How to work from home (or remotely)

Here is a great article on how to manage people working remotely. This article has very specific and useful tips on what you need to do, what software tools you should use, and provides links to some of the recommended tools. We have been using this approach very successfully for years, and the two most important things we have found are:

1. Videoconferencing that is easy to use and can be "always on" or nearly always on. This means Skype or some other one-click video tool, rather than something like Webex or GoToMeeting. We use GTM all the time, but you have to go through a dialogue to set up a videoconference with Webex and GTM, and the overhead is too high for remote collaboration.
2. Good symmetric bandwidth at every worker's location. This means if you have someone working remotely from their home, they need business class broadband with a minimum of several meg of upload bandwidth. You need symmetric bandwidth to support the videoconferencing.

There are a variety of collaboration and project management tools, and you need something, but the minimum requirement will be a tool that can be accessed remotely so that all employees can easily keep project activities up to date.