Fresh Way to Answer Your Calling

Fresh way to answer your calling
Keach Hagey

Last Updated: January 25. 2010 11:38PM UAE / January 25. 2010 7:38PM GMT
Walid Halani, an Ajman resident whose work in Dubai as a translator requires a three-hour commute, has been telecommuting for the past year. Charles Crowell for The National
If Walid Halani wants to make it from his home in Ajman to his translating job in Dubai in reasonable time, he has to leave at 5am to miss the morning rush hour.



And even then, Mr Halani, 33, can expect to spend three hours of his day on the road.

Add the flexible nature of his work, and he is a perfect candidate for telecommuting, a form of working from home through e-mail and telephone that has been gaining popularity globally as broadband internet penetration increases.

“I told my boss that the nature of my work as a translator doesn’t require me to be at the office all the time, because most of my work can be delivered by e-mail,” Mr Halani says. “So I can save my time and the company’s time by spending less time on the road.”



A recent study by Bayt.com, the Middle East jobs site, found that 72 per cent of the region’s professionals agree with him that telecommuting has benefits for the employer and the employee.

Mr Halani’s boss, Mamoon Sbeih, the managing director of JiWin Public Relations, says he supports his employee’s choice to telecommute for the past year as it increases his efficiency.

“He comes in one or two days a week to interact with colleagues and to understand what they need,” Mr Sbeih says. “But in general, because he’s a translator, I get much more out of him when he’s relaxed and he doesn’t need to drive in from Ajman.”


The arrangement has worked well largely because there is trust on both sides. Mr Halani worked for JiWin for three years before he began telecommuting.

Bayt.com’s research underscores the importance of trust in telecommuting. The survey shows 40 per cent of respondents agreed that self-disciplined employees with excellent performance records would be able to telecommute, while 18 per cent agree that employees who do not have face-to-face interaction with customers or colleagues would be suited to it.



A further 11 per cent say the practice would be suited to working mothers.

“It is interesting that so many of the region’s respondents feel that telecommuting would be most suited to employees that are self-motivated and good workers, presumably because of the perception that with telecommuting comes a number of distractions … and also from the idea that without the watchful eye of a boss and other colleagues, some employees would not always be inclined to work,” says Lama Ataya, the director of marketing and corporate communications at Bayt.com.



Mr Halani is not free from some of the anxieties that telecommuting can cause.

“It has some advantages and some disadvantages,” he says. “Because you are home you can spend more time with your family and children, but at the same time you are working away from the office so you don’t know what’s happening in the office.

“Your boss doesn’t know what you are doing. He may think you are sleeping or playing or wasting your time at home, when really I am working very hard to deliver my work before the deadline.”



And telecommuting does not work in every industry. Sam Husaini, the managing director of the advertising and marketing firm Impact BBDO in Abu Dhabi, says Abu Dhabi’s high rents compared with Dubai’s forced some of his employees in the past to live in Dubai and commute daily, but he has tried to avoid this as much as possible.

Mr Husaini did have a few people telecommuting last year but he stopped it as soon as he could.



“At the end of the day, when it comes to coming up with good thinking and good work, you cannot replace the fact that face-to-face interaction is needed,” he says.

“Generally, I insist that everybody be based in Abu Dhabi so that we can spend more time with our clients.”

In the Bayt.com survey, 18 per cent of the respondents say their company does not support telecommuting.

“That almost a fifth of the region’s workplaces do not support telecommuting might not be a reflection of organisational reluctance; rather it might be that certain industries simply will not benefit from it,” Mr Ataya says.



“Telecommuting has been shown around the world to be highly useful to many types of organisation but, as with any new service technology, one size does not fit all.”

Mr Halani said that while he loves being able to spend more time with his children, who are 1 and 4 years old, their requests to go to the park or offers to “help” with his translating add an extra challenge to meeting his afternoon deadline. Not to mention the cabin fever.



“If I could afford to take an apartment in Dubai, I would not work from home,” he says. “You can’t stay at home 24 hours a day.”



khagey@thenational.ae