Photo by *Zara
To coincide with Anywired’s launch, I thought it would be worth going over the key reasons why I believe working through the web is something worth doing.
If you’re already doing web work, you might resonate with these points.
If you’re thinking about becoming a full-time, part-time or casual web worker, this post should help introduce you to why myself and others are passionate about this way of working (and living).
1. Communicate in your own time. In traditional jobs, the phone can be a constant interruption. When working online, you choose when and how to communicate.
2. Unclutter your work life. Paper, forms, binders, pens, plastic sleeves, more paper… it’s enough to drive you crazy (and certainly enough to thwart your efforts at an organized life). Working online allows you to make the transition to a paperless office — or even a paperless life.
3. Work should feel like living. Work-life balance can be a troubling idea. Does it mean that when you’re working, you’re not living? Working online allows you to structure your work around important events and actions in your life — rather than positioning work as an obstruction to those things.
4. Work only the hours you need to get the job done. Traditional working days are structured around hours, online working days are structured around tasks. Complete your set tasks more quickly and you’re rewarded with a shorter working day, rather than more work to do!
5. Work for employers and clients anywhere in the world. Where you live is no longer the primary arbiter of where you work. Through working online, you can work for clients or employers interstate or internationally. Once you remove geographical requirements, the pool of available jobs becomes much larger. You can also live where you want, rather than where you work.
6. Be more autonomous. While you may have a boss overseeing your work online, they’re usually not in a position to stand over you as you work.
7. Kill the commute. All your traveling is done through wires and connections — unless you want to go the park, your local cafe, or somewhere else entirely. Save on petrol and free up more time. If you spend two hours a day commuting, that’s two hours a day you now have back.
8. Take advantage of technology to make you more productive. There are thousands of helpful people out there developing software, apps and other technology to help you complete tasks faster online. Working through the web allows you to take advantage of that.
9. Create your own workspace. Forget the cubicle, or the stuffy office. Work from your bedroom, your home office or your garden. Pick a new workplace every week. Play music, decorate it how you want, arrange things to your liking. You’ll have the freedom to create a workspace which fully unleashes your creativity.
10. Build a digital office. Achieve ultimate mobility be simplifying the externalities of your work life. Handling your work digitally allows for simpler workspaces and light-weight travel.
11. Work anywhere there’s an internet connection. If the requirements of your work are just a laptop and an internet connection, you’re no longer bound to one place. Carry out your work anywhere: from the local library, to your neighboring state, to South America. It might sound dreamy, but it is possible.
12. No enforced geographical separation from your home and family (unless you want it!). Even if you have private time when you’re working, your family may simply appreciate the feeling that you are ‘around’ rather than in a separate place. Some of you might also find it refreshing to take a lunch-break with your kids, or your spouse, instead of your boss and co-workers. When you feel the need to truly have some ‘alone time’ you can commute to another location. In essence, work time no longer needs to be rigidly separated from work and family time.
13. Avoid office politics. Gossip, bad relationships with co-workers and nasty bosses can all be powerful causes of work-stress. While web work does have stresses of its own, it does largely avoid the issue of office politics.
14. Do your job how you want. As web work is task focused, it generally doesn’t matter how you complete a task, as long as you get it done. You have the freedom to complete tasks following processes that work best for you, rather than your employer.
15. Be at the forefront of a movement. The phenomenon of working online is a new movement populated by remarkable and tech-savvy individuals. Expect friends and family to be fascinated (and a little mystified) by what you do.
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18 Comments, Comment or Ping
Michael Martine
Well, congratulations on the new blog. Great name and url. I’m down with all of this, of course. I love working like this, I think it’s the best!
Jan 10th, 2008
Dan Cole
The down side to working online though is the fact that you don’t start making money right from the start… like a new small business. How about tip or what not on how to get past this hump. I’m currently a unemployed college student, who would rather have a job with the qualities this post describes versus an hourly wage with inflexible hours.
Jan 10th, 2008
Soham
Wow! Thats a piece of news and a good start to the entire process…. will be looking for more… keep blogging…
I think you missed one point entirely: the satisfaction which comes on doing something good all by yourself… I think that is what drives entrepreneurs , both offline and online ones ahead…
Good luck!
Soham
Jan 11th, 2008
pablopabla
I am thrilled to see the birth of this blog from you Skellie. I am sure I’ll be learning much from here just like from Skelliewag.Org. Hence, I’m now a subscriber
Jan 11th, 2008
Catherine Lawson
I love the new blog. These are all powerful reasons for working online. Whilst I don’t work exclusively on line - I switched my office to home over a year ago and I’m really enjoying the benefits.
I love not having to employ as many staff because we’ve simplified our admin with an online system. And it’s great not to have to go out into the cold to get to work.
