Jayme Pendergraft >> Good afternoon and welcome to today's webinar, “Working from Home with Ticket to Work.” My name is Jayme Pendergraft and I'm a member of the Ticket to Work program manager. Thank you for joining us today to learn about Social Security's Ticket to Work program and how your employment team can support your work from home goals. Working from home has become more and more of an option recently, and though there's some data saying that's changing, it can still be a good option for you. Each of us is on our own journey and we hope you can get some information today that will help you on your path to employment. Let's get started by reviewing some of the functions of the webinar platform so you can interact and get the most information out of today's presentation. 

First, please know that all attendees will be muted throughout today's webinar. When asked how do you want to join the meeting's audio, please select the system default option. This will enable the sound to be broadcast through your computer. Be sure your speakers are turned on and your headphones are plugged in, in order to hear the webinar. If you don't have sound capabilities on your computer or prefer to listen by phone, select the connect with phone audio button on the previous slide and the dial-in option. Dial 1-800-832-0736 and then enter the access code 418-9148, pound sign. You can also use the join meeting audio via receive a phone call as shown in the image on the screen and entering the phone number where you would like to receive a call. Now let's review the Adobe Connect platform. 

First, you'll notice different boxes on your screen. These boxes are called pods. We have the presentation pod and this is where the slide deck appears. That's the largest portion of your screen. Below that is an open space for the placement of the closed captioning pod. The top right corner is the Q&A pod. Below that is the Web links pod. We'll talk about those pods in more detail shortly, but first we'd like to discuss accessibility. Real-time captioning is available and is displayed in the captioning pod, which can be placed below the slides. You can show or hide the captioning display and can also choose the text size and text color combinations to best meet your vision preferences. To open closed captioning, select the CC option from the top menu bar. The captioning link can also be accessed in the Web links pod under the title Web Captioning. You can also access captioning online in a separate viewing window. The choice is up to you and your preferences.

If you're fluent in American Sign Language, or ASL, and would like support during today's webinar, we developed a resource that provides instructions on how to connect with an interpreter through the Federal Communications Commission, or the FCC, Video Relay Service, or VRS. The ASL user guide can be found in the Web links pod under the title ASL User's Guide. We will have a couple of questions and answers sessions today, and we are of course here to answer your questions that you may have about the Ticket to Work program. Please send questions to us anytime through the webinar by typing them into the Q&A pod. If you're listening by phone and are not logged into the webinar, you may also ask questions by emailing them to webinars@choosework.ssa.gov. We will then direct the questions to our speaker during the Q&A portions of our webinar. We'll address questions at a couple different points during the presentation. Please keep in mind that we cannot answer personal questions during this webinar, but we'll provide you with some alternatives about how to get help throughout the course of the presentation. Another available resource that we hope you find very useful is the Web links pod. This pod is in the bottom right of your screen and lists the links to the resources covered in today's webinar. To access these resources, please select the topic of interest and access the resource to learn more. If you're listening by phone and are not logged into the webinar, you may email webinars@choosework.ssa.gov for a list of available resources. Or you may reference your confirmation email for today's webinar to access a list of available resources. Also, please note that Social Security cannot guarantee and is not responsible for the accessibility of external websites. 

Today's webinar is being recorded, and a copy of it will be available within two weeks on the ChooseWork website at http://bit.ly/wise/ondemand. This link, as well as others, can be found in that Web links pod I just mentioned, which is at the bottom right corner of your screen, and it's titled WISE Webinar Archives. In addition to today's webinar, you can also view previous recordings of webinars that we've conducted throughout the year. If you experience any technical difficulties, which we hope you do not, you can send an email to webinars@choosework.ssa.gov or put a question in the Q&A pod, and we'll do our best to help you figure out what's going on. 
As I mentioned, I'm Jayme Pendergraft, and I am the moderator today. I'm also joined by Ray Cebula, our presenter. Ray received his law degree from the University of New Hampshire's Franklin Pierce School of Law. Ray has now spent 23 years providing legal services to individuals with disabilities and their interactions with Social Security. He then became part of Cornell University's Work Incentive Support Center. In 2005, he joined the staff of Cornell's Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability. Ray now serves as the program director of YTI Online, which is Cornell's Work Incentives Practitioner Credentialing Program. Please remember to submit your questions for Ray throughout his remarks. Again, we'll be stopping a couple times to engage with your questions and provide you those answers. But remember, don't make them too personal, as we can't answer those during today's webinar. And with that, it's now my pleasure to hand the presentation over to Ray.

Ray >> Thank you, Jayme. I just wanted to start by saying I have happily worked at home now for 20 years, and it's one of the best things that ever happened to me. So working at home does have its benefits, and it may have some drawbacks, although I've not really experienced them, I have just heard about them. All right, so we're going to talk about lots of stuff today. We've got to go over some basics, like we always do, and we're going to talk about what is this Ticket to Work program that Jayme's mentioning, and how does that work? And then why consider it working from home? It can vary from all kinds of reasons, a personal preference, something that would accommodate a disability more than traveling to an office, and we'll get into that much deeper when we get to those slides. Is a work from home job right for you? Yeah, I found out that it was. I had no idea, but I did find out that it was the right thing for me. And hopefully today we can help you answer that question for you, and some various tips for working at home. How do you do things when you're at home? It is setting things up differently. Your workspace is different. You know, what's going on around you is very different, and again, lots of things to consider in how you will fit into that work from home world. 

So what is Social Security's Ticket to Work program? The Ticket to Work program is actually a very fine program to provide you with services that you may need to return to work. It varies from anything from education and training or to making a decision about working from home. Notice on this slide, it's free and voluntary. There is no charge to you, and any assistance that you receive from an Employment Network or from a benefits planner will be done at no cost to you. And we can offer career development for people who are aged 18 through 64 and receive a Social Security disability-based benefit, either SSDI, SSI, Childhood Disability Benefits, or Disabled Widow Benefits. 

