‘Telecommuting’ is changing the way we live and work
New work-life trends are rapidly emerging thanks to technology and the digital revolution.
Given the stresses of today’s ‘commuter reality’ in our larger cities; chronic traffic congestion, the rapidly rising
cost of fuel, parking hassles, more of our own precious time wasted just getting to our places of work - is it any
wonder more and more people are joining this revolution and choosing to work from home?
Whatever way you look at ‘Telecommuting’, a term reportedly coined by a Los Angeles consultant to describe this new
phenomenon, broadband is offering people new choices in the way they live and work, around the world.
For example, new evidence has recently emerged in the UK to suggest more and more people will soon be working away from
the office. More than 2.1 million Brits already work from home and around 8 million more spend at least some of their
working week in their homes instead of at the office, according to the UK, Office of National Statistics.
In the US there has also been a surge in the number of people turning to home-based work, lead increasingly by mothers
not prepared to compromise their home life with their working life. This is evidenced by a growing number of web portals
devoted entirely to supporting the home-based work force. See www.work-at-home.com
Why this phenomenon should be happening is complex, but experts agree that a reasonably priced broadband phone
connection is at the top of the answer list. It provides a high-speed way of receiving and sharing data and staying in
touch with work colleagues from your computer at home. Other reasons put forward include a feeling of more safety and
security and the fact that people nowadays tend to value their time more highly - while the daily commute to the office
continues its relentless appetite for this precious commodity.
In New Zealand a local company, Interscribe is looking to make good use of this trend here too.
Interscribe, a joint venture company between Transcription Holdings and established customer contact centre PHONEplus,
is looking to recruit more New Zealand based staff to join the ranks of its professional Medical Transcriptionists, in
order to cope with rapidly growing volumes of work from US and UK based hospitals.
Using an easy to install and operate web-based interface, Interscribe’s Medical Transcriptionists listen to dictated
voice recordings made by doctors, radiologists, specialists, surgeons and other healthcare professionals and transcribe
them into hard copy patient notes, medical reports, correspondence, and other administrative records. A specially
trained Interscribe supervisor then vets the transcribed reports and edits them for accuracy and clarity. The digital
documents are then securely returned, via the Internet, to the healthcare professional who dictated them. The reports
are then reviewed, signed off, printed and filed. The documents then become permanent patient records.
“The growth in work from the US and UK is substantial”, says Kathryn Starr, Interscribe’s General Manager. “Our team is
well regarded because of the commonality of language, treatment and skill requirements. We are regularly congratulated
on the high levels of quality delivered by our NZ-based team”.
Interscribe is actively recruiting up to 10 new transcriptionists a month.
“Working from home is a big advantage for our team and broadband availability with more competitive pricing has really
helped us recruit new staff. There are psychological reasons why people enjoy it. Experiencing less stress, finding it
easy to self-motivate, having more time for themselves and to nurture their children and feeling they have a better
work-life balance. We do have office facilities for training and for those staff who want to come in and enjoy the
social aspects of an office environment form time to time, but most staff prefer the advantages of working from home”,
says Starr.
Experienced Medical Transcriptionists, who might like to take advantage of working from home, or those interested in
medical transcription work can talk to Interscribe about career prospects by telephoning Leah Lazarus on 0-9 414 3607 or
e-mailing her at lml@phoneplus.co.nz.
ENDS.