How to convince your boss to give you a work phone

With more and more people working from home, employees are increasingly using their personal phones for work-related communication. This has disastrous consequences for their wellbeing and work-life balance. You can solve that problem to a great extent if you know how to ask for a work phone from your boss.

There are several ways to succeed when working remotely. Getting a virtual number to improve team efficiency is one such tactic. For both employees and small businesses, it will be a win-win situation if you learn how to ask for a work phone from your boss.

Why do you need a work phone?

With remote work becoming the norm for many, work has encroached upon personal and family time for most employees. By learning how to ask for a work phone from your boss, you’ll be optimising both your work and personal spaces. Here’s why you should be interested in a separate number for work.

Expense tracking: With the same phone, it will be difficult to know how much you spend on work-related calls and messages. You also wouldn’t know your data usage for work. A separate phone will help you track those expenses and submit them for reimbursement.

Privacy: Sharing your number with customers and clients increases the risk of privacy violations. When you get a work phone, you can comfortably share that number without having to worry about robocalls or spammers.

Contact organisation: Your business and personal contacts may get lost if you use the same phone. With a separate phone for work, you’ll know where to find your business contacts and their messages and calls.

Work-life balance: You’ll have to attend all calls and messages if you use your personal phone for business. That’s because missed calls will cost you business opportunities. But you would know that the calls coming to work phone will be business-related and then set office hours for it.

How to ask for a work phone from your boss

Now that you know why you should have a separate phone for work, here’s how to ask a work phone from your boss in a professional manner.

1. Log your activities

The first step is to log all your calls and messages for a week or two and identify all work-related communication. This should tell you the time you spend on business calls and messages. It will also reveal the number of business calls you may have missed while you were on personal calls or after-hours.

2. Identify how much you would save

The next step in how to ask for a work phone is to make a business case for it. With your call and message log, you will know the amount of time you would have saved with a work phone. It would also tell you the battery usage and wear and tear on your personal phone, which would prevent you from taking some business calls.

3. Find out how your business associates would benefit

When you have a separate phone number for business, you are comfortable sharing it with more people. This added visibility could bring in more leads. It will also make it easier for your colleagues to call and text you.

4. Research new smartphones and plans

If you know how to ask for a work phone from your boss, you’ll know that this is the trickiest part. You’ll have to find out a smartphone and a data plan that your boss would be comfortable with. Keep in mind that if there is a large team, your boss will be aware that your phone will set a precedence.

5. Share the plan with your boss

Now that you have made your case, share it with your boss. Focus on the advantages of the phone and tell them how the investment would be worth all the savings. Do talk about how your work-related communication will be optimised.

Chalkboard - The smarter alternative to a work phone

If you’re wondering how to ask for a work phone from your boss, you should know that there’s a superior alternative in Chalkboard. Since it’s a virtual number, you don’t need an additional device, which would make your boss happy. It also means that you don’t have to carry around two phones and worry about their chargers.

Chalkboard has exceptionally affordable subscription plans, which will reduce your monthly expenses. The app also has auto-reply that you can use to send pre-determined messages to all the calls you miss. It will also ensure that you get to spend uninterrupted time with your loved ones during after-hours.

Sign-up today and experience the difference with Chalkboard. Now you no longer have to worry about how to ask for a work phone from your boss.