No Fixed Office

It seems that after my post yesterday, about not really know what to do with this blog, I may have had a little inspiration. Not sure if it will turn into anything yet, but it will be hopefully a project that will get me back into the swing of working on this blog more regularly.

While I have not fully formed the idea yet in my mind, I can tell you that it will be moving away from the currant topic, and into a more observations of topics or something along those lines. Even though it is sort of working in my mind I am still not entirely sure what is going on and what it might turn into.

I just was excited to see that I was getting inspiration from just opening up about the situation with the blog, and I think this has helped me to see that there is potential for this blog in another topic or way.

Anyway stay posted I suspect that I will get on top of this idea and maybe get something moving by mid week. That is if the topics come to me, I know the general idea it is just hard to put in words tonight, being late, and also being quite warm, that i am sweating even at almost midnight.

Anwyay cheers to future plans.

So one week into my serious test of taking my office mobile around the world, and I have hit a couple of bumps in the road but for the most part have figure ways around or found alternate solutions to what I was expecting.

Firstly traveling has not been such a big worry, getting through airports, is probably the most difficult in the US, it seems that their screening metal detector gates are the most sensitive, and you really have to remove every little piece of metal from your body. This is not such a big deal though, travel is travel and for your own safety you do understand and expect that some precautions are taken.

Anyway that is not really a big revelation to anyone, and not really a big part of being mobile with your office either. What the primary things that I will focus on are the mobile phone and internet services.

Mobile Phone Options

It turns out purchasing a phone overseas is somewhat more difficult then in Australia. Well at least in Canada Anyway, all I wanted was a cheap prepaid phone and to get it unlocked off the provider that supplied it, so that I can buy another prepaid sim at each stop. well This just seems to be to difficult for people in phone shops to bother with. I would have thought a Sale is a sale, big or small, every sale needs to be made. However for the most part my inquires were met with disinterest or one comment was “Not in Canada, maybe an international handset” This was when I asked about buying a handset not locked to a carrier.

So, anyway I have not really needed to make calls anyway, so I have survived, making use of SMS, which runs about 3times what it normally costs in Australia, however much cheaper then a few dollars a minute to make a call.

Mobile Internet

Again the situation is it seems kind of similar. You can purchase prepaid options more easily for mobile broadband, however once you buy the USB stick and get it unlocked this would be quite an expensive option. More expensive then just paying the high rates that the hotels offer internet for anyway.

This however has quite a good outcome, it seems that free Wi-fi is something that is quite widely available in Canada, in fact Every Starbucks is a hotspot. Along with many other coffee shops, and even Safeway offer free wifi while shopping (however coincidentally there is a starbucks in the store).

So while it has been a little more difficult and not so convenient, to get online and to get the things done that I would normally do, it has not been such a huge step to be able to get them done. In a few days this is going to be tested again when I make the move from Canada, to the USA, I hope it is more cost effective to either buy or the freedom of access to Wifi hot spots is just as good.

The true test of any mobile office is just how mobile can you make it. How far can you take it from home? How long can you maintain the mobility away from home? And most importantly how do you face the cost/benefit ratio to maintain your office when mobile?

For the most part these question answer themselves when you are in your home city. Everything that you need is generally available to you are reasonable prices, that just make it easy for your to work with your mobile office. To many extents this does not change when you are traveling in your own country.

Where things start to get a little interesting is when you consider taking your office overseas. Many new things become challenges, which previously you may have taken for granted. Things like the weight of what you need to take with you, how you will make phone calls, access to the internet, and more than likely a handful of other things that will change by being outside the country. All of these can be worked around though.

What your portable office weights

If you have not previously traveled with your mobile office, or have just traveled short distances where weight is not a big issue, you may never have really thought about the weight of what you carry. Of course the things like your laptop and charger are the essential items that you cannot do without. Then there are the other accessories such as Mobile Broadband modem, Mouse, maybe a portable hard drive, and any number of other accessories you may see as needed. All of this adds to the weight of your bag.

Some people I think will be making the move towards an Ipad or Iphone or similar devices to take away quite a lot of the weight problem. This however creates another problem, which leaves you with a somewhat limited functionality. While for the most part you can work with everything that you may need, often there are plenty of sacrifices, depending on just what your office is needed for.

Making Phone Calls

When you go to another country most people inevitably will turn on international roaming on their mobile. But is this going to be the most cost effective option. It depends on a number of different points really. Which include but i am sure are not limited to, how long you will be in another country? How many calls you expect to make? Will they be international calls or local calls?

