For those of you Elsewhere (not to be confused with YG’s mantra of Anywhere), the Boston area was hit overnight by a March (in like a Lion) Nor’easter, dumping 8+ inches, with the heaviest stuff coinciding with the morning rush. Canton Public Schools informed us last night that my daughter would have a snow day, ensuring that at least one parent would be working from home.

Being an enterprise mobility guy myself, and of course always having my analyst hat on, this got me thinking about how mobile technologies have allowed enterprises to become Anywhere and claw back some previously unproductive time from Mother Nature. I’m sure many executives and HR departments had to make the decision this morning: are we open or closed? Do we tell workers to come in, stay home, or use their own judgment? This probably occurs far less than say 10 years ago, because of the increasing flexibility of knowledge workers to work from any location. Home broadband, Wifi, 3G, VPNs, IM, mobile email, VoIP, all allow us to create a semblance of the office in our homes, if we ourselves, or our companies, have invested in these various technologies.  Technology itself cannot prevent people from goofing off, but at least the tools are available.

As for Yankee Group, no email or voice mail went out. It was business as usual and employees were left to make their own decisions. But, of course, being so forward looking, YG is more Anywhere than others. Conference calls and meetings went on as planned, with some hearty souls making it into less crowded conference rooms and others perhaps dialing in comfy from their dens with a cup of hot cocoa (and in their PJs?).  As for me, I emailed my boss this morning to tell him I’d be working at home; not because I fall into the non-hearty category, believe me, but a midday doctor appointment threw another variable into the mix (I composed most of this on my BlackBerry from the waiting room, FYI). My boss probably could have cared less since he was in Paris at an event, a fact I had forgotten until I saw his status update on Facebook (consumerization is a topic for another blog post).

Snow days are certainly another thing for businesses to consider when thinking about the Anywhere worker and the tools and technologies to support them. Can we measure the productivity benefits of snow day working? I’m sure a talented analyst could use some historical weather data to build a complex model and provide us with some answers. And the Old Farmers Almanac might be a good source to build a forecast. But beyond snow days, this got me thinking about business continuity. Surely New Englanders can handle a heap of snow (we can, can’t we?). But what about more serious events that threaten business continuity – natural disasters, 9/11-like terrorist events. After Sept 11, there was a tremendous amount of discussion about business continuity. Are there plans in place?

So for those warming up to the fire after shoveling out or just watching (and perhaps enjoying) our misery on the Weather Channel from a warmer and drier place, its time to start pulling together those Anywhere plans. That means mobile and remote working technologies, a primer which can be found in our May 2008 Report, Enterprise Guide to the Strategic Mobile Knowledge Worker. Now that it’s after 5pm it’s ok to go out and make a snowman.