Your desk job makes you fat, sick and dead …

Podio co-founder Jon Froda along with panelists Cali Williams Yost, CEO and Founder of Work+Life Fit Inc, Kate Lister from Telework Research & Richard Leyland, Founder of Worksnug explored the potential of ‘workshifting‘ and how working from anywhere has immense possibilities when it comes to productivity & work-life balance.

Is it productive to work at home or anywhere other than the office?

Certain subjects just naturally incite opinion wars. The big ones, like political preferences, or whether you’re Team A or Team B, are better left out of polite conversation. But when it comes to doing your job effectively, where do we draw the line? Should the nature of a person’s autonomy — or lack thereof — be at the whim of the boss, or the discernment of the employee?

The four corners of the Internet nearly came to blows recently when tech-world darling and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer boldly put a stop to employees working remotely. Needless to say, people are a little upset.

I’m definitely in the let them work at home camp. Here is a pretty good infographic on the state of things.

The anywhere office

Over the last year, we have been experimenting with an office anywhere approach. We have combined this with a new collaborative environment in our physical office. So … after a year in, how is it working? Here are a couple of recent quotes from 2 of our staff.

I feel like I have the best of all worlds… I can come into our open area at work when I need to meet with staff or someone in particular. I can hole away in my home office to do solitary work, and I am in fact, in my home office most of the time. My home office is a quiet environment (most of the time) and I can actually think and work. While there, I feel totally connected just by having my Lync window up showing all my team’s status colors. I think the work-life balance benefits of this arrangement are incredible and I feel empowered knowing that I don’t have to “show up” in the collaborative area just to be seen.

And another.

I enjoy telecommuting because I have the option of staying away from the masses, the drive byes, and the side conversations if I wish.  My favorite days are those where I have few meetings and I can actually do work.  Unfortunately that doesn’t happen very often so I have to find other ways to get real work done or to just think/strategize.

So, what do you think? Are you an anywhere office kind of person?

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• A Visual Breakdown Of The Benefits Of Working From Home (fastcoexist.com)
• Outfit Your Home Office Without Going Out of Business — Savings Experiment (dailyfinance.com)

Are workers who can and do work anywhere (including home) more engaged?

I am a remote, or as I prefer to believe, an anywhere worker. I can work anywhere. And I do. It works for me and a lot of my colleagues and friends. We are a very productive and motivated group. I love it when I find evidence to support what I do and believe.

What do you think? Are you more productive being an “anywhere” worker?

If you work from home, you’ve probably gotten an eye roll or two from your office-bound friends. But as consultant Scott Edinger explains, working from home or in a remote office can lead to increased productivity, more effective communication, and better teamwork.

Who is more engaged and more committed to their work and rates their leaders the highest?

A. People who work in the office

B. People who work remotely

If you picked A, you might be as surprised as the investment firm I worked with recently, which found in reviewing results of a 360-degree feedback process that the answer was, in fact, B.

The team members who were not in the same location with their leaders were more engaged and committed— and rated the same leader higher—than team members sitting right nearby. While the differences were not enormous (a couple of tenths of a point in both categories), they were enough to provoke some interesting speculations as to why this might be happening.

via Why Remote Workers Are More (Yes, More) Engaged.

Related articles

• Report: Remote Workers More Engaged, Committed (inc.com)
• Tablets vs. PCs — What’s best for remote employees? (lenovo.com)
• Remote Working Comes of Age (remoteworker.wordpress.com)
• Managing Freelance Workers and E-Lancers that Work Remotely (themarlincompany.com)

How the remote workforce is changing

We all know it is true. We see it happening every day. The remote workforce is growing, it is mainstream, it is maturing and it is learning new skills. And, it won’t go back to the way it was. We have an anytime, anywhere revolution going on.

As advances in technology have made it a practical possibility for millions, remote working has increased dramatically over the last decade.

While once working from home was considered a bit of a novelty, we argue that it is now so mainstream it’s more interesting to consider how the remote workforce is changing.

Mashable spoke to human resources professionals and other experts to get some interesting insight on this subject.

How the Remote Workforce Is Changing

Related articles

• Tablets vs. PCs — What’s best for remote employees? (lenovo.com)
• Are workers who can and do work anywhere (including home) more engaged? (businesstechnologypartner.wordpress.com)
• Is Working at Home Right For You? (apartmenttherapy.com)
• Time to prepare for the human cloud (itpro.co.uk)