While I am still no where near another country at this point I suspect that buying a cheap prepaid phone will be the best option, to if nothing more have to make calls in emergency at the lowest possible cost. Even potentially for making international calls. For example In Australia, I know that my international roaming costs me a couple of dollars per minute when i visit the US, however if I call the US from Australia, I only pay a matter of cents. I expect there will be some sort of similar option, costs may very well vary but never hurts to look.

Getting on the Internet

Again like making phone calls this is something that you may take for granted at home, with the spread of mobile broadband, and the range of options which are available. However this is where international roaming gets quite expensive.

Again just like the phone, I am hoping that there will be a cheaper prepaid option for this as well. Something that I can pay for up front and just make use of while away and maybe hold onto as an option to top up next time that I travel.

What Else?

Possibly the other big challenge I seem to see is how to pack for climates you are not regularly use to. For example even though you may experience single figure temperatures in a temperate climate in winter. How do these differ to single digit temperatures in a different climate.

Whatever the challenge though they are I believe all things that can easily be overcome without a huge deal, and something that is going to be fun to work through in the respect of a truly mobile office.

Wow, I did not realize just how long it had been since I made a post here. This is something that I am going to have to change, in the near future.

To get things started on this change to posting more often here, I will be looking at making some theme changes, for the moment, the default theme for WordPress is going to be showing, as the theme I was using was quite dated, I think. However the the theme will not be the only thing to change here.

One of the first things that I would like to do with the website here is work towards build more of a community here. The first step in this will be looking for input in the form of guest posts from other people who are working with No Fixed Office. Because to be honest my experience in working with No Fixed Office, is a fairly closed and narrow representation of what is really out there. So I really want to get some other people’s experiences to share with everyone out there. If you would like to submit a guest post please visit the Contact Page and get in touch, to discuss your interest.

At some point this will also include adding a forum to the site however the last thing that I want to do is, add this on to quickly. I am also a little unsure at this point of the best way to implement this. So suggestions are always welcome.

I look forward to your suggestions or thoughts on the site here and hope that I can get back to providing you with some great information in the near future.

Do you find that the time that is allocated to you for your coffee break is just that little bit to short? How would you like to be spending the majority of your time on a coffee break, while getting the majority of your work done on that coffee break? What about if that coffee break lasted all afternoon.

It is really one of the quite attractive parts of working with no fixed office.  The ability to be able to take your work with you and spend the afternoon working in a coffee shop is something that I am sure many people would prefer then having to sit in a small office, be it at home or as part of your job. Trying not to get distracted by other things that could just as easily take your attention, eg coworkers, meetings, email, and the likes at work, or when in a home office things like TV, kids, games, or anything else around the home.

While taking your work to a coffee shop will not avoid all these distractions all the time, it can be sometimes easier to set the differentiation between what you are doing and what distractions you will encounter. But we will take a look at how some of the distractions can be avoided by going and working on a full time coffee break at a coffee shop.

Co-workers – This will be an easy distraction to avert, as it can come down to most of your co-workers will not be willing or able to step outside like you are. Of course if you are planning to go and work in a cafe for the afternoon, ensure you have it approve by your boss, but this often will not be overly difficult if you can prove increased productivity, and may even lead to you needing to work less hours to get the same amount of work done. As long as you can actually buckle down and get it done.

E-Mail – This distraction can be a tricky one to avoid. Everyone seems to try and work with email, to get in touch with clients, management, and other co-workers. One way to negate this distraction is to not connect to your email when out of the office, leave email to be checked in the office, and make anyone who may really need to contact you aware they will need to contact you by phone.

The distractions that you encounter when working from a home office are going to be a little easier to negate when you are working in a cafe or other remote office location, but lets look at the benefits.

TV – This is a no brainer, while you do find that many cafe’s have a TV in the store somewhere and it may be switched on, it is probably going to be rare the show is one that you are interested and often times the sound is off or turned down low anyway. Working in a cafe really does make it that much more difficult to just get up from your work work and go and sit in front of the TV to watch a football game or other show.

Kids – This is another easy one. By taking yourself out of the home, away from where children might be, it makes that definite cut between being at home, and working. Do ensure that children have proper supervision, of course. But children can be a big distraction as most of the time they do not realize or understand the differentiation between playing and working.

These are really just some of the distractions that you can face there are many different distractions which will be different for everyone, the challenge comes down to identifying these distractions and ensuring that your stepping out of the office or home, and going to get your work done in a cafe is actually going to make a difference to the distraction.