Evolution of Work

How We ‘Do Work’ Evolves with Digital Innovations

by Hybrid, Remote & Flexible WorkResearch
'Three Generations of Telework: New ICTs and the (R)evolution from Home Office to Virtual Office'.
Extracts and summary of the research by: Jon. C Messenger and Lutz Gschwind (2016)

Summary of the research: 

Remote working has evolved through three main stages since the 1970’s.

Stage 1: Home Office (1970’s to early 1990’s)

This first stage involved performing office-based tasks at a stationary (often home-based) location using information-based technology (i.e. relatively immobile desktop computer) alongside landline-based, fixed communication technology. 

Stage 2: Mobile Office (early 1990’s to early 2000’s)

The more mobile laptop computer, was used alongside mobile phone-based communication technology to transform static work into mobile work either at home or on the move.  

These first 2 stages are often referred to as “Old ICT” (Information & Communication Technology).  Most research to date around ICT use at work has been focused on these first two evolutionary stages.  

Stage 3: Virtual Office (later 2000’s to 2020)

The third stage, which includes the “New ICT” revolution, started with the launch of smartphones and tablets in the second half of the 2000’s and refers to the merging of both information access and communication into one device.  

It also coincided with the advent of powerful technology that connects any mobile device instantaneously to work via cloud-based systems and does not require work-based information to be physically stored on the device itself in order for work to be completed or to communicate with others.

The effectiveness of remote work increases when managers shift their perspective from work monitoring to information sharing. 

Research Conclusion

‘On the one hand, [digital technology has enabled] us to constantly connect with friends and family as well as with work colleagues and supervisors; on the other hand, paid work becomes increasingly intrusive into the times and spaces normally reserved for personal life. Crucial to this development is the detachment of work activities from traditional office spaces.

Today’s office work is largely supported by Internet connections, and can thus be undertaken from basically anywhere at any time. This new spatial independence dramatically changes the role of technology in the work environment offering both new opportunities and new challenges.

Scholars are increasingly concerned with the advantages and the disadvantages of new ICTs for aspects such as working time, WLB and OSH, as well as individual and organizational performance. 

Notes:
  • As digital technology continues to evolve, how we incorporate this technology into our working lives will change and adapt how we both view our work in addition to how we engage with our work. The development of Extended Realities and The Metaverse will take us into Stage 4…
A reminder of what the acronyms mean:

ICT: Information and Communication Technologies – i.e. digital technology that provides access to electronic information through portals such as wireless networks, mobile phones, tablets and other electronic devices. It includes the use of electronic communication tools such as email, social media and the Internet, for both work and home life. 

WLB: Work-Life Balance

OSH: Occupational Safety and Health.

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Digital Accountability

Digital Accountability of Strangers when Remote Working

by Hybrid, Remote & Flexible Work

If you were self-employed or worked as a freelancer prior to March 2020, you would already have been familiar with the daily struggles with procrastination,  meeting and setting (often self-imposed) deadlines and accountability to self and others. Frustration and guilt can become constant companions when not entrenched in an office-based work environment with clients, colleagues and managers in constant attendance. 

For those who have become (un)willingly indoctrinated into this ‘way of working’, it has been difficult, at times, to adjust and cope. It is said that we have limited capacity for self-regulation and willpower. If we are tired or stressed, the ability to tape into these and once the dregs of willpower are used up each day, it becomes really difficult to keep going. It is why having set routines and relying on automated behaviour is such an important part of us being able to be more effective at what we do on a daily basis. 

Since the start of the pandemic, many workers have found tools and techniques to attempt some element of focus and motivation. The most effective of these is accountability to others. A friend of mine (a freelance food writer) started virtually attending the London Writers Salon online writing hour on a daily basis. Having accountability with anyone, even strangers can help one to focus on a particular task that needs completing. Focusmate is one of those ways of doing exactly that. 

What is coming to light is that our focus and attention are being eroded, both through the technology we use (and how we use it) and potentially through our lifestyle norms that include: higher levels of workplace expectations and stress, lower levels of exercise, less focus on good nutrition and lower quality and quantity of sleep. Technological distractions are a great temptation when hard-cognitive work is required of us. Social media feeds and web browsing is like ‘brain candy’ when we are faced with harder cognitive gymnastic-like tasks.

