Isolation, poor feedback and lack of control have been cited as major disadvantages of home-based working, in a new survey conducted in the United Kingdom. Loss of feedback, isolation and the control and monitoring of staff are all regarded as major disadvantages of home based teleworking by over half the respondents of a study into the use of teleworking within UK companies

The report, "Teleworking in the UK 1996", published by Small World Connections and sponsored by Flexible Working magazine, clearly shows a five fold increase over the last five years in the number of companies using or planning teleworking practices The report also found that all respondents cited security, equipment cost and the provision of support as concerns but only 25% of the respondents regard them as major concerns.

The results also found a clear difference in the perception of these problems between companies who had experience of home based teleworking and those who had not. Those with experience tended to regard loss of feedback, isolation and the control and monitoring of staff as less serious than those without experience. Loss of feedback is assessed as a major disadvantage by 40% of those with home-based teleworkers compared with 64% of those without teleworkers. There were also significant differences with respect to isolation of staff (35% compared to 57%) and control and monitoring (25% compared to 52%).

Bill Murray of Small World Connections found the major benefits of teleworking are:

• improved productivity
• office cost saving and increased staff effectiveness

Around 75% of respondents also reported some benefit from improved staff retention and recruitment, reduced absenteeism and stress.

Managers seeking to avoid the pitfalls and capitalise on the many benefits of teleworking should consider attending the Telework UK '96, a conference that examines teleworking from a business perspective. It is the major UK business conference of European Telework Week (4-11 November) which supports events across Europe that promote and study the use of flexible, location independent working practices. (see story below).

The only event of the week to specifically address the business community, the Telework UK '96 conference will bring together industry leaders, major employers, technology developers, key politicians and experienced telework professionals They will examine the business benefits and wider environmental and social issues impacted by teleworking and present practical advice and solutions

Teleworking in the UK 1996, is the first phase of a larger study into teleworking in the country. Later phases will include more detailed investigation with interviews and case studies and will be presented by Bill Murray at the Telework UK '96 conference. The conference is organised by Telework Events and is sponsored by Mercury Communications Ltd and Flexible Working magazine.

Tickets cost 750pounds for all three days, 550pounds for two days and 330pounds for one day (prices exclude VAT).

Conference enquiry and booking line:

Bill Murray, Small World Connections

As part of the Telematics Application Programme Support Actions, this TWEURO WWW site is often a "first port-of-call" for other projects and interested parties, trying to get a first impression of the range of TAP and the projects funded within it. We publish regular updates on individual projects, and the latest projects to supply us with information are detailed below:

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EMPLOY, (European Multimedia Pedagogic Local support network Organisation for the social integration of unemployed Young Europeans), is a TAP-funded consortium whose objectives are to develop a European network of local multimedia centres providing education "on demand" - distance training for the young unemployed who may not have benefited from the more traditional education system.

Led by ADICE, a French education association in the communication, information development and training sectors, the consortium also includes partners concerned with education and training from Austria (Berufsfoerderungs Institut), Germany (Internationaler Bund, Stuttgart), France (Ligue FOL - 17), Ireland (National Youth Federation) and England (Norfolk College).

The project is supported by two technology partners: MEDIACONCEPT (France), a company specialising in multimedia educational applications, and GEMPLUS, also of France, a leader in the Smart Card industry. Two major sub-contractors also support the consortium: ARTTIC (France), a service company specialising in managing international collaborations and ORF, the national Austrian radio and television service.

Initially, five multimedia training and teaching centres are being set-up and these and will evolve according to user needs. The centres, listed below, will focus on differing training needs and will be based at:

• La Rochelle (France):
• This site will focus on young school leavers without qualifications
• Linz (Austria), Dublin (Ireland) and King's Lynn (Norfolk):
• These sites will provide support to those young people close to illiteracy
• Stuttgart (Germany):
• This site will focus on the development of professional training needs for young technicians seeking employment.

