Patent Hoteling Program Is Succeeding as a Business Strategy. United States Patent and Trademark Office

摘要

The U.S. Patent and Trade-mark Office (USPTO) offers a variety of telework options for its employees-from 1 to 5 days a week. The largest of these is the Patent Hoteling Program (PHP), where employees work from home at least 4 days a week and reserve office space for when they need to be present at USPTO. At the end of fiscal year 2011, more than 2,600 patent examiners were participating in PHP. Goals of PHP include reducing space and cost requirements while improving employee retention and job satisfaction. PHP is considered one of the leading government telework programs, yet no comprehensive and independent review of the program's costs and benefits has ever been com-pleted. Because, by law, participation in telework programs should not result in diminished federal employee performance, we specifically looked at the productivity of PHP participants. Also, because USPTO's management challenges include addressing the backlog of about 700,000 patent applications, we sought to determine if PHP can help reduce this backlog in a cost-effective way.