And as you’ve pointed out - you can get a heap more things done in less time.
Jan 11th, 2008
Al
A big attraction for me is that working online lets you follow your raison d’etre. You can do this offline, but the online world is much more open. You don’t need pots of cash and high-powered connections, you can get ahead if you’ve got the goods and you’re willing to work at it.
Jan 11th, 2008
Mina G.
Congratulations on the new blog, Skellie. I know you’ll do an excellent job here!
BTW, regarding your reason #15 (”Be at the forefront of a movement”), it’s really more like the “middlefront” to the many thousands of us who’ve been working exclusively online since the late ’70s and early ’80s.
Naturally, that was long before the WWW, and long before Internet access was available to the general public. Okay, so maybe kids didn’t trudge 25 miles in the snow to go to school back then, and there were indeed automobiles and electric lights, but we did have to rely on unwieldy 3M WhisperWriter “portable” teletype terminals for on-the-road email and chat, at least until the Osborne I and Kaypro luggables came along. (Don’t even ask how we connected them to hotel room phone lines!)
Fortunately, from about 1983 on, a large number of us congregated in the “Work at Home” Forum that Paul and Sarah Edwards launched on CompuServe. What a difference to be able to exchange info with others about revenue sources, road-warrior kits, liability and health insurance vendors, marketing techniques, etc. At that time, only a minuscule percentage of the population had any idea what “online” even was, much less how or why anyone would earn a living that way. So that nationally (later, internationally) accessible CompuServe forum served as a singularly invaluable resource to the hundreds of thousands who visited it over the next 15 years or so.
May your Anywired site become a similarly powerful community support center to the many more “Middlefronters” who are seeking info about online work today!
Jan 11th, 2008
Jeremy
Nice list of reasons to work online from where you want - look forward to tons of concrete tips and resources.
Nice , simple but stylish layout.
Jan 11th, 2008
Joanna Young
Hi Skellie, #5 is probably the main attraction for me - it means opening up a much bigger market of course, but the main benefit is the sense of connection I get with people in countries all over the world. I find this very inspiring.
Joanna
Jan 11th, 2008
Shawn Jooste
Great post. It’s the way things are moving and more and more people are finding these benefits when working online.
Jan 11th, 2008
Anthony Lawrence
One more:
You can’t get laid off.
Business may be really bad, but some guy with a spreadsheet in an office halfway across the world doesn’t get to decide that today is the day your income totally stops.
I think it’s really funny when people talk about the “security” of traditional employment: self employment is far more secure nowadays.
Jan 11th, 2008
Kristen
Good Luck, Skellie!! You identified every reason why I have loved embarking on my own web-based business and I look forward to your tips and recommendations! I love your original blog, and I’m sure Anywired will be a great success… Thank you!
Jan 11th, 2008
Kare Anderson
Savvy Skellie
idea: ask us, your new fans, what pithy items we’d add to this post.
For example, I’d add
16. Find the one-time and ongoing colleagues with complementary talents, temperament and/or experience and identify the way(s) you can accomplish more together than apart. When we get to use their best sides together they tend to become high-performing and happier.
- Kare, movingfrommetowe.com
Jan 11th, 2008
Saad Padela
Great way to kick things off, Skellie
For me, one of the exciting things about working for yourself, and working online, is the powerful incentives it gives to constantly improve yourself. Every new insight, every added skill, every contact becomes a part of your daily arsenal. You rarely get that in an office environment, where what you do day-to-day may not change very much, even as your skills grow.
Jan 11th, 2008
Paul T.
Great info in the midst of mediocre blogs - one of the few I have read that deserves a bookmark!
Now if someone would write one on getting support from a spouse who is stuck in the “conventional job” mindset.
Thanks!
Paul in Oregon
needsbasedtraining.com
Jan 12th, 2008
Mike Smith
Awesome article. All are definitely reasons I do what I do
@ Paul, what I did was work on my online job without saying too much about it, or showing too much, and then once the money started coming in where we could live off it, I then said “HEY, REMEMBER THIS? I TOLD YOU IT WOULD WORK” … well, maybe not those words exactly, but you get what I mean
Jan 13th, 2008
Linda R. Moore
Cool, Skellie! I’m sure this one will be just as juicy and interesting as the other. I will be reading voraciously.
Jan 13th, 2008
Marga
Great site! Great information! A friend told me about earning money bloging and never new how to do it. Thanks to you I can see my future.
For over 30 years I have been accumulating experiences and knowledge that goes from unique, fun, loving, …….. In all, how to live a balance healthy life. Writing a book is a big task right now, but bloging it could be a great way to share and help others.
Thanks.
May 7th, 2008
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