>Good evening all.
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>I am increasing working with folks who work at home or at least work outside of our office. If someone works in the office, you have a general sense of when things are going well and how fast an assignment is getting completed.
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>It's different when someone works outside the office. Communications are much less frequent and there is not any of the "hanging around the water cooler" chatter that gives you a sense of where things are.
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>I was wondering how other shops handle the issue of measuring employee productivity of those who work outside of the office? Are there any rules of thumb, or other guidelines? Do you have any business rules that work without pi**ging off the employee?
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>Subcontracting is not really an option. The folks working outside of the office are people we know and like and who know our customers and our business. Subcontracting would waste huge amounts of time because the scope of every task would have to be explained.
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>Thanks
>Don Lowrey

To work remotely with your own staff or with subcontractors is the same.
A few main rules:
- project management software – could be in XLS sheets
- you should know exactly, which part of the project when will be done.
- pre-evaluation of the work – how many hour you expect this to be done
- well explain required tasks to remote worker
- feedback – ICQ, e-mails, phone calls
- in central office you should have always technical person, who will answer to the questions.
- it is more productive your remote workers to work on more than one task simultaneously. Sometimes the project require some gaps during which your permanents staff prepare answers of the questions - consulting with clients, colleagues, suppliers, etc.