At first glance, the benefits seem considerable for all concerned. Companies gain the flexibility to put together teams of skilled workers irrespective of the geographical locations of individual members. Organisations with multiple offices can make best use of workers' skills across the disparate locations. With a proportion of home-based workers, companies can save on overheads such as office space and electricity bills. Better still, if they use virtual contract workers, they can bring in people to work on projects on an 'as needed' basis.
Workers gain more autonomy over how and where they work.
Contractors can work simultaneously on different projects for different teams, irrespective of the geographical locations of their various employers. If it was really that one-sided, we'd all be doing it. In truth, virtual teamworking is only possible for those in the knowledge-based industries, particularly those on the technical side of IT and networking. Here, virtual working technologies are all-pervasive and many workers are quite happy sitting in front of a screen all day, with only email and IRC chat to keep them company. Even then, many employees still prefer to work in an office.