Editing Remote work (section)

===Distributed versus collocated teams===
There are two types of work that explain the geographical distance between coworkers/collaborators. '''Collocated work''' is the case in which team members are at the same location. '''Distributed work''' is the term used to explain team members who are not in the same physical location when working on a project. There are many differences, similarities, benefits, and obstacles between these two types of work. In order to distinguish between collocated and distributed work, it is necessary to go into more detail.

Collocated work is the case in which the team members are at the same physical location. This may be temporary due to travel to a common location or permanent because all collaborators of the group are at the common work site. Same location means that the coworkers can get to each other's workspaces with a short walk and communicate via face-to-face interactions. Also, during meetings or small group meetings, a major advantage of collocated work is that individuals are able to move from one meeting to another, simply by overhearing a conversation, seeing what someone is working on, and being aware of how long they had worked on it with or without progress. In addition, during these meetings, coworkers can observe someone's reaction by being able to see his/her gesture or glance. This allows for one to make sure that the group has common ground prior to moving on. Also, coworkers have access to common spaces for group interactions and have mutual access to significant shared information. In a study, researchers observed an individual describe something by drawing with his hands in the air. Later, someone referred to “that idea” by pointing to the spot in the air where the first person had "drawn his idea".

Opposite of collocated work, distributed work is the case in which team members are not physically in the same location. Thus, they are forced to use different methods of technology to communicate to make progress on the project/problem they are working on. Today, the technology distributed work groups use to communicate is constantly changing because of rapid changes and because different groups have varying access to technology. {{harvp|Olson|Olson|2000}} describe the options of communication today which include:
* Telephony in its current incarnation
* Meeting room video conferencing
* Desktop video and audio conferencing
* Chat rooms for text interactions
* File transfer
* Application sharing
* Some very primitive virtual reality options

Distributed work can be very successful, if the company or group displays technology readiness. Some of the benefits of distributed work include:
* Simultaneous access to real-time data from instruments around the world, allowing coworkers to talk while something is happening
* Cost reduction – both for the employee and the employer. While the company experience sales costs on supplies, office space rental, etc., the remote worker has the same benefit on reducing their own cost on things like meals, fuel and car maintenance.
* [[Microsoft NetMeeting]] has been a success. People who had previously driven long distances to attend a meeting in their area began attending from their offices. These individuals chose to forego the time and stress of travel in favor of remote participation
* Ongoing work – 1,000 software engineers working on the project in four sites. Has allowed numerous people at various different sites to stay in contact over email video and audio conferencing, transferred files and fax. If everyone understands the structure of the collaborative work and knows his or her role, distributed work can be a success.

Distributed work is far from perfect and there are many failures, some of which include:
* Complaints about the quality of communication over audio and video conferencing
* Hard to detect a person's motivation when you are not in the office. For example, if someone had a tough meeting you do not know this and therefore will not know that it is not the right time to send a lengthy, stern email. One important feature of collocation that is missing in remote work is awareness of the state of one's coworkers, both their presence-absence and their mental state.

Overall, people who have little common ground benefit significantly from having a video channel.<ref name="Distributed Work"/>