Page 49 - Managing the Mobile Workforce

28 � mAnAgIng the moBIle workForCe

do. I don’t feel like I have someone over my shoulder all the time, and
that is a really huge selling point.”
At an organization like Deloitte, with around 165,000 employees
in 140 countries, “mass” seems like an appropriate term, “customiza-
tion” individualizes it, and “career” is the medium through which
people get the work done over time. So let’s go back to Sharon Allen,
the company’s chairman, to consider what that means—and how that
affects the paradigm of virtual work—for enterprise leaders. Deloitte
has the highest percentage of regular telecommuters—93 percent—of
all companies on Fortune magazine’s 100 Best Companies to Work
For list in 2010. Like all effective leaders, Sharon started with a sim-
5
ple example when we asked her how telework touches her own job.

The very best example of how telework is supporting my own career is
today’s example. That is because as the chairman, while I live in South-
ern California, my office is in New York, and I benefit from the team
that is spread throughout the country. The technology that supports us is
really what makes that all work. For instance, when I moved from Port-
land to Los Angeles, I was fortunate enough to have my assistant, Cindy
Hoppe, and her family actually move along with me. She supported me
here when I was the regional managing partner. When I took on the
chairman’s role about seven years ago, after a period of time she recog-
nized I was traveling a lot—the majority of the time, in fact—[and] she
basically came to me and said, ‘Why is it I commute an hour and a half
each way to work into Los Angeles if you’re never here?’ Good question,
right? She moved back to Portland, and works out of her home office and
supports me every day as my executive assistant. She picks up my Los
Angeles phone from her desk in Portland. She even supports one of the
regional managers in L.A. as well. She backs up his assistant because
they are able to stay connected so well through technology with the instant
messenger communication. Even though she is remote, she can stay con-
nected to his office. My speechwriter happens to live in North Carolina.
Bob, [Sharon’s chief of staff] works from his office in New York but oc-
casionally from his home in New Jersey. Dana, [in our public relations
group] is in New York. My team is basically spread all over the country.