Cogs in a bigger machine

Virtual firms come in all shapes and sizes. Some operate a small central hub with the majority of staff working from home, others can be major corporates where only a handful of staff work remotely.

With lower costs, increased productivity and improving technology, their numbers are growing. According to Russell Evans, managing director of organisational and people development consultancy, Primeast, working at a distance may create management challenges but it can be commercially rewarding.

Evans says remote workers have to stay motivated while aiming to meet targets away from the hustle and bustle of an office. “Managers need to recognise that their leadership is key to success,” he says. “They need to recognise the importance of trust and that it is developed differently in remote working. Communication needs to be more frequent, more overt and more specific.”

Success is sweet in any language

Applied Language Solutions
Private company: Translations

Gavin Wheeldon knows a thing or two about working in a virtual office. His Yorkshire-based translations business links directly with an army of some 3,000 self employed home workers across the UK, and a further 14,000 situated in every country around the world. “We have one guy up in Scotland who claims to be able to speak 20 plus languages, but we only use him for one or two.”

With 100 at the Huddersfield head office – project managers, developers, sales and admin staff - Applied Language Solutions works with companies and organisations across the globe translating mainly to and from English into thousands of languages including some of the more obscure. “We work a lot for the UN and they give us some absolutely bizarre languages,” he says. “We also do a lot of translation into Welsh and Gaelic, both Scottish and Irish.”

The work ranges from technical manuals through to websites. “Our translators are freelance running their own home businesses. We use Skype for conversations but we have developed our own workflow system where they log into a portal to collect and return work. And, as they are paid on a per word basis, there is a self-billing system so they needn’t send us invoices,” says Gavin, 33, who created the company six years ago after a career in sales.

Today his business is looking to generate £8m of sales this year, a 30pc increase on this year. The secret, he says, is getting the right people.

Nat Marmol, 28
Huddersfield
Interpreter and translator

Argentinean Nat Marmol may live in the same town as Applied Language Solutions but she is very much a home-based freelancer who takes work from a variety of agencies. She speaks English, Spanish and Portuguese and is now learning French so she can land her dream job at the UN in Geneva. “I worked there as an intern for two months, It was a great experience – great training. It will be a couple of years before I can apply for a job there.”

Until then she’s a home-based freelance. Work ranges from major assignments translating technical documents, which can take weeks, to short pieces proof-reading another translator’s work “every translation is checked for accuracy,” she says. “There are weeks when it’s really quiet then you can get three assignments in one go.”

Nat started her linguistics training at the age of two – learning English in Argentina - and ended up in the UK to study for a masters’ degree. “It can get a bit lonely working at home. But I do other things like go to the gym and Tesco, meet friends or go to the park. But I do find I wear the same clothes all day - I have loads of clothes that I don’t wear because I don’t have to go to the office.”

She works from her living room. “I used to have an office but that’s now the nursery – we had our first baby a few weeks ago and people say this is a great job for a mum; working from home means you don’t need child care and you can be at home with your baby and manage your hours to suit.”

www.appliedlanguage.com

Telecoms giant sees bottom line benefits

BT
PLC: telecoms

BT began to implement a home working policy in 1986 and now 10,000 employees work permanently from home with tens of thousands more working flexibly. The figures speak for themselves, says BT. employee productivity has increased by up to 31pc with BT’s homeworkers on average being 20pc more productive than their office based colleagues. And that adds £8m to BT’s bottom line. Flexible workers also take less time off sick and a greater number of women return after taking maternity leave than the average. “Flexible working enables our people to remain productive at work while caring for children, elderly or sick relatives or volunteering in the community,” says Naomi Fitton, BT People and Policy manager. Home working, she says, also benefits the environment “We save more than 7,000 tonnes of Co2 each year by reducing travel to work.”

Tina Sydenham, 41
Cardiff
Part time, term time home-based worker

“After two years of commuting 90 minutes to work every day I decided to look into the possibility of being a homeworker. Because my team were scattered around the country I felt that there was no logical need to travel to the office and home working would give me extra time to spend with my young daughter. My manager was supportive and BT provided a study in my house with the relevant equipment.

“Since also switching to term time working, working Monday to Friday, 9am to 3pm, I am able to work around my daughter’s school holidays. My line manager knows in advance exactly when I will be taking my leave, so there are no surprises for him.

“A lot of my friends are envious of my working arrangements. It’s great that I can earn money, hold a good job and be a mother all at the same time.”

www.bt.com

Lawyers practice remote working

Scott-Moncrieff, Harbour & Sinclair
Partnership: solicitors

“There are no office politics at ‘Scomo’,” says Lucy Scott-Moncrieff, “because there is no office.” The law firm which specialises in legal aid, personal injury and employment law does have a small hub of three based in London’s Kentish Town but 60 qualified solicitors are based across the UK.

“We are a conventional lawyers’ firm except that everyone apart from the support staff is self-employed and based at home,” she says. The bookkeeper also works remotely. “Sometimes he works from his house in Spain.

“We have a lot of part time judges, we have people who teach and those who want to work part time. That’s the thing – they are self-employed and can’t be tied. They are a bunch of happy bunnies.”

The legal definition, she says, as you’d expect from a lawyer, is that a self-employed person has to carry the business risk. If one of the team is working on a no-win, no-fee basis, and they lose, they receive nothing (unlike in a traditional legal firm where the solicitor would still receive the salary). The firm does hold monthly unit meetings and social gatherings but the day-to-day work is conducted via the company intranet with its own case management system. “The supervisors in each case can ensure standards are being maintained,” she says.

It’s a business model that suits the lawyers. Traditionally, she explains, a legal fee is three times the lawyer’s salary. “one third also goes to cover the costs and one third to the practise partners. This way we can really cut the overheads. our lawyers get 70pc of whatever they bill. The 30pc we get covers things like professional indemnity insurance, supervision and admin back up.” Turnover at ‘Scomo’ is £3m a year.

Mitchell Woolf has worked with Scott-Moncrieff, Harbour & Sinclair for six years. “I’m a human rights lawyer but was academic based. I saw a lot of cases coming in that weren’t being taken up,” he says. He contacted Scomo and joined the freelance panel, still working as an academic. “It’s perfect because it is so flexible and because I’m self employed no one can dictate my case load to me.”

www.scomo.com

By Eliza Hook