So let's talk about two of those big programs. SSDI is Supplemental -- that's the first mistake today. SSDI is Social Security Disability Insurance, and it is what it says. It's insurance. When you're working and you're paying FICA taxes, you're buying into that system. And after you've worked for a period of time, you will become insured. That Childhood Disability Program and Disabled Widows Program that I mentioned are also treated the same way as SSDI when you go to work. So for short, we call it SSDI, but we mean all three of those programs. And then we look at the SSI program. Social Security Income Program is a needs-based program that does not require a work history. Yet it is, again, provided to people who have a disability and are unable to work, whether they've worked in the past or have not worked long enough to become insured for the insurance program. 

So when you have these benefits, and sometimes it takes a long time to get them, why choose work? There are lots of reasons, but right now we have to look at the assumption that everybody on this call who wants to return to work has a disability. And earning a living, making ends meet through employment is not something that everybody can do. But it may be right for you. At the very least, we can supplement the benefits that we have and make ourselves financially better off. Once people understand that many free services and supports that are available to them through the Ticket to Work, they often find that the risks of losing benefits outweighs the rewards or is outweighed by the rewards that come to you through the Ticket to Work Act and through employment. I always like to tell people when I'm counseling them, what do you want to do? And people look at me not understanding what I meant, but what do you want to do? Do you want to go out with friends after work? Do you want to go out Friday night and have dinner and some drinks with friends? Can you do that now? Well, through employment, that's one of the very small things that you'll have a choice about, and you can do that should you want to. 

Now how can the Ticket to Work program help? I think you have to understand the Ticket to Work program is fairly limitless. You can do just about anything you want. But we're going to help you connect with free employment services to help you decide if work, including self-employment and home work, is right for you. Preparation for work, you know, I like to use the example of a computer person, somebody who is programming computers. If you did that and have been out on disability for five or six years, you may need some more training to update your skill set before you can go to work. We can help you get that. If you want a certificate, if you want to become a plumber, we can help you do that. Find paid work opportunities. The Employment Networks that we'll talk about at some point today are great at finding the local businesses that are hiring and knowing what types of jobs and sometimes whether that particular employer is a good match for a person with a disability. And once we find you a job, we're not done. We're not done. We want to work with you until you succeed. Basically, we want to work with you until you tell us to go away, that you've got it. We want you to be a success at work. So you can learn more about these topics in What is Social Security's Ticket to Work, a self-guided tutorial in the Web links pod. 

Who can help you achieve your work goals? As you think about returning to work and possibly changing careers, you may have lots of questions and you may need lots of support. And that support can come from many places. It can come from family members, from friends, or from the providers under the Ticket to Work. So connecting with the Ticket to Work program service provider can help you develop achievable goals and establish steps to find and maintain employment in your new career. And notice we're not really looking to get you a job. We want this to turn into a career. And that's our goal for you. The Ticket program service providers can even help you identify the types of careers you might enjoy and any transferable skills that you may have. Even if we look at an SSI recipient who may not have a work history that's ensuring them or spotty work histories, and they haven't worked for a while, we can talk to you. Find out what you enjoy. It's amazing how many times I've taken hobbies and found people jobs that will fit in with their hobby, something they love to do. And that's another goal for us. We want you to have the job that you want and enjoy. And transferable skills, even if you haven't been working, there are many skills you may have developed while you've been at home. And we want to see if you can take those skills and put them to work. So the providers, the service providers that we're talking about here, through the Ticket program, you'll have access to a variety of Ticket program service providers, including Employment Networks, we call them ENs, or the state VR agency. Every state has one. Some have a separate agency that serves low-vision and blind folks. Doesn't matter which one you call, you'll get to the right one. And the Employment Networks are numerous and vastly different. 
So you're going to be shopping for an Employment Network. Does that Employment Network serve people like you? If you have a mental impairment and I'm an EN who only serves people with physical impairments, we're not going to be a good match. But we can call specific ENs that do work with folks like you. And again, the Employment Networks are private or public organizations that have an agreement with Social Security to support your employment efforts. And for people who are eligible for that ticket, remember we said age 18 through 64. Many state public Workforce systems, such as American job centers, they used to be called one-stop shops, are Workforce ENs. So that's a great place, too. If you're looking to build a resume, you can go in there and borrow a computer, start looking at other resumes and try to build your own. They'll provide you with some assistance. And then you can also use their job ads to start looking for a particular job or to make contact with an EN who you may want to work with. 

How can working with an EN help? Well, the services and supports from that particular EN are there to help you on the path to financial independence through work and might include identifying your work goals, write and review a resume, prepare for interviews, request a reasonable accommodation, or receive benefits counseling. All of those things are going to be part of what most of the Employment Networks can do. And they're all very valuable, particularly if you're writing a resume. I've been working the same job for 25 years. If I needed a resume, my guess is they don't look the same as the one that I gave to Cornell 25 years ago. I'm going to need some help. How about preparing for interviews? Very important that you have questions to ask the employer. They always end, now, do you have questions for us? And if you don't, it could leave a big vacant spot in your prospective employer's mind. But if you do, it shows that you're interested in this business, that you've done a little research to find out how things work. And benefits planning is one of those things just about everybody who's returning to work needs. I'm going to talk about that, too. 

So the state VR agency, who is -- can serve also -- as an Employment Network, provides a variety of services, a wide variety of services to people with disabilities who want to work, enter new lines of work, or enter the workforce for the first time. So we're looking at things from every angle here. The state VR agency may also offer benefits counseling and may also be able to help you with Vocational Rehabilitation, training, and education. If you need Vocational Rehabilitation to recover from an injury, or if you need to learn how to use a prosthetic device as a result of an injury, that's where you're going to get your services. You're going to go to VR to get your physicality and your mental state work-ready. Then the training and the education comes in if you need that to get into the workforce. 

