Work-Life Balance: Make Your Case for Telecommuting

When you are trying to maintain work-life balance, you appreciate family-friendly policies offered by your employer. Among the most popular (and most valuable) of these policies is the ability to telecommute. This can make it much easier to juggle your family and career responsibilities and often allows you to enjoy a more flexible schedule.

But what if your employer doesn’t currently offer telecommuting—or at least, hadn’t offered it to you? In that case, you may have to try your best to convince them that this would be a wise option. The key here is to stress how this would be mutually beneficial for both you and your employer. You also want to avoid saying anything that might inadvertently give the impression that you are eager for the chance to slack off or just want to get out from the boss’ watchful eye.

This article shares some tips for making your case. First, cite past experience illustrating how you work well independently. Your boss will want to be confident that they can trust you to work efficiently on your own.

You also want to spotlight the benefits of this arrangement to your employer. You may need to think about this for a bit. Some examples might include the decreased likelihood that you’ll need to take time off for family issues, or the savings involved with eliminating your in-office workspace.

And of course you want to demonstrate that you have a plan in place for how you will work efficiently and productively from home, including how you will plan your schedule, minimize noise and distractions and keep in communication with your onsite co-workers.

Image courtesy of Thinkstock/John Rowley