Teleworking
Thirteen journeys to the future of work
Andrew Bibby
1995
Developments in computer and telecommunications technology make it possible for increasing numbers of people to avoid commuting daily to work and instead they can communicate with their colleagues or clients from a distance by ‘teleworking’.
In theory, teleworkers have the opportunity to turn their back on the pressures of urban life, working just as effectively down the telephone wires from a retreat deep in the countryside. Telework, it is claimed, will at last reverse the two hundred year old move to the cities, bringing welcome new employment opportunities for remote rural areas.
But what is actually happening in practice? In this comprehensive and entertaining account of teleworking today, Andrew Bibby travels throughout the UK and Ireland in search of the future of work. He talks to the individual telework pioneers, visits the growing number of community-based telecottages and finds teleworking offices being set up by multinational companies in the most unlikely rural settings.
Andrew Bibby is a writer and journalist who has made a particular study of the development of teleworking. He is the author of a practical teleworking handbook Home is Where the Office is, and a regular contributor to The Observer, The Independent and other national newspapers and magazines.