How can working with a VR help you? Usually, VR handles cases where people have the need for more significant services. I just mentioned a couple of them. If it's a Vocational Rehabilitation that you need, you're going to likely end up with the state VR agency. If it's something that's very expensive, if you need a prosthetic device, let alone learn how to use one, it's VR that's going to help you with that. If you need a computer to do your job, it's VR. In some states, this includes intensive training, education, and rehabilitation. I've known many people who have gotten their bachelor’s degree and their associate degrees through vocational rehabilitation. And VR may also provide career counseling and job placement. The counseling is important if you're not exactly sure what job you want. Talking to somebody about it is a great help so that we can get you a job that you want. Remember, it may not be the job, but it's something on the stepping stones to that vocational goal. Especially when I'm working with young people, they want to be a doctor tomorrow. It's like, you can't be a doctor tomorrow. We've all had experiences flipping burgers and doing other things that we never want to go back to before we get to that dream job. 

All right. So how do you find these people? It's really easy. You get on to the Find Help page on the computer. If you have a computer, if you've got a phone, you can do it that way, too. But the first thing you might want to do, no obligations, give a call to the Ticket to Work helpline at 1-866-968-7842. If you're using a TTY, 1-866-833-2967. From Monday to Friday, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Eastern Time. And when you do get to the Find Help page, and there's a link in your Web links pod, you can search for these providers. You can search for a benefits planner, an Employment Network, or your state VR agency by zip code, by the services they offer, by the disability type that they usually work with, languages that are available besides English, and what type are they. If you're looking for an EN, you don't want to pull up everything. So you click the box that says EN, and your search is limited to those folks. And you can further limit those searches once you get into it. And I'm in there an awful lot, finding contacts and finding websites that people can use during their journey to work. Great page. 

Now, the Ticket to Work helpline is toll free, and they're there to answer your questions and support you on the journey to financial independence. Now, this could be the first call you make. The Ticket to Work program is a great program, because everything I've mentioned, every agency I've mentioned, could be your first call. And you're right by calling any one of them, because we'll all get you to the person that should be providing you with services today. And if you want to talk to anybody, again, without any obligations, the Ticket to Work Help line can answer some tickets. Do you have a ticket? Lots of people aren't sure. Call them. They will be happy to tell you if you do have a ticket and if it's been used. Okay. So that, again, the Ticket to Work helpline, Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Eastern Time, 1-866-968-7842. And for TTY users, 1-866-833-2967. All right, Jayme, we're at the first Q&A session.

Jayme Pendergraft >> Great. Thank you so much for all that information. Hang on one second. I have a bit of an echo here. Let's give that a try. Do we still hear an echo out there? All right. I think I'm good if one of my team members could just let me know. So this is Jayme again. And Ray, we do want to start off by asking you again, just can you tell us who is eligible for the Ticket to Work?

Ray >> Whoops. I muted myself. Thank you. I muted myself, hoping it would help with that echo. The Ticket to Work program is available to anybody who is age 18 through age 64. Now, there's a little catch with the younger folks. If you are age 18, you must have been determined to be a disabled adult. Because if you're receiving them younger than 18, you're a disabled child. And that adult decision is based on your ability to work. So they have to go through a review to become disabled adults. And you can go through age 64. There is nothing -- I believe the Ticket to Work documents are still being sent out to people periodically. There is nothing that says you have to do this. If you decide this isn't for you right now, you can wait with no impact on your benefits and your current status. So, again, age 18 through 64, and you have a disability cash benefit. Some of you who may be working now may not have a cash benefit. So if you don't have that cash, you're not going to be able to use a ticket.

Jayme >> It's Jayme again. Thank you so much. I'm going to go ahead and mute you while you're not talking. So that actually leads me straight into my next question. And that's, do I have to use the Ticket to Work program? Or can I find a job of my own and just apply for it? Why should I use Ticket to Work?

Ray >> Excuse me. You don't have to use the ticket at all. As I said earlier, it's voluntary. And it's up to you. You can most certainly find a job on your own. But what I would like you to think about is just using some of the services that are available to you, particularly benefits planning. Because, you know, if you work with a benefits planner about this job that you're about to take or that you've just taken, you'll learn how that new income is going to affect both your cash and health care benefits as well as any other benefit that you have. And knowing when something's going to happen is a good thing. But, no, you can get your job. You can find your own job and go to work. And even if you do go to work on your own and you find you need extra support, then you can start searching for an Employment Network to help you out so that you can stay at that job.

Jayme >> Thanks so much, Ray. Thanks for muting him in the background there. My follow-on question is we have some folks in the audience, they have never worked before. Is the Ticket to Work program a good option for them?

Ray >> Jayme, the Ticket to Work is a great option for them because, again, that's the particular population that might have no idea what they can do or what they want to do because they've had no exposure to the workforce. And, you know, just sitting down and talking, you know, again with a benefits planner, with the VR agency, or with an Employment Network to see what's going to happen if you go to work. You know, will you have more money? Usually that's the case. Even if you lose your cash benefits, you will have more money. But what happens to some of your other benefits? What happens to your benefits if you go to work, lose them, and need them back? You should have all of that information. And then the real basic questions, what can you do? What do you enjoy doing? You know, even if we've never worked, we all enjoy doing something, and it's amazing how often that can be turned into a job. So I think, yeah, the Ticket's a good place for you to start.

Jayme >> Absolutely. Thank you, Ray. And along those lines, we have some folks out there wondering if the Ticket program provides any support for training or educational opportunities.

Ray >> Yep, absolutely. You know, if you need a four-year degree because you want to become a teacher, you're likely going to get that type of service through the VR agency. You know, they are the big player. They have the most funding. If you're looking to get through a certificate program, an EN can help you do that. An EN can help you go to school, you know, but they're going to help you get loans and help you get grants and things like that. VR will pay the tuition for you. So it depends on what you need, but education, any kind of training. You know, we're in this period of time right now where everybody is questioning whether you need a college education to make a living, and I've got to tell you, you know, that's just wrong. I had a plumber come to the house the other day, and for that hour he was here, I paid him a whole ton of money. So never forget the trades. Never forget it, whether it's plumbing, whether it's an electrician, whether it's hanging wallboard in a construction site. You know, those are all good and fine-paying jobs.

