“Nomadness”

by Clint O'Connor / Aug 14

One consequence of transforming into a digital nomad may be (will be, some could argue) a significantly increased blending of business and personal life depending on the degree of “nomadness”. Most business owners will be familiar with this as so much personal effort goes into nurturing a business. Employees that come and go to a traditional corporate office are more likely to have a cleaner separation of corporate and personal lives.

This leads to a concept of “nomadness” or nomadity where none equates to conventional rigid divisions between business and personal, work and life. High equates to significant intermeshing of business and personal. Digital nomadity is the use of computers and communication tools to facilitate nomadity. Our capability to embrace digital nomadity, if you will, may largely track the age of digital nomads as well as the type of job. There are always exceptions and we need to avoid stereotypes, but younger nomads often grow into change better than older ones. The same is true of corporations – younger corporations may be more willing to change established work conventions than older established ones. Younger workers trying to fit into older establishments may fight to change the status quo – and older workers trying to fit into younger establishments may feel overwhelmed. In some ways, it’s a replay of the internet vs. the brick and mortar companies.

When we can work from anywhere at anytime, our business and personal lives start to merge and adjustments need to occur both from a personal management perspective and a corporate management perspective. Conflicts will occur when we cannot manage both to a reasonable standard, leading to unhappy corporations and unhappy employees (nomads). Companies that install keystroke loggers and spycam software on their systems to monitor nomads are doomed to lose them as soon as another opportunity comes along. Smart filters and no web email are reasonable restrictions on corporate time but will not work for nomads working on personal time.

This leads to a need for tools and conventions to manage and facilitate greater nomadity. One is training to help us (both corporate and employee) make the transition and manage our time division and controls wisely. Another is hardware and software that supports digital nomadity – corporate IT security and control, while still allowing personal freedom to go anywhere and do anything… all in the same machine. We also need to develop commonly accepted policies and conventions that balance the two uses without being obtrusive and confining.

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