Tech firms let workers stay afield.

Four years ago, when Calabasas-based Xylan Corp. wanted to hire an engineer from Salt Lake City, the computer networking company hit a snag. The worker wanted the job, but balked at the Southern California location.

Rather than lose the engineer to a competitor, Xylan opened an office in Salt Lake.

"It's hard a lot of times when you're looking for key engineering talent, to get them to relocate," said Xylan spokesman David Rodewald. "Instead of forcing everyone to relocate, we've set up offices there."

With demand for talented high-tech workers far outstripping supply, more L.A.-area companies are setting up satellite offices or allowing employees to telecommute from home. It's an especially sensitive subject for local industry leaders, looking to enhance the area's reputation as a second-tier high-tech community.

"There are a lot of telecommuters in our industry," said Bill Manassero, executive director of the Software Council of Southern California. "A software developer who is writing code can work anywhere. So you've got software developers all over the place."

The Labor Department reports that the number of people telecommuting has nearly doubled, from 1.9 million in 1991 to 3.6 million in 1997. But the high-tech industry is taking the movement a step further, establishing a network of small satellite offices around the world, many of which are staffed by only one or two employees.

"Certainly the trend is increasing," said Amy Callahan, Western region vice president of the Information Technology Association of America, an industry trade group. "Most of our industry companies offer flexible work schedules."

Long-distance employees confer with coworkers and bosses over the phone, Internet, e-mail, fax and videoconference. "Coordinating is tough. We always live by e-mail," Rodewald said. "You can get 20 to 100 e-mails a day, depending on how involved you are with a certain project. There are constant conference calls and videoconferencing as well."

Allowing employees to live where they want opens the field for qualified workers. And good workers continue to be hard to find. The Information Technology Association estimates that 346,000 information technology jobs went unfilled in 1998.

The high demand means worker benefits almost always include bonuses and stock options, said Ken Bauer, human resources director at Xircom Inc., a Thousand Oaks company that makes modem and network plug-ins for laptops. "I'm sure everybody else is doing the same thing," Bauer said. "We're looking at very unique ways to attract and retain people."

But even competitive pay, stock options and offices with game rooms and gyms won't always cut it for an employee who is determined not to live in L.A.

Xylan has about 100 engineers in eight satellite offices, which the company opened because they found that job candidates were unwilling to move to Southern California, said Andy Jentis, the company's human resources director.

"It's wherever you can find people," Jentis said. "It's a global economy."

Some of the most in-demand employees, such as software developers, can move just about anywhere and still find a job. "Good programmers are very difficult to find," Manassero said. "They can kind-of dictate what they want to do."

Xircom, for its part, has allowed employees who have been with the company a number of years to move to other areas and telecommute rather than lose them.

Jay Foster, an eight-year Xircom software engineer, decided to move to Austin five years ago.

"I told my manager I was moving to that part of the country and l would like to continue working for Xircom if I could. He came back to me with an offer to telecommute," Foster said. "They realize that to keep some of the talent they want, they have to offer options." Indeed, Foster had landed a spot in Austin before Xircom made the telecommuting offer.

Sometimes, the answer is to open an actual office, as Xircom did in Belgium after finding a pocket of skilled engineers in that country who didn't want to move. Xylan, meanwhile, opened an office in India late last year.

"Indian engineers cost one quarter that of U.S. (engineers)," Jentis said. "You can hire a lot more people for the same dollars. And they can work virtually, they don't have to set foot in the U.S."

Still, both employers and workers say there are limits to telecommuting and satellite offices. The daily exchange of ideas and brainstorming is more difficult and employees have to be self-disciplined. Foster, for example, moved from his home office in Austin to an executive office to get more social interaction.

"One of the toughest adjustments was not having people around," he said. He also sees limits to how far he can advance his career from a remote location. Management positions, for one, are out of the question from Austin.

"Overall it's good, but there are trade-offs," he said.