Jayme >> Definitely. Thank you, Ray. And for anyone who does want to look into that type of position more, we have some great resources on apprenticeships on the Choose Work website. So if you head to choosework.ssa.gov and give a search for apprenticeship, that'll give you some good resources. And then, of course, apprenticeship.gov is another really wonderful resource to get in on the trade field. So, Ray, you were talking about VR and ENs, and we have somebody wondering if they can work with both.

Ray >> You know, you can't work with both at the same time, but there is this part of the Ticket to Work that's called Partnership Plus, and it allows you to go to VR to get your vocational training and your rehabilitation and to get an education if you need it. And then once the VR agency closes your Ticket to Work, you can take it to an Employment Network and use it there for on-the-job supports for help getting a different job if you need one or you prefer to work at home and need to ask those very questions. But yeah, you can use them both in tandem but not at the same time.

Jayme >> It's Jayme, and now for our last question of this round of Q&A. Ray, can you tell us a little bit about the overall goal of the Ticket to Work program? What do we want to get out of it?

Ray >> You know, the goal of the Ticket to Work program is to really work yourself off of benefits. It's to provide you with enough money through work so that you don't need to be tied down to the Social Security agency, to the SNAP agency, you know, to the Housing Authority, so that you can become financially independent. And as I said, if you do see a benefits planner, they're going to pretty much put a plan together that's going to make sure that you will have more money as these benefits begin to drop away. There's a lot of choice that I have because I'm not on benefits that you might not have. What about going on a vacation? I can do that. What about saving money? I can do that. Now that we have ABLE accounts, you can potentially do that too. But maybe I have more resources so that I can save. Lots of things are going to be improved financially by returning to work. And I can tell you after doing this, I've been working with people with disabilities on benefits for 43 years now, the only way you're going to get out of poverty is to begin working. We want that for you. We want you to make up your own mind if you want to go to the shopping mall and buy a new pair of shoes. If you want to stop for dinner and stop for takeout on the way home because you've had it, you can do that. We want the same choices for you that we all have.

Jayme >> It's Jayme. Thank you again, Ray. And if folks in this webinar would like to learn more about that overarching goal of Ticket, which is to reduce and eventually eliminate your reliance on benefits, take a look at our WISE on demand page and visit the June webinar, which is a really deep dive into how working will affect your benefits. And you can access that hopefully after today's webinar by using web link number seven or visiting choosework.ssa.gov. And with that, Ray, I'm going to hand it back over to you to get to the real substance of today's topic and talk some about working from home. So take it away.

Ray >> Okay, thank you. All right. So why consider working from home? You know, there are lots of reasons. There are probably as many reasons as we have people with us today. We've got a bunch of people here with us today. Special transportation. Is specialized transportation available where you live to get you to work on time and to pick you up from work on time? Do you need a reasonable accommodation? You know, maybe an anxiety disorder is making you not produce at work because there's too much activity going on around you. Working at home would make you more productive. That's a good reasonable accommodation that you can request from your employer. To manage your medical needs, if you need to take medication at a specific time where you have something at home that has to be injected, maybe it's not a good idea to transport that medication to work and leave it in the lunchroom refrigerator. Maybe you don't want to do that or the doctor's telling you not to do that. Do you need a flexible work schedule? You know, maybe there are times when you need to take a break longer than the break that you normally get. Rather than that 15-minute break, you need to rest. You need to not think. Can you do that on the workplace? Or are you better removing that from the workplace and staying at home? A less stressful environment, absolutely. I can attest to that. There is almost no stress when you are working at home. I have a very luxurious position where I can basically work anytime I want so long as I get things done. The most stress I have is listening to my dogs barking outside while I'm trying to do a webinar, which they're doing right now, if you can't hear them. 

How about different fields of work? Maybe you want to change jobs and the job that you have can be done at home. I'm thinking of medical billing. People that do medical billing often do that at home, you know, often do that at home. If you live in a rural area, how much of a commute is it for you? Is that going to be tough in the winter? Do you have a disorder that is more painful or more troublesome in the middle of the winter? Maybe we want to do that. What kind of transportation do you have if you live in a rural area? I live in a rural part of Santa Fe, New Mexico. There is no bus out here. If I want to get downtown, I have to drive. Maybe your disability prevents you from driving. If you can't get a license, working at home is a good option for you. So again, you can put yourself on any of these little dots on the computer screen and think about your own situation and what might be best for you. Again, the pros and cons. 

Potential for enhanced productivity. The first day I started working at home, I had set aside two and a half hours to get a task completed, and it was done in an hour. When you work at home, people from the other offices don't stop in and say hi, don't ask if you want to run across the street for a cup of coffee or just ask you questions, and you always have interruptions. I believe I am much more productive working at home. Save time and money on commute and wardrobe? Well, that's for sure, and I think everybody learned that if you were working when the pandemic started and you were sent home. I save a whole lot of money on my wardrobe, which was never quite extensive as it should have been anyway, but I don't commute. I can still remember when I was back in Massachusetts, the first day of the month I would have to buy a $350 train pass and a $400 pass to park my car at the train station. That was tough. That was a real tough pay period for me. I don't pay to commute anymore. I walk from my bedroom into my home office. And remote meetings allow more flexibility for teams of all sizes to come together easily and efficiently. My team, I have a faculty member living in Cincinnati, I have a faculty member living in San Diego, and me in Santa Fe. In 10 minutes, I can get everybody together via Zoom or via Adobe Connect or Teams. It's very, very possible for entire teams to work in different places. 