Users' participation and performance will be monitored, and it is anticipated that the training modules will result in qualifications. A certain number of training modules will include the intelligent use of telematics themselves. Employment information for the users and information about qualified young people for potential employers will be managed regionally.

Progress:

The project commenced in January 1996 and will take approximately 3 years to complete. Claudine Debrary of ARTTIC, and EMPLOY's Project Manager, advises TWEURO that: "Work is progressing according to plan."

• The five sites have been installed
• The initial training sessions on the five sites have been held to assess users' needs in terms of technical installation, pedagogical approach and training contents
• Specifications for the enhanced set-up are being prepared

Further information can be found at KANSAS TICKETS

The objective of this project is to build a full Regional and Trans-National methodology for matching regional development needs to integrated telematics investment programmes, where all partners will use defined common technologies, applications and services for telematics in specific sectors, and all participants in the project will be connected to a single inter and intra regional network to share applications and services - the Sites User Network "SUN".

The six regions involved include Baden-Wuerttemberg, the North of England, Catalunya, Rhone-Alpes, Lombardia and Upper Austria and, together, they will collaborate to:

• Identify cross-sector community needs in each region;
• Develop common as well a specific solutions using Telematics applications, services and technologies;
• Develop cross-sector, cross-programme solutions for both regions and trans-national partnerships;
• Implement both generic and specific solutions in the work place as a part of daily operations;
• Validate the applications and services in working practice in order to evaluate integration strategies, cost and benefit, market relevance as well as human, organisational and regional effects;
• Generate new common and generic knowledge of the validation results on the basis of project internal learning effects, as well as on scientifically defined methods and mechanisms;
• Disseminate and discuss these developments with a wide spectrum of the European and International Community.

In addition, there is a significant investment in the development of large-scale management processes. This effort is aimed at the integration of public administrations, users, policy makers, service deliverers and product/service vendors into the processes described above. The principal areas involved are:

• Telematics Applications and Services;
• Advanced Computing and Telecommunications;
• Business Process Design and Reimplementation;
• IT Research and Development.

An additional objective of this project is to provide practical issues on which European Commission General Directorates can work together to achieve balanced and integrated programmes which provide optimised benefit to the communities of Europe.

Anticipated benefits of the project will be to provide the participating communities (in excess of 25 million) with access to regional administration, education and training as well as health care services, improved levels of direct customer service through faster response times, direct public access, and uniform information presentation. It is expected that there will be reduced costs for the users of the application due to common applications, shared information and distributed systems for public access.

European industries will have validated, user-oriented common and generic technology, applications and services as a starting point for future products and public services, input for future standards and needs, as well as user-ready applications and services. It is hoped that the outcome of the project will involve and enable other European regions to support and integrate Telematics applications and services, and develop European regions for progressive growth, competitiveness and employment.

Progress

Dr. Horst Weisbrod of Application Lab e.V, the co-ordinating contractors, spoke with us recently and commented: "All the Regions have activated Regional User Groups with defined Application descriptions along their needs and requirements.

"A set of common methods and mechanisms (first StarterKIT) as well as a description of architecture, technologies and standards for common inter-regional TeleRegions platform is defined.

"The first integration and validation phases have been activated, with more than 30 user-defined telematic applications and services included. There are already some prototypes running, integrated and at validation stage within the user organisations. Most of these applications are of single user interest. The project has also created a set of five clusters of common TeleRegions applications - the first prototypes are under inter-regional construction."

Further information can be found at the TeleRegions SUN Web Home Page: http://www.teleregions.org

Sue Gibbard works for the TWEURO project and can be contacted via E-mail at: 100066.2140@compuserve.com. Alternatively, you can contact Sue via fax at +44 1428 725 499.

Telework is high on the agenda in discussions about Europe and the Information Society. The issues range from social questions raised by the prospect of many more people working at home, to the competitiveness of European industries and the questions of where and how the new jobs of the Information Society are being created. The scope of debate is wide, from practical matters such as health and safety at the "home workplace", to strategic opportunities, such as the possibility of reducing traffic congestion and pollution through telecommunication - transportation trade offs.

