Telework Exchange

On the surface, telework looks like an easy process to implement, but officials with the Kitsap Regional Coordinating Council (KRCC), the local council of governments in Kitsap County, Washington, know otherwise. That is why, with the support of Washington State University (WSU) Extension and other state and local partners, the KRCC has launched a pilot project to develop and refine a telework toolkit that will deliver resources, define best practices, and share lessons learned for local employers, employees, and IT personnel.

The goal is "to cut down on not knowing where to begin as well as the trial and error that we’ve seen when people try to move forward with telework on their own," says Mary McClure, executive director of the KRCC.

The pilot project is funded with a $150,000 grant through the Washington State Department of Transportation’s Commute Trip Reduction Program.

Once the toolkit is completed, it will be shared with the state and leveraged to encourage employers across Washington to implement telework as a way to reduce traffic congestion and greenhouse gases, improve productivity, and support employee efforts to balance work/life responsibilities.

"We hear stories all the time about employers who jump into telework and have an expectant set of employees who are gung-ho and ready to go, but they get three steps into the process and set it aside," McClure explains. "They just didn’t quite know how to plan and manage a sustainable program or how to address the challenges they came up against."

The recently-developed toolkit, available at www.teleworktoolkit.com, will involve the participation of volunteer teleworkers from 16 organizations, including private and public sector employers, local companies, mom-and-pop shops, and larger regional and statewide corporations with local branches.

Teleworkers, employers, and IT personnel will provide feedback about the telework experience and the toolkit, says Brad Rucker, who is coordinating the project for the KRCC. Pilot participants can work from home or at the remote telework center provided at the WSU Extension location in Jefferson County, Washington.

The toolkit contains, among other things, a telework self-assessment form for employees to help determine if telework fits with their business requirements; a checklist of what is required for a home office setup; step-by-step instructions and considerations for organizations that want to establish a telework program; and samples of telework policies and agreements.

"Hopefully, we’ll be able to refine the toolkit and provide a lot of detailed information about what works or what doesn’t work," says Rucker. "The goal is to create a valuable knowledge base that’s available in one online location, so that employers willing to try telework will be able to leverage the successful experiences of others to make it happen."

The pilot project, which began in February 2009 and runs through the end of May, is coming at just the right time: Kitsap County, set on a peninsula just west of Seattle and already challenged by car and ferry congestion and cross-traffic flow, is about to face a commuting nightmare. The Hood Canal Bridge, a major commuter route from Jefferson County into Kitsap County, is scheduled to be shut down for replacement work during May and June 2009.

The only option for those Jefferson County residents who commute into Kitsap County and on through to Seattle will be to board a passenger ferry, which will take them across the waterway to an awaiting bus in Kitsap County. The bus will take them to a dropoff point, but they will have to have a colleague pick them up, hire a cab, or take another bus to make the final trek to their worksites. The arduous journey will be reversed for the afternoon commute.

McClure says the hope is that employers with affected employees will turn to the telework toolkit and give telework a test drive during the six-week-long bridge closure. In anticipation of the closure, the WSU Extension Learning Center in Jefferson County has been promoting the use of its telework resource center, which boasts the area’s highest broadband fiber Internet connection speeds.

Although the level of interest shown by employers in using telework to spare their employees a grueling commute has not been high thus far, McClure believes that as the bridge closure approaches "and it sets in that this is really going to happen," many employers likely will consider telework as an option.

"Kitsap County has primed the pump for employers to be prepared for this challenge, and the information and the infrastructure will be in place for telework to occur during the bridge closure because of this advance work," says Monica Babine, a senior associate for telework for WSU Extension.

She adds that while Washington has been an enthusiastic advocate of telework since the 1990s, its emphasis on reducing commuter trips, tackling climate change, and undertaking construction to improve road and bridge infrastructure is driving increased statewide interest in telework.

To facilitate this process, WSU Extension is launching a business unit to serve as the state focal point and champion for telework, while offering its regional campus sites to employers as telework locations.

"There are a number of converging activities and trends that have taken place that make this the right time to expand telework," says Babine. "We’ve got people interested in it, they want to work on it, and are willing to invest in it. I think it’s inevitable that we’re going to see a lot more people teleworking in the near future."

The Teleworker will follow up with the Washington and KRCC officials following the bridge repairs to report on the results of this program later this year.

Statewide Telework Program Proposed

Washington State Senator Ken Jacobsen, who represents the 46th district in the Seattle area, has submitted Senate bill 6018 to the 61st legislature calling for the development of a statewide telework program.

Under this proposal, the Washington State University Extension Division of Governmental Studies and Services would serve as the initiative’s program manager and champion. The goal of the effort is to support Washington’s statewide efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, optimize use of the existing transportation systems, and better position state employers as competitors in the world economy.

In order to establish this program, this bill assigns tasks including: telework promotion and employer education; development of telework resources for prospective users; coordination with interested state businesses; research to identify telework benefits and barriers to implementation; and analysis of how telework supports economic development across Washington state.

If the proposed legislation is passed, program officials would be required to report regularly to the legislature on its progress, and the program would be subject to a top-down review in December 2010 to evaluate results and next steps.

For more information on the telework toolkit, visit www.teleworktoolkit.com or contact Brad Rucker at brad@essentialsurveys.com.

For more information on the Washington State University Extension Division of Governmental Studies & Services program, please contact Monica Babine at babinem@wsu.edu.