Now, the cons. There are social aspects of going to work in person, in an office. That I do miss it at times. When I do get to campus, I can feel that energy coming from other people. Because the only people I'm meeting here are my puppies. It becomes difficult to separate your home and work life at the beginning, yeah. But I know right now that I can take 20 minutes, go in, set up my Crock-Pot, and dinner will be ready. You get your 15-minute breaks, right? That's when you throw things in the Crock-Pot. And I don't think it's difficult. I have an office that's separate, and I'd recommend that you do that. When I leave my office and shut the door, work is over. And when I'm in here working, I am working. So you can sort of set it up like you're going to work in a place. Having extra space to do that is really, really beneficial. And purchasing supplies for your home office. That can be a con. I'm provided with a laptop and a couple of monitors. I have to provide my own internet. But we have internet at home. So it wasn't that big a deal. It depends on your employer. My employer gives me a credit card so I can buy office supplies and have them shipped here to the home. That might be the case, or otherwise you would be buying paper to use in your copy machine. That you're going to have to balance on whatever your situation is. But I'm telling you, those pros outweigh the cons every day. You know, when I get anxious because things aren't going right, I can go outside and throw the ball around with my dogs. And that will calm me down and I can come back in. And that's fine. So it gives you a whole lot. I think it gives you a lot of freedom once you're into it. If you start doing things on work time that you shouldn't be doing at the beginning, it may become problematic for you. But I'm telling you, once you get into the habit of this is work, that other room is home, you're going to be all set. You're going to be all set. 

All right. So what types of jobs are available? The short answer is there are a lot of jobs that are available. People begin working from home -- in 2020, everybody did. At that point, we had people at Cornell who were completely freaked out. How are we going to teach people without being in a classroom? How are we going to do our jobs if we can't leave the house? And I just sent a note to everybody. If you want to talk about it, I've been doing it for 18 years. And here was 2020, the world shut down. So everybody had to work at home. We learned a lot. The result for Cornell was that many other people who Cornell thought had to be in the office are able to work from home now. So we actually expanded our at-home workforce. And Cornell's watching. You know that. They haven't lost a thing. In fact, they've probably gotten more. And so if you're looking for a work from home job, you have a lot of industries out there to choose from. You're going to have human services, human resources options. If you're a counselor, you're going to have counseling options that you can do from home. You have telemedicine. I can get an appointment for a telemedicine video call with my doctor quicker than I get in to see him. And all of the older jobs that we think about, the telemarketers, the people who are doing medical billing, I know that's been going on for a long time. My sister actually did that. She started as a medical biller at home and eventually ended up running a medical practice. So these jobs that you're talking about can always develop into something. I was a faculty member at Cornell. It took many years before I became the director of the whole project. These jobs also have great advancement opportunities. 

All right. How many people work from home? Here's some statistics. These are 2024 statistics, so they're pretty new. Full-time remote, 13% of the workforce is working at home always. Hybrid, 28%. If people live closer to campus, they may go to campus and work a day a week or two days a week. They don't want me to come to campus two days a week because they have to pay for my transportation and it's too far. And then in-person workers, 59% of people still go to work. If you're working at a shopping mall, working in a retail store, you can't do that from home unless you have your own business, and you could do it from home. But if you're working at Macy's, they're not going to let you sell things from the home department over the net. It just won't work out that way. So the future of job interviews, look at this. Both of the faculty members that I have with me today were hired virtually. Ninety-three percent of people who are going for job interviews are doing them on a computer. That's enormous. Back when I started, I would be flying around. I lived in Iowa for a while, and when I wanted a job and wanted to go home to Massachusetts, I had to fly out for those interviews because this computer stuff just wasn't here. Only 7% are in-person. And most jobs at my institute, at the Yang-Tan Institute at Cornell, are filled remotely. We don't have to pay people to come to campus to do that. If they want to, we certainly can let them, but you don't need to do that. Today, with the cameras that we have, I'm on a headset right now that is giving me some issues because I can't hear right now when Jayme's talking, but I got my captions going. Things are better remote. You can get to know people without taking them out of their home environment. And when I see someone who is talking to me from their home, they're more comfortable. And that's the person that I want to hire, somebody who I can see, who's comfortable. If you go in front of people, you put me in a suit and tie and sit me down at a table with 15 people, part of me is going to be a nervous wreck. That's just the way it is. So for those 7% of the people, I'm sorry. You should have remotes. So don't expect to go into the office that you're going to be working in. Remote companies, 16% of companies operate fully remotely. If you call for help to Amazon, I'm trying to think what else, my bank, you're not calling the bank, you're not calling Amazon. You're calling some service support person who's working out of their homes because sometimes they don't flick the button right and I can hear the kids in the background. So you know they're all at home. That's fine. It works. Hopefully it saves the company more money so that they can pay you more. But the statistics, I think, might have dropped a little, as Jayme said, because the pandemic is over and businesses reopened. But we have proven, the workers have proven to all of the companies out there that working from home can be very successful. 

And here are some other occupations. Teach online classes. Again, I've been doing that for 25 years, teaching online. Conduct data entry. Companies have the need to have data put into their computer systems. That's how they can tell how many shirts to buy, based on the last year's number of shirts they sold. Provide customer service. You know, your computer, I bet you if you have a computer at home and you wanted services, you would probably call Dell or HP, and that person you're talking to is likely to be at their home. Serve as a virtual nurse. Telemedicine is there. And everybody, regardless of what kind of health care you have, can use teleservice. And, you know, if you get a nurse, you're even luckier. I always say it's the nurses and the physician's assistants who do all of the good work for me. They see me when I'm sick. The doctor only sees me when I'm feeling okay and need prescriptions renewed. How about a virtual assistant? I have one. She happens to work on campus. But to me, she's virtual because we're 2,500 miles apart. Or you can become a consultant. You know, every once in a while, I'll have someone call me and they want me to consult. And I have to go through a process to get that approved by Cornell. But I sometimes never see these people. You know, some of it might just be via email. I produce a memo or something, send it back to them, and they pay me for my services. So you can do that, particularly if you've been in your job long enough. These are great jobs. And some of them are paying more money than the salary that you're earning. When I work as a consultant, I'm making a whole lot more money than I am working at Cornell. 