The first European Telework Week - November 1995 - saw over 30 registered events across Europe. The activities ranged from key international events in Austria (ACTS/National Hosts Conference: "A Day in the Information Society"); Rome (2nd European Assembly on Telework and "New Ways to Work") and London ("Tomorrow's Workplace") to grass roots "open days" at telecottages and telecentres in both cities and villages. ETW '95 attracted coverage by the press, radio and television.

Second year

The 2nd European Telework Week, 4-11 November 1996 - will build on last year's success to achieve even wider public attention. Events and activities pioneered in1995 will act as role models for ETW '96. Organisations in every part of Europe have already indicated their support to international, regional, nationaland local events and activities. With European Commissioner Martin Bangemann accepting the role of "patron" for European Telework Week, there's no doubt that the European Commission's most senior executives are putting their full support behind the many telematics/teleworking initiatives across Europe.

ETW '96 provides opportunities for everyone who has an interest in telework - employers, teleworkers, unions, suppliers of telework technologies and services, policy makers and environmentalists. If you want to support European Telework Week by organising your own event, joining or sponsoring other activities, helping us reach more people - or simply by keeping in touch and participating, register an interest now - you can do this at:

the European Telework Online website - http://www.eto.org.uk or E-mail: etw96-info@eto.org.uk) or through the Telework Europa forum on CompuServe (GO TWEURO)

Three major events

• Vienna - 3rd European Assembly on Telework and New Ways to Work - (4-6 November, 1996)
• Bonn - Telework Deutschland '96 - Neue Wege zur Arbeit (11-13 November, 1996)
• London - Conference: Tomorrow's Workplace (6-8 November 1996)

The three major events will be interconnected through videolinks.

The latest information and contacts regarding European Telework Week can be found online:

• CompuServe GO TWEURO - messages and library section 7 (Events Diary/Sites);
• Internet http://www.eto org.uk or email etw96-info@eto.org.uk.

As well as Telework Week events the website links to useful telework sites and resources across Europe and world wide.

Vienna event

The European Assembly has become the major platform for debates on telework in Europe. Further to the debates in Berlin (1993) and Rome (1994) the main topics this year will be: Getting people to work; Training for the Information Society and Working towards Substainability. The main players in these areas will be invited to come to the City Hall in Vienna and meet with politicians, union representatives, scientists, industrialists and telework experts and practitioners.

Further information:

London event

The London conference will be held from November 6th to 8th at the new Britannia International Hotel, in Docklands. It will continue the theme, successfully started last year, of telework as a business benefit and will also look at the wider social and environmental issues.There will be over 40 speakers over three days with a choice of different streams focusing on People, IT and Property. Key speakers will include leading world authorities on the subject, business leaders, experts and managers of teleworkers. There will also be demonstrations of video conferencing and other technologies.

Further information:

Bonn event

The Bonn conference and exhibition - Telework Deutschland 96 - will be held from November 6th to 7th at the Holiday Inn Crowne Plaza hotel, starting with a reception of the Lord Mayor of the City of Bonn in the Old Town Hall on the evening of 5th November. The conference, subtitled "New Ways to Work and Employment" will focus on different models of telework in a huge variety of application areas, of how telework creates and maintains work and employment, success stories in telework and also the problems and pitfalls of telework implementation in organisations and ways forward to tackle these.

Further information:

Some of the organisations contributing to this year's European Telework Week are: 3Com, Alcatel, IBM, CAP Volmac, Compaq, Canon, Digital, ICL, Netscape. Microsoft, Toshiba, Mercury Communications, Swedish Royal Institute of Technology, Austrian Ministry for Public Economy & Transport, The Netherlands Ministry of Transport, City of Vienna and City of Bonn, European Community Teleworking Forum, European Trade Union Confederation, Global Office Network, Regus International Office Centres, France Telecom, Deutsche Telekom, TeleDenmark Consult, Royal PTT Netherlands, Telework Associations in Belgium, The Netherlands, France, Spain, Finland, United Kingdom, Italy, Sweden.