, and it’s mind-boggling to think that there was absolutely no one working remotely as recently as 1990, before the advent of the internet.
Another survey reveals that over 61% Indians want their commute timings to be included in the work hours. It is pretty clear that when it comes to attracting talent, the companies offering remote working options have a distinct advantage as compared to their peers.
Join Hencework as a Collaborator
We are on the hunt for collaborators who share our ethos and who are looking for a workplace in which collaboration ultimately leads to a happy workforce.
Whether you’re a designer, a front-end developer, or a WordPress-angular-react developer, if you are sure you can deliver a certain level of commitment and quality of work, Hencework has just the projects for you.
Spanning time zones, cultures, and languages — we are open to professionals from the most remote locations as long as they’re willing to tread this path with us. It might not always be easy, but it is almost always very gratifying.
Drop us a line at contact@hencework.com with the subject line “Become a collaborator”. Tell us a little bit about yourself, attach links to any relevant work, your availability, and your experience in the industry.
Come join the remote work revolution with us!
Visit www.hencework.com to know more about what we do.