Is a work-from-home job right for you? Now, this is your decision. No one's going to force you into that unless you have to make a choice. You can work at home doing this job. If you want the job, you are going to do that. But right now, we're in a position where we can make the choice. You've got to consider what you're going to do. Are you available? Do you have to be available during a set schedule? You know, I'm supposed to be available Eastern time because that's where Cornell is. I live in Mountain time. And I do start work at 7 o'clock in the morning. That's 9 o'clock eastern time. But you know what that does for me? Not often, but every once in a while at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, I can stop working. And I've got lots of daylight, and I can play with the dogs, I can run some errands, you know, or clean the house. Sometimes those set schedules, if you're in a different time zone, do have their advantages. Do you have home office space that's free of noise and distractions? I think this is critical. You need a place at home that you designate for work. I work in my home office. You know, I don't come in here otherwise. I really don't, you know, because this means work. Free of distractions? Pretty much, you know, pretty much. The dogs are still distractions, but, you know, I wouldn't have the dogs if I didn't work at home. Do I have high-speed, reliable internet access? That was a big thing out here in rural New Mexico. How can I move if I don't have Comcast or one of the other big internet companies? Well, I found an internet company, a little local one that's done very well for the three years that I have been out of range for those big companies. You've got to have it, though. How about computer skills, computer navigation skills? Here's Jayme. I can hear her laughing at me with my computer skills. Yeah, you have to be able to use a computer. You have to be able to do things on one of these machines. But, you know, you're still connected to an employer. When I need computer help, I can reach out and call my IT center or I can just reach out to another person working at home or working on campus to get some help. So you're not going to be independent on that computer. At least I'm not going to be anyway. Do you have a clear-speaking phone, you know, with a headset, or is your computer good enough so that you can have meetings and talk? Yeah, I'm wearing a headset today because Jayme and I discovered that sometimes when I'm on this platform, I can be a little muffled. And so I went out and I bought a headset. It seems to be working. It's working for you guys today. It'll work for me next time. And do you live in a certain state or country? You know, if you remember during the pandemic, if you were paying attention to hotels and airlines and travel and all that stuff, you know, there was a hotel, a Hilton Hotel in Hawaii, who was saying, come on out, if you stay here for a month, we'll give you a room with all these internet stuff free and you can work and we'll reduce the rate. And you have no idea how badly I was thinking about going to Hawaii for a month. And then my boss told me I couldn't. So that's a con. My boss told me where I had to be. And that was too far out of the time zones. But, you know, it was a possibility for some people. You know, people were moving to Europe and working because they have internet. And you can do it. You can do all of this stuff. I have one benefits planner who now lives in New Zealand and she is still providing benefits planning services to people in the United States. Now, that's a stretch. That's the other side of the world. It's night when it's day here. But she gets it done. And her employer has been thrilled with that. So the possibilities are endless. They really, really are. Aside from these basic things that you need, you may be provided with them if you're in an office. But some of it we have to pay for. 

Okay, working from home skills. Skills that are useful. Time management. You've got to do that. You do that in the workplace. But somehow it isn't so important as it is when you're at home. Because home is here, right? And it's very, very easy to say I've got to step away for 10 minutes to start the dishwasher. I have to start the laundry. I've got to get it out of the washing machine and put it in the dryer. But is that interrupting your work and making it take longer? Of course, we're all going to have those few minutes where I finish this task, I need a break, and my break is going to be putting dinner in the Crock-Pot. And that's fine. I bake the Crock-Pot up, I come back, I'm ready to work again. Written communication. You're going to have to get your writing skills up to snuff. Because even though email tends to be very informal, if you're working, your email has to be formal. If you're asking somebody to do something, if you're asking questions, none of these see you with number two. We don't do that. You can do that with your friends on your home email. But at work you need to be a little bit more formal, particularly when you're dealing with clients. You're representing the company. So what comes out of your computer needs to look like that. Motivation. You can get motivation from anything. I'm living in the best place I've ever lived, and when I'm sitting at home, I can look out the window and see the Rocky Mountains and the desert. I have three puppies that are running around. That gives me motivation to work. And aside from the fact that I actually love my job. So you need to find motivation. Something's got to get you out of bed. Something's got to get you up and doing the job. That can be difficult when you're at home, because there are lots of things at home to draw you away. How about organization? You need to be organized too. If I am on a meeting and I'm asked for something, I have to have it within reach. And I need to know where it is, because the meeting's not going to wait 20 minutes for me to find something. Flexibility. That flexibility I think I've developed over time. And now I can get up and make dinner. I can change the laundry. And I know how to do that and do it quick. I know that, okay, I need to get away from this computer now. I just need five minutes. Let's do something productive in the other room. There are times where I just go to the other room and sit and think. That type of flexibility to come in and out of work situations is going to be much, much more helpful at home. And soft skills. Are there any of those that we can help you develop? How do you talk with your employer? 

Let's use reasonable accommodations. I think that's a good one. If you have to ask for an accommodation, do you know how to do that right now? Or do you need to talk to somebody to help improve your ability? That can be nerve-wracking. But maybe somebody can talk to you, make some suggestions, and you won't be too nervous to do it. Or maybe there's somebody out there who can actually help you ask for that if you need that. But lots of those soft skills, including skills interacting with people, from your office. It's tough sometimes. Sometimes if I'm in a bad mood, I'll get an email from somebody and it's like, well, she's in a real bad mood today. And there may be no negative intent. I just read the email because maybe I was in a bad mood. And so we need to learn not to be offended, not to be hostile to people because of what an email said. Maybe it's not what it meant. 

