By Andrew Bibby

A glimpse of the strength and diversity of telework initiatives in Europe was on show at the European Telework Awards ceremony in Brussels on November 6th, as large European corporates shared the spotlight and the prizes with innovative microenterprises and community ventures.

The Awards, now an established feature of European Telework Week (Nov 2nd-9th), attracted entries from across the European Union. Introducing the awards ceremony, Peter Johnson of the European Commission DG XIII stressed the importance of the new ways of working, made possible by information and communications technologies (ICTs). "We need to learn from best practice. The European Telework Awards ceremony enables us to learn from the best in Europe," he said.

Teleworking, usually defined as remote or distant working made possible by the use of ICTs, encompasses a wide range of practices including home-based working, mobile working and the use of satellite offices and telecentres. Peter Johnson told the Awards ceremony that in total about four million people were now teleworking in European Union member states. "The number is growing very rapidly," he said. "Ten million people will be teleworking in one form or another by the year 2000."

Twenty-two companies and organisations from nine countries were short-listed for the European Telework Awards ceremony and had the opportunity to briefly explain their use of teleworking before an invited audience at the Palace Hotel in Brussels. The event, compered with flair by Belgian television presenter Daisy Van Cauwenbergh, was also simultaneously web-cast over the Internet.

The variety of teleworking now taking place in Europe was reflected in the short-listed entries. Among larger companies represented at the ceremony were BMW for its TWIST teleworking programme involving 400 employees, Telecom Italia Mobile for its innovative use of laptops for field-based technicians and Dutch and Danish telecom operators KPN and Teledanmark for major recent telework campaigns. British Telecom showed its striking TV advertisement on the theme 'why not change the way we work?'.

Presentations from smaller enterprises making creative use of telework included those from Dutch IT firm Vertis, Scottish call centre training centre and operator GCS, and the Danish company Excel. Excel recently opened a satellite office in Billund, saving some of its employees the task of commuting over sixty kilometres to its head office in Herning.

KITE, a small enterprise based in a rural area of northern Ireland which uses ICTs to work for US clients, was another entrant. KITE's director Michael McCaffrey spoke of the way that work could now 'follow the sun' around the world.

Two ventures which aim to take telework opportunities to people with disabilities were shortlisted: the Portuguese THINK programme, and the Italian programme CSELT. The European Telework Awards also included an entry from the young people of Piquecos school (Tarn-et-Garonne, France) for a set of telework-related designs used on telephone cards in several European countries.

This year the awards attracted a very strong bodies of entries from public authorities and government bodies. From the eleven submitted, the three entries shortlisted were the Telearbeit im Mittelstand initiative aimed at promoting telework to smaller enterprises and run jointly by the German federal government and Deutsche Telekom, the use of flexible working undertaken by Surrey County Council (UK) and the Fueva project operating in the Spanish region of Castilla y Leon.

As befitting a competition celebrating innovative use of technology, the voting for the European Telework Awards was itself innovative. The entries were carefully considered by a small team of telework experts but their votes were balanced by votes cast in advance of the ceremony by visitors to the Telework Awards web site, and by the audience at the ceremony itself.

The winners were Telecom Italia Mobile (best contribution to European competitiveness), BT (best advertising campaign), KITE (most entrepreneurial use of telework), CSELT (most innovative use of technology), Fueva (best public initiative), THINK (best contribution to European sustainability) and Teleworker magazine (best single article or programme).

The European Telework Awards were a highlight of this year's European Telework Week, which included events and activities across the European Union. Peter Johnson of the European Commission DG XIII put these events into a wider context when he reminded the Awards ceremony audience that the EU's forthcoming Fifth Framework Programme for research and technological development will include further opportunities to explore the economic growth and job creation possibilities of the information society. "We have an exciting opportunity for Europe to become the world's showcase," Mr Johnson said.

This page was last updated on May 13, 1999

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