It’s easy to set up an off-site employees programme in your business. Just follow these simple steps.

Step 1: Appoint a staff member(s) to set up the OSEP
Depending upon the size of your business, the person appointed to set up an OSEP could be the HR and IT managers, senior management or a staff representative. A steering group could be set up including anyone who is already working off-site, as their experience will be very useful.

Step 2: Set your objectives
The first step for your OSEP developer is to set some objectives. There are many reasons for implementing an OSEP; it could be to save money on office costs and travel costs, or it could be to support a family-friendly workplace.
One way to start this process is to refer to your organisation’s Vision and Mission Statements (if they exist). If your Mission mentions clients as being really important, perhaps the OSEP’s primary objective is to ensure staff spend more time with clients. If your Mission mentions valuing employees, perhaps the primary objective is to support a family-friendly work place. Implementation of an OSEP may also support business objectives, such as increasing staff retention through creating a more flexible workplace.
Many other business objectives also could be achieved through an OSEP. Reducing the cost of overheads, such as telephones, heating and car-parking could all be objectives of your OSEP. Think about what results you expect to achieve and how you might measure savings and changes. At this stage you could start developing your cost-benefit analysis.

Step 3: Identify potential obstacles
It is important to identify all the possible problems that could prevent an OSEP from being successfully implemented in your organisation or business. Barriers can include operational constraints, such as the cost of purchasing and setting up home offices for staff, or social constraints, such as staff not wanting to be isolated from their colleagues. With each barrier to success start a list of ways to overcome each obstacle.

Step 4: Design a possible programme
The goal of this step is to maximise the possible benefits and minimise potential problems.
There are many variables you can control, such as the number of staff involved, how staff are selected or assessed, the off-site work location (e.g. home or elsewhere), the hours or days involved and whether staff will share work spaces and desks.
For example, if saving space is a major objective you could relax the selection criteria (to get more participants) and build in workspace sharing at an early stage. If management attitudes are seen as a possible problem, you could use tighter selection criteria, allow off-site work for fewer hours or days a week, and maintain space on-site for employees to begin with.
The programme design could take the form of a simple statement or two, e.g. “We will allow up to 25 employees to work from home for a maximum of one day a week for a trial period of three months.” But it could also take the form of a much more extensive strategic plan.
Once you have this statement, you will be able to work out the various costs and benefits you can expect and fill in the gaps of your cost-benefit analysis.

Step 5: Getting employee acceptance to implement your OSEP
Once the objectives are agreed, costs and benefits are finalised, and potential problems addressed, you need to consult staff to ensure the programme is accepted and supported. You might consider developing OSEP training resources for participants in the programme. Training could cover occupational safety and health in the home office, performance management techniques, IT skills and more.

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