All right, so to prepare for your job searches, before you begin looking for a work from home job, take some time to update your resume. They're different than they were 25 years ago. That's all I can tell you. I'm not at a point in my career where I'm going to update my resume, but you may have to. Think back about your work experience, paid or volunteer. Were you taking training classes? Were you getting an education? Lots of people get concerned, you know, I've been on disability benefits for six years now. What do I tell an employer about that? Well, talking to an Employment Network is going to get you very far. What were you doing? Were you taking training courses? Did you take a community college course? Did you babysit family members' kids while they were working? There are lots of things that you can build to fill in that gap that are going to be very helpful to your ability to get a job. So take an inventory of all the skills that you have, including field-specific training or certificates. Homemaking, there are lots of skills involved in that. Talk about organizing. When you're taking care of a kid all day and you've got to make dinner -- and making dinner, have you developed your cooking skills? That's a skill. And maybe you don't think about it very much, but that skill could be put into a job. How about you use the skills to help you find a job that's good for you? Once you have that list of things that you can do, things that you love to do, maybe that's where you want to look for a job. You know, I don't want to be a chef. I don't want to be on the food network. But, you know, I like breakfast. I do a mean breakfast. So maybe a short order cook at a smaller restaurant would be something that I'd like to do. I've developed that skill. Let's see if I can sell it to somebody. Notify your references. You're going to have to have references from people. It might be a friend. It might be a family member. It might be a former worker. Tell them that you went to an interview, and this company may be calling you. I've had people do it both ways. They tell me, and I'm always grateful for that. But if they don't tell me, I'm caught. It's like a blind side. I'm caught completely unprepared, and don't know what this company is calling me for. And sometimes if I don't know what the company is calling me for, I don't answer the phone. All right, and practice video interviewing skills. Very, very important. Just because I've been on many interviews at times doesn't mean I don't want practice now. I want somebody else, probably a friend with another camera on their computer, to interview me. I want to give my elevator speech to them so that I -- you know, this is the two minutes I've got to tell them about me. Is this sounding good? What questions should I have for this employer? Have you done research? You know, I really think I've made mistakes a lot when I answered that.
 
Do you have any questions from us? When I just said no, I don't, I'm all set. I should have said, you know, my research shows me that you're involved in this, this, and this. If I start in position A, do I have an opportunity to get into spots doing some of those tasks in the other networks that I find interesting? That's a good question. How much flexibility are you going to have? You've got to have those questions too. And be cautious. You know, I mean, it's a sad thing that there are so many scams out there. You know, but people call every day. You know, I get messages on the computer either at work or on my home email that are just bogus. And we've got to watch out for them. If you're looking for a job, these are just red flags that are telling you something's wrong. How about promising you high income for a little work? You know, I had somebody who called about an Amazon job. They could work at home, and all of these things would be delivered to their house with the boxes. And they needed to pay $1,500 up front. Well, you know, that doesn't sound right. Amazon's got facilities where they pack boxes to ship out all the time. They're not going to want me doing it from my house. Nor should you be paying an employer for a job. How about providing unclear or vague descriptions of the job? If anybody can tell you exactly what you're going to be doing and respond to your questions about those duties, it's the employer. And if people can't do it, you've got to let that red flag rise and notice something might be wrong. There's a short or no interview process, you send in your form, and you'll be hired. Well, that sounds wrong to me. Somebody should be wanting to meet you. Again, charging application fees to apply or to do the job after you've been hired. What if I had to pay Amazon to get those products to my home so I could pack them up? Well, that's not right either, so this probably isn't Amazon. And how long has this company been in business? Oh, we just started six months ago. Okay, you know how many businesses open and close real quick. Maybe I don't want a job in a company that doesn't have a long-term existence, because I don't want to be the person who doesn't have a job in another three months. Just watch out and be careful. If it doesn't sound right and doesn't feel right, it's probably not right. 

And you've got to watch your taxes before you accept any employment opportunity. Make sure you understand the tax consequences of that. We know that we're going to be paying certain taxes as an employee, but what do you do about some of the things that you're providing that everybody who works on-site gets free? I learned my tax consequences, and I pay attention. How much of the internet cost coming into my house is for work? And I have a tax deduction for 30% of the internet. That's what I use for work that I have to pay for that nobody else has to pay for. Some job opportunities may not withhold taxes, which really puts you in a position where you might not be an employee. If they say, we're going to give you $3,000 a month and we're not withholding anything, you're going to have to figure out how much you have to pay the federal government and the state government before you start that job. That doesn't mean the situation is bad. It just means that's the way the company does business. And there are two tax documents noted on this screen here. A W-2 form is what you get when you're an employee and taxes are withheld. That's what I get, a W-2 every year that tells me how much I made over the year, how much I paid in various taxes. And a 1099 form is just a little paper that says this agency paid me $3,000. When I do my side work, it's all 1099 work. And they send me a note, $3,000. When I get that check for $3,000, I have to know that I have to pay taxes now and not wait until the end of the year and pay penalties because they're all late. So you've got to understand how that's going to work. And there are people out there who can help you do that. The volunteer income tax assistance programs are fabulous and they can help get you set up if you happen to be a 1099 worker. 

All right, so do you need help finding a job? Check out the Find a Job page. Again, that's the link in your Web links pod. And there's all kinds of resources and information about employment organizations, including those that specifically help people with disabilities. And get your job search started by connecting with a Ticket to Work program provider. Again, it could be VR. It could be an Employment Network. It could be a benefits planner. Any way to start is the right way to start. And Lori's tips from working at home. We have a success story, and I love the success stories. So let's meet Lori. Anxiety made it difficult for Lori to build a career. But with the Ticket to Work program's help, Lori can now comfortably work from home in a job in a public relations marketing or employment options firm. It's a pretty good job. She has more than a job. Lori has found her career, and she's very passionate about it. What she said, her quote, "Making my own money is very freeing. I want to do whatever I can to help others understand and learn about this great program." I think I said something similar. You're working. You are free. Free to make choices. Tip one for a defined workspace. It's a workspace only. Not enough space? Set up a desk or a table for work only. If you've got to work in your bedroom, for instance, make a corner of that your office. Make a corner of the living room in your office if you're working at home and you're alone. The benefits, it helps you focus, that's for sure. There's nothing to interrupt my train of thought when I am sitting here working. It assists you to leave work if you have a dedicated space, even if it's the corner of your bedroom. You can leave that space. Some people put one of those little screens around their workspace so that if they're not there, they won't even see it. I think that's a great idea. What if you don't have equipment? Maybe your employer says, well, you can work at home, but you need a laptop. You need a monitor. You need a camera. You need a headset. And you have to buy all of that? How about contacting state VR? How about contacting an Employment Network to help you get that stuff? 

