Katy Leakey rises early in the morning, has breakfast with her husband, Philip, and heads to the 12-foot-by-12-foot office where she spends much of her workday.
Like many other entrepreneurs, she keeps her jewelry and home accessories business running smoothly by checking in with customers and distributors through phone calls, e-mail and the VoIP service Skype.
Unlike many entrepreneurs, she works out of a tent in Kenya.
Katy and Philip Leakey, son of the famous archaeologists Louis and Mary Leakey, hire rural Kenyans to create the eco-friendly products that make up The Leakey Collection. The couple, who live among the Maasai people in the Kenyan bush, sell the goods online and in U.S. retail stores. They reinvest a portion of revenue on local projects such as building roads and schools.
Kathy Levinson’s office environment is vastly different. The real estate agent works in a 10-foot-by-12-foot refurbished storage closet in the basement of her Port Washington, N.Y., home. She made the windowless office cozy by adding carpet, fresh paint and soft lighting.
Leakey and Levinson are part of a surging group: business owners who work from home or in remote or mobile offices. Nearly 9 percent of all North American adults operate a business out of a home, according to Forrester Research. And the number of people who work remotely will continually increase worldwide, according to research firm IDC.
Many factors will contribute to the continued growth of remote working. They include technological advances, workers’ urges for more life/work balance and the desires of retiring Baby Boomers and older adults to keep working for personal and financial reasons.
Folks in their 60s, 70s and 80s “have 35 or more years (of life) to enjoy and pay for, but not everyone wants to be a greeter at Walmart,” says Joanne Pratt, a futurist and researcher who has studied the…