Dave Ditges // July 18, 2011

Talk about a mobile office

The passenger seat of a car is not your typical office, but then again, nGen Works in not your typical company.

Last month, my wife and I decided to pack up and move out of our home in Jacksonville, Florida to Washington state to spend some time with family. It’s not every day that people can pack up and move at the drop of a hat, but our jobs and lives are flexible enough to allow that. We jumped on the unique opportunity to do a cross-country move (and road trip), and ran with it. In one week, we donated car loads of living essentials to a shelter, sold furniture and a car on craigslist, and gave away things to others who needed them. Whatever was left got stuffed into the car and headed out west with us.

One of the necessary ingredients in this master cross-country plan was the fact that I’d be working every day. I would have to figure out how to work wherever we happened to be; in a hotel, with friends staying in houses, the car, or using my own lap as a desk. nGen gave our trip the thumbs-up and the adventure began. I knew it would be challenging at times, but it offered great possibilities as well.

We began our road trip on the weekend so I had a little time to enjoy the drive without thinking about how I was going to work five to seven hours a day in a cramped front seat with little arm or leg room. It wasn’t long before Monday rolled around and I had to make my way ‘into the office’. At this initial stage, I had to play a mental game with myself, assuring myself that I could really work from the road…

“I’m not going to have internet.”

“The tethering plan just isn’t going to work.”

These were thoughts that rattled through my head as I looked out the windows at the green, rolling back hills of Virginia. I clenched my teeth, opened my computer, and to my surprise, I had a great 3G signal the entire day.

Crazy, I know.

I was able to check in on Basecamp, ‘talk’ with coworkers, and stay up-to-date with all my projects. Not only was I able to work on the computer, but I was also able to open up my new sketch pad and do some wireframing as well.

The working days got even easier. We planned out times to meet friends and I would escape to another room while my wife would chat it up. I had everything I needed. I could easily access internet, use my tethering, make client phone calls (as soon as I knew which time zone I was in), I had a desk to spread out on, and the peace and quiet that allowed my brain to focus solely on the projects I had to finish. I found it easy to enter my ‘work zone’. I cranked away on projects with the time I had carved out to complete them. My wife was happy, too. She got to sit and talk for hours with people she hadn’t seen in years without me sitting there, constantly checking my phone and not joining in the conversation. It worked out great for everyone.

When we started our road trip I thought it might take us about seven days to get to Washington. Heck, Google mapped the trip at three days solid with no sleeping, so seven days seemed totally doable. By day five we had just started to head west through West Virginia and Kentucky, so it began to look more like a two-week trip.

I wasn’t too upset.

My mobile office was working out great. Plus, we got to stop at every Harley Davidson store we passed by, head over to Marshall University just so we could say, “WE ARE”, and eat at Stewarts Original Hot Dogs. One of the oldest, most famous hot dog joints in Virginia.

The toughest part of the trip was the drive through Kansas, Colorado, and Wyoming. Long 10 hour days of driving meant I had to sit there with my headphones on, a shirt hanging in the window to block the sun, and my laptop burning up my legs. I won’t even mention the crazy thunderstorms we had to drive through. The beautiful, snow-covered mountains of Montana were a welcomed sight for this Florida boy.

As we broke through the storm into Washington, it was bittersweet: our long road trip was coming to an end. It seemed only fitting that we arrived at our final destination, Bellingham, WA (30 minutes south of the Canadian border) at 11:30 pm, seeing that we left Jacksonville at 11:30pm eleven days earlier.

By the end of our road trip across the US of A we had:

• Driven over 4,500 miles
• Stopped 12 times to see family and friends
• Added four new tires to the car
• Driven through 13 different states
• Worked 50+ hours from the car and friend’s houses
• Stayed in hotels only three of our 11 nights
• Visited 4 different Harley Davidson stores (we buy a shirt ever time we pass a store)

Not many jobs allow you the flexibility to take a road trip across the United States and be on the clock at the same time. To quote our fearless leader, Carl Smith, “If you can make it work, go for it.” That’s just another way nGen Works is so very different from the rest.

It’s a great company to work for. Not surprisingly, lots of other people agreed when I’d tell them I have a job that allows me to work from the road and travel across the country. Eleven days on the road without missing a day of work.

What an adventure…

One I just might like to try again.

Google Maps steered us wrong only once.

Beautiful Montana mountains and my beautiful wife.

No road trip is complete without some sort of car trouble.