Create a morning routine. Just like going to work, my morning routine is just like the one I had when I left the house every day. I don't have to set an alarm because my dogs wake me up at 5. They are my alarm clock. But if I had to, I would. Get up regularly at the same time, at least during the week. You're working certain hours. And get ready for work. Don't come into the office space in your jammies with a cup of coffee. That's not a great thing to do. You've got to get yourself ready. Throw on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. And you can sit down and begin working. And you know you've got yourself ready for a specific task. Establish a firm line between work and home. Those boundaries, either the screen, my office door, shut them. And work's gone. It's off. If I have to come in on a Saturday or Sunday because I need to do something before Monday happens, I open the door. And then I shut it again when I leave. Close your computer when you're finished with it. Turn it off. And set a schedule. A schedule is incredibly important. When are you going to work? Because friends and family think you're working at home, I can call anytime. No, you can't. You will not call me from 9 to 12 and from 1 to 3. I'm working. And write down your work hours. You know, I have a little task list every day, and this is the kind of nerd I am. I can tell you what I did and how long I spent doing it 20 years ago because I keep those pads of paper. I'm just waiting for my employer to say, you didn't work full time in 2003. But keeping records like that is an important thing. It helps you get organized, too. 

Stay connected. That's the important thing and one of the hard things that I find. It's important to maintain connections with other people. My work is such a big part of me that there aren't a whole lot of people that I contact. And I think that's my own fault. Working from home can feel isolating. It's never been that way for me. I've always had a couple of friends going on or people in other states that I could reach out to to chat with. But if you don't have a social network, it can be very isolating. Here are some tips to get help. Take advantage of video conferencing with coworkers. Set up a meeting with your supervisor. Set up a coffee meeting. We're having coffee break today at 11 o'clock. Tune in for your 15-minute coffee break and chat with people. Meet up with a neighbor during your lunch break. No problem there. They're right next door. Connect with colleagues through email or your company's online chatting system. And how about have dinner or a video call with family after work? Make sure you're still connecting with people. I've had dinner with people over the computer. I've met them and we've both eaten our meals while we chatted. And it works. You can't be an island out there. You've got to have connections. All right, Jayme, that gets us to our final Q&A session, I think.

Jayme >> It sure does. Thank you so much, Ray. And we have about seven minutes left in today's webinar, so we're going to have to move fast. I do want to say, though, that if we don't get to your question, remember all of those opportunities that we've given, that you can seek answers to additional help, and we'll review those again before the end of the webinar. Ray, we have a lot of people out there asking about the exact services that ENs can provide and wanting to know, you know, do they give job coaching tips? Can they actually help you find a position? So can you talk a little bit about that?

Ray >> I can. I sure can, Jayme. You know, the ENs, you've got to understand, are all different agencies. So they may all do things differently. But most certainly they're going to talk to you about what jobs you want, what jobs are available in your area. I mean, the idea is for them to help you get back to work. And if you're not sure what you want to do, you're going to have discussions about that. And, again, what are your interests, things like that, so that you both agree what types of jobs you're going to look for. And most of the ENs, particularly the local ones, know their communities, so they will know who's hiring, that they will know what's a good position for somebody with X, Y, Z company if the person has a disability. Or, no, I know that business is hiring right now, but they don't have a good track record of working with employees with disabilities. And you might not want to do that. That's not a good way to start. But they know what's available to you. And, as I said before, getting you that job is just the start, because that Employment Network wants to see you succeed. You might need to talk to them once a week. Maybe you just need someone to scream at, and it's about work. That person might listen to you, might have some suggestions, or if it's a particular issue on the job, they may have a solution for you. So they want you to become a worker with a disability. We want this job to stick. And it's okay if it doesn't stick. Maybe you thought it was going to be the job you wanted, but you don't like it. Let's get another job. Now that you don't like that one, let's talk about what you didn't like, and let's talk about the things you did like so we can focus on more of those good things. But that's a great question.

Jayme >> It's Jayme. Thanks so much, Ray. And with that, we are going to move on to some of our closing slides. But first I did want to share a quick anecdote. I've been working with Ray now for about 15 years, and we didn't meet in person for probably the first half of that, and now we've only met a handful of times. And he has become a wonderful friend and mentor. I have taken classes from him. He's given me career advice. So that work from home can certainly open doors to new relationships, and it's just a different type of relationship in terms of being mostly virtual. So I did want to share that piece of information as well.

Ray >> Thank you, Jayme, and I love being your friend. And when we get together, we have a great time.

Jayme >> It's Jayme. We sure do, Ray. And with that, I'm going to go ahead and keep moving on. So how to get started. We've heard from someone in the audience that they've already gotten started and given the Help line a call to talk about all of this this afternoon. So congratulations to that person. And that's exactly how to get started. You can give us a call at 1-866-968-7842 or 1-866-833-2967 for TTY. You can visit our website at choosework.ssa.gov, and you can use our Find Help tool to find an Employment Network or other service provider that suits your needs at choosework.ssa.gov/findhelp. We also encourage you to connect with us by visiting our contact page on ChooseWork, and that is link number 17 in the Web links pod. On that page, you'll find our social media, and you can also subscribe to blog and email updates, and you can subscribe to future emails about the webinars as well if you're interested in attending another one. 

Along these lines, I wanted to add that we did add a new link to the Web links pod called How to Spot a Work from Home Scam. It's hot off the presses, just published this morning. So if you have questions about scams, and I did see some in the Q&A, we encourage you to take a look at that blog post for some additional advice. We do have a text messaging program, and you can opt in to receive text messages by texting TICKET to 1-571-489-5292. As a reminder, standard messaging rates may apply, and you can opt out at any time. And lastly, you can email us at support@choosework.ssa.gov. We do encourage you to join us for our next webinar, which will be “Working for Yourself with Ticket to Work.” Ray alluded to self-employment a couple of times during today's presentation, and we do try to do work from home and self-employment topics back-to-back because they do go very well together. You can register online, which is link number 18 in the Web links pod, or choosework.ssa.gov/wise, or you can give a call to the Help line. Our next webinar is on September 25th from 3 to 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time. With that, I would like to give a big thank you to Ray for all of this information, and also thank you to all of you for joining today's webinar and starting your journey to financial independence with the Ticket to Work program. We do encourage you to take one of those next steps and start that process now. And with that, we will conclude today's webinar. Thank you.