Good article but the author recently just started working from an office so everything is new and interesting. He should do a follow up after six months.
I think this article illustrates the importance of having a good routine while working at home. The author would just roll out of bed and get to work. It is important to do things in the morning that you would normally do if you were going to work. Also, it sounds like he just worked till nightfall and had no life. While working at home, I make sure to get out of the house in the evening and usually do social activities at least a few times a week. This helps as I don't like socialising at work when I am working in an office.
He went from massive overtime (75-100 hours/week?) to a lot less (50 hours/week?) and got a substantial productivity improvement - same output at half the time spent.
We switched to a 3-days-in-office, 2 days work from home schedule and that's turned out to be a big boon to productivity.
At the moment I'm working for myself again and decided to go the co-working route and I'm loving it. Home, coffee shop or office depending on the day. I also like to work weird hours, so having 24 hr access to an office comes in handy when I want to work from 10pm to 7am on a Tuesday.
Just before our exit, we ran our company from a condo. Here are some pictures under 'Environment'[2]. One major upside for us working in residential space was the cost. Electricity, rent/condo fees, parking, and internet fees are all less expensive than commercial rates. As well owning residential space is far less expensive than owning commercial space.
[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=972838 [2] http://www.igeejo.com/blog/default/photos
I work at an office now, but I basically look at it as a time to socialize. For getting Real Work done, I still prefer my desk in my bedroom. (But actually, my desk in the office is quite nice too... when everyone else is working from home.)
* makes the worst case performance improve
* makes the average a little bit better by virtue of that
* and does not impact (or even worsens) the best case.