Having someone you can be accountable to for a short period of time, that forces you to achieve tasks is a useful way to make that happen. Alternatively, teaming up with a work-buddy, a coach or an accountability partner can also help. 

There are plenty of apps and programmes that can help you physically minimise your digital distractions. Find tools and processes that work for you. Whatever you find most effectively, start building that into a daily habit and build on that by finding something else that works well for you. Technology should be used as a tool to make you more productive and efficient. If there are apps or tech behaviours that are too distracting or reducing your ability to get work done, reach out to others (especially if they were already self-employed or freelancing prior to the start of the pandemic) to find out if or how they are trying to maximise technology more effectively. 

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Busyness and overwork in the Workplace

Busyness in the workplace and the stealing of leisure time

by Workplace Norms, Expectations and Responsibilities

A century ago, social status was accompanied by ‘an abundance of leisure’. The wealthy and upwardly mobile demonstrated their wealth by how little they did, and how much others did for them.

We’ve now flipped those expectations completely so that social status now comes from a narrative around ‘busyness without leisure’. To the point, that busyness has become a status symbol. When someone asks how work is going, the first response we often get is ‘Things are really busy at the moment, there is so much going on’.

We also seem to get some kind of internal reward from others seeing as hardworking and the ‘look how busy and important I am’ mental narratives that come with additional responsibilities in an organisation.

Longer hours are seen as a core characteristic of the socially privileged and those who have ‘made it’.

For those of us who do not produce ‘things’, but rather ‘ideas’, busyness has become a signal of our knowledge value.

The logic in this is that the busier we make ourselves out to be, the scarcer our knowledge resource must be, and so is, therefore, of greater value than another who isn’t as busy.

But, the longer-term effect of this working longer hours, to increase the perceived value of our knowledge, is that we spend more, and more time at work or ‘doing’ work.

Because these knowledge workers conduct the majority of their work with the tools of technology, they end up being constantly connected to these tools, often worried about not being available when needed or missing out on that ‘one big opportunity’.

Research conducted in this area clearly demonstrates that this type of Always On, Always Available behaviour is stressful and exhausting. It can also reduce both quality and quantity of sleep, thereby not allowing enough cognitive or physical recovery time overnight. This means next-day productivity levels are low and distraction levels are high.

This can result in more work pressure over time. It can also lead to longer-term stress, anxiety and perceived burnout. 

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4 Day Work Week

Not all 4-day work weeks are created equal

by Autonomy, Flexibility and Job Control

There seems to be some excitement around the 4-day-work-week being trialled in the UK. However, not all 4-day work weeks are created equal.

There are a few different ways that an employer could implement a shorter working week. Either employees:

* work the same number of hours per week, but reduced to 4 longer work days
* work less hours with the same amount of pay
* work less hours with less pay

The article suggests that of the 30 businesses taking part, participants are required to still complete the same amount of work they were previously doing. And they will still be required to work up to 35 hours per week (i.e. the same number of hours they were required to work previously over 5 days). What this implies is that these workers will be working less number of days, but more hours within each of those days. It also does not make clear who this 4-day work week would apply specifically to. It seems from the link supplied in the article to the 4 Day Week website, that there is a skew towards those who belong to a trade union. I wonder what impact this would have on the potential for overtime hours (and therefore, the potential for earning overtime pay) may have on these workers.

There is only so much productive, effective work our brains are cognitively able to do each day. Expecting increased productivity with the same number of hours worked per week – shoe-horned into just 4 days (as per the current research being conducted in the UK), seems a bit of a self-defeating exercise to me. I also fear that a number of these employees will still be working on their ‘day off’, but not in the office environment. Unless there is a mandated ‘no technology use in your day off’, it will be difficult to manage and monitor the effectiveness of the ‘day off’.

I also wonder how working more hours each day may impact those who are working parents – who have to drop off and collect children from preschool or school. How do these parents manage to fulfil their home-based responsibilities, such as homework, bath times, family meals etc if they are working longer hours? It doesn’t quite seem as feasible or idealistic as initially presented in the Time-Out article or on the ‘Why a 4-day week’ website.

I hope to be proven wrong.

Research conducted by the BCG in 2009 showcases a different type of 4-day work week. Although project teams trialled different working time off options during the week, the main criteria for each of the trials conducted was that consultants were required to refrain from technology use during their mandated time off.

An additional, and I think critical, point is that the teams worked together to decide which team member took the time off and when. The team members also negotiated how the client work would be completed without the client suffering from any team-mandated time-off.

What the research found is that those who participated in the experiments were more productive, and had higher energy levels and standards of service delivered. They were also more likely to stay at the company for longer and reported higher levels of job satisfaction. In addition, the need to maintain high client service levels increased the level of teamwork and effective communication among team members.

I would suggest the BCG model is a better option than simply ‘demanding’ that a working week be reduced to 4 days while working the same number of hours for the same amount of pay.

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The Autonomy Paradox

Technology both helps and hinders autonomy

by Autonomy, Flexibility and Job ControlResearch
'The Autonomy Paradox: The Implications of Mobile Email Devides for Knowledge Professionals'
Extracts and summary of the research by: Melissa Mazmanian, Wanda J. Orlikowski and JoAnne Yates (October 2013)

A note: The original qualitative research for this paper was conducted during 2004 and 2005. It is therefore reminiscent of knowledge workers use of mobile email devices (e.g. Blackberries) and mobile phones (rather than smartphones). Although some mobile phones had internet connection capability from 2001, the first iPhone was launched in 2007.

Key quotes from the research:

  • ‘Although individual use of mobile email devices offered professionals flexibility, peace of mind, and control over interactions in the short term, it also intensified collective expectations of their availability, escalating their engagement and thus reducing their ability to disconnect from work’
  • ‘Professionals were ending up using [mobile email devices] everywhere/all the time, thus diminishing their autonomy in practice’
  • ‘[The] autonomy paradox reflected professionals’ ongoing navigation of the tension between their interests in personal autonomy on the one hand and their professional commitment to colleagues and clients on the other’
  • ‘The ongoing use of mobile email devices enacted a collective dynamic of escalating engagement that was attenuating the very autonomy that professionals were extolling. Having the freedom to use the device anywhere, anytime, the professionals ended up using it everywhere, all the time’.

Summary of the research: 

Autonomy is defined (in this article) as: ‘the ability to exercise a degree of control over the content, timing, location, and performance of activities’. It is traditionally either endowed (through status or seniority) or bestowed (e.g. through experience or length of service) on those who have earned the privilege to decide when and how they get their work done.

In this qualitative research, a number of professionals within interdependent teams were interviewed on their use of mobile email devices (i.e. blackberries). Within these discussions, the researchers came to understand that although these professionals felt that they had been empowered, through the use of a mobile email device, to be more responsive and available to their managers, colleagues and clients as a way of demonstrating their competence, work ethic and desire to succeed in their job, they individually and collectively changed the workplace norms around availability and responsiveness within their work environment.

The workers not only justified their increased technology use by stating that the constant checking of their email device:

  • allowed them to stay up to speed with and manage the flow of information that passed by them
  • gave them the ability to ‘watch work’ and a sense of control over their workload
  • ensured that they did not become a work bottleneck when they were not in the office
  • helped to enhance their sense of professional status and competence

However, the constant checking of their devices had a number of unintended consequences:

  • it shifted the norms, expectations and assumptions of others (colleagues, clients and managers) in terms of accessibility, availability and responsiveness times
  • it increased the number of hours spent looking at and responding to emails, thereby directly reducing their amount of downtime
  • it blurred the lines (temporal boundaries) between work and private time
  • it increased the levels of stress experienced by these professionals

The professionals justified their voluntary increased use of the devices as a way to demonstrate their level of autonomy and their ability to act as responsible and competent professionals. They also stated it to be a consequence of their ‘Type A’ workaