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Telecommuting as an Alternate Worksite Strategy
by Jim LaRue, MBCP, CISSP
One of the most difficult decisions to make while doing business continuity planning is where to relocate employees if the primary business site cannot be used. One viable solution is locating the
employees in their own homes, allowing them to “telecommute.” Interest in telecommuting has picked up steam. Many businesses affected by the 9-11 terrorism found that this was the quickest way to react to
the loss of their workplace. Worries about security, long lines and hassles at the airport, and the rising costs of business travel, have caused many companies to rethink their policies. Changes in
household demographics, such as the increased number of single parent households or those employees with legal and family obligations requiring them to stay near home have all but retired the assumed “employees
will move to the company facility out-of-state” attitude. Adopting such a remote work strategy for business continuity can not only ease the response burden, but can minimize costs.
“Businesses and government learned many lessons from the September 11th terrorist attacks”, said Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md). “Among them was that having telecommute work capabilities in place can be a major advantage in dealing with any type of event that displaces workers. The ability to continue government functions and private commerce will make a world of difference in being able to cope with whatever events we may confront in the future. In the meantime, telecommuting holds advantages for workers that are traveling or cannot go to their workplace because of weather, family or health reasons.”
There are a number of factors that must be considered before making a wholesale decision that employees are capable of working from home. A comprehensive Business Impact Analysis (BIA) should first be
conducted to understand the interdependencies between work groups, their true need for collocation, and the tools employees need to do their job. If you find that many work groups who are sitting next to each
other now could run in an acceptable manner by using email and transferring files electronically, then you should consider these workgroups as viable telecommuters. Some subset of employees should be
determined as “critical”, since most companies are concerned with only bringing back their most critical workload initially after a disaster. This does not, however, end the planning.
In most cases the companies’ data being transferred through your in-house local area network will need some form of protection before being sent over the Internet. Some form of virtual private network,
where your files are encrypted before sending, will need to be established between your employee’s homes and other corporate facilities. The company may wish to identify those employees deemed
“critical”, and quietly provide them laptop PC’s or older PC’s being replaced by more current hardware. Some form of high-speed data link, such as DSL or a cable modem should be installed as well since a
dial-up modem is typically unacceptable for business data transfer. An inexpensive firewall or router should be included at employee’s homes to keep these PC’s and your virtual network from being
compromised by hackers. Rules can also be set on these devices to prevent inappropriate sites from being viewed on the PC’s, or other violations of the company’s Internet policy from taking place. A particular
PC or server can be established as an alternate server for loading the data that should be stored off-site for just such an incident. The cost of these can be expensed as fringe benefit, but are trivial
compared to the costs of even leasing “shared” business continuity space.
Once implemented the viability of working from home offices should be “tested”. Testing should first be done to check the logging in capability, “pinging” required sites, and through transfer of
non-work data files of similar size and type as the real files. Lessons learned from these test should wring out any problems. The fix to these may be as simple as providing simple documentation of the log-on
processes, access to non-electronic work tools, and so forth.
A collateral benefit of establishing this telecommuting strategy is that it can be used during operational emergencies, such as winter snowstorms, or by employees who are too ill to spend an entire day at work
but who feel well enough to be able to provide a few hours of activity.
Obviously some detailed examination of the links to other work groups, company wide area networks, customers and suppliers or data will be needed. Compensation policies and non-work usage will have to be
addressed as well.
Telecommuting is, however, a viable alternative for alternate site strategies for resuming business functions after a disaster for many work functions. Thought must be given to the implementation of this
strategy. It involves a great deal more than just giving the employee access to a PC and modem. As seen in practice, however, a well defined plan for critical employees to telecommute from home has
allowed many business workgroups to provide a level of support enabling survival of the business until their original workplace is recovered.
Jim LaRue, MBCP, CISSP
President and Senior Consultant
Dreamcatcher Disaster Resilience, LLC
© 2002 Dreamcatcher Disaster Resilience, LLC
Dreamcatcher Disaster Resilience, LLC is a Rochester Hills, Michigan based full-service contingency planning company. They provide disaster recovery planning, business continuity planning, HIPAA security
compliance, emergency management planning, training, and project management services. For additional information please feel free to call (248) 650-9900, or email to JLaRue@dreamcatcher-dr.com.
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