How do you work 'remotely'?

[Biancadelriosback]

Okay, so I'm currently sat in a coffee shop in my local city centre, trying to work and failing!
A few days a month I am required to work 'remotely' and I live quite far away so can't work from home. How do you do it? Am I missing a trick? Our city used to have a free hot desking space which was great but it's closed down now. At the coffee shop I have to keep my legs crossed so I don't leave my laptop unattended, I'm taking up a table and feel bad (have no problem if people want to join me), i keep having to buy coffees so I'm not a CF, now I'm hyper as fuck and can't concentrate! I had never done this before a couple of months ago so wondering how others do it? Should I be changing coffee shops every few hours?

The company I work for, all employees work remotely from home, though could in theory work anywhere in the world with a WiFi connection, one of us is in Poland. Why can’t uou work from home?

Why can't you work from home? That is what I would include in the definition of remote working!

Why can’t you work from home? That’s generally what working remotely means at my place of work. In my team we have people based in an office in Yorkshire, people in an office in the SE, me working remotely at home in the NW, another colleague at home in the SW, one at home in the midlands etc etc.

Who is saying you have to work remotely?

That's hilarious

Am I missing a trick?

^

We're all missing tricks these days

I work from home. Why can’t you work from home? Just don’t travel into the city that day.

I work from home and I occasionally work in cafes etc.. I buy water (bottled so as to also not be a CF!) rather than coffee

I just work from home. I'm not allowed to work anywhere where members of the public are present or the WiFi isn't secure. So home, mums house and work it is for me!

we just work from home... i dont understand how location matters?

Why can't you work from home? That's the whole point, you don't come in to the city at all, no commute. I then take any video calls etc from there.

If you have to come in for meetings (and that's why you need to be in the city), then tell them you can't work remotely on those days and need a desk space.

If the issue is that you don't have internet or for other reasons can't work from home, then I'd discuss with your manager, they don't want you to have expensive and inefficient days either.

I work from home or a coworking place or from Starbucks where most folk are working or studying so you can ask someone to mind your stuff and I don’t feel I need to drink more tea than I would anyway.

A library? Often free WiFi and comfy chairs.

We need more detail OP. Can you confirm whether your employer requires you to be within a certain geographical distance of the office whilst you’re working remotely or is that simply your interpretation of what it means?

I work from home, pretty straightforward really!

Early nomination for classics

Well I live in a small town which is about 40 mins away from my office, we are moving to new offices which are around 1.5 hours away from where I live (traffic depending) and I have a few site visits to the new offices with potential suppliers throughout the day. So today for example I had a meeting at new offices at 10 and have another at 4pm so I came into the city rather than driving to my current office, into the city, then back and forth before heading home again at the end of the day as I'd be stuck in loads of traffic and it would take me forever to get anywhere or do anything.

No idea if that makes sense, ive had so much fricken coffee!

Can't you work at the new offices between meetings? If you've got meetings there at 10 and 4, they surely have to find you a space to work between times?

So you are visiting multiple different sites and travelling between them? Not actually a full day in one place? But you don't want the faff of returning to the office inbetween as its a PITA journey?

That isn't really remote working then, that is "site visits"

I would simply ask whatever site I was at if I could borrow a desk and carry on working there after the visit, till it was time to leave for my next appointment. And repeat till its time to go home.

It's still a building site so can't work from there.

Waitress had just been over to ask if I want another coffee. I said yes. Why, why, why did I say yes!

Have you tried a library?

Schedule site meetings better, or get work to pay for an office for a couple of hours.

I don't schedule the meetings unfortunately, they are done around access to the building so always morning and afternoon. It's only a couple of times a month so not the end of the world to sit in a coffee shop, was just wondering if anyone else is ever in this position and what they do. Company definitely won't pay for a desk somewhere as there is no reason I can't work out of a coffee shop. If it's a problem they'll just tell me to drive home or back to the old offices which, like I said, would take forever and I'll not get anything done

Find the local library, get your own wifi connection so is secure. Locate other hot desking space - try any sort of enterprise or entrepreneurs place. Advertise on local FB pages or similar for space to work or office share on a temp basis etc.

Remotely just means not in the office but elsewhere. I would try for a more backstreet coffee place than traditional costa or neros etc and smaller so waitress will watch stuff while nip to the loo kind of thing. But really you are a coffee shop nightmare as you are stealing chair space from paying customers - ie more than a coffee every two hrs or waters etc

Make sure you're claiming for those coffees!

Deffo claiming for the coffees! It's all on my expense account ha!

I know I feel like a right CF. Usually I move coffee shop every couple of hours so I'm not a total CF