Want to Start Telecommuting at Your Current Job?

I got fired at the last job I had because I was pregnant. Illegal for my boss to do it, I know, but I couldn't prove it. I had only been working there for 3 weeks. Since then, I have had two kids (14 1/2 months apart), moved to Texas, started a new job, and convinced my boss to let me telecommute 3 days a week.

I started working at a small real estate office this past December ('06). The 'office' is actually a residential home in a neighborhood. I have my own office with two large desks - very nice. It was very hard (emotionally) to place my two small kids (11 months and 2 years old at the time) in a day care, since I hadn't worked since becoming pregnant with my firstborn; I was always at home being a mommy. Now someone else was taking care of my babies, while I was working. However, it was nice joining the adult world again. :) I do all the accounting work for this office - except the yearly statements and taxes. It's a small office - just the 'BOSS' and the 7 of us that work for him. I deal with his money, so it's important that my job be done efficiently and in a very timely manner. (Because of the nature of the foreclosure business, if I don't do the job quickly, then my boss doesn't get reimbursed by the banks.) He's used to controlling every aspect of the business, since he built it from the ground up.

After a few months of my kids being constantly sick from day care, and getting to the point where I didn't need 40 hours to do my job, I started thinking of telecommuting. Once I had the idea, I ran with it. I can do this job from home, mostly, if I had the capability of accessing the server at the office. I spoke with our tech guy (contractor) and he said it could work. I discreetly asked a couple coworkers if they thought my boss would say yes. Everyone said, "No way!" You see, my boss likes to have control of everyone and everything, at least during business hours. However, I am a firm believer in prayer - and God answered my prayers. I wrote up a proposal for telecommuting, offering to lower my salary (since I wouldn't be paying for day care). I gave it to him and told him what I wanted... He said he had already thought about it! I rarely went a week without missing some work because the kids were sick so much from the day care. If I were working from home, the job could be done whether the kids were sick or not. A couple days later, and a few issues later that were addressed, he said yes! Whoohoo!

Unfortunately, the week when the tech guy was supposed to set things up before I started working from home, the kids both got strep throat. So I started 'working from home' a week ealier than planned. That would have been great, except that my computer wasn't set up. So no work was done. Then my boss started getting frustrated with the situation, and demanded that I work at the office at least 2 days a week. I feel like he didn't give the plan a chance to work, but it turned out for the best. I was going to have to be at the office for a couple of hours 2-3 evenings a week to print checks and make deposits, since he didn't want these items leaving the office for security reasons. Since I'm here at the office 2 days a week now, I can do all this during day time hours.

So now I work from home 3 days a week, and I'm at the office on Tuesdays and Fridays. It's great! I have an ideal situation - plus I switched day cares. Now they're in a small, in-home day care with only 4 other kids. They're not getting sick, and I get to be with them 5 days a week! All in all, it has worked out great. Now I need to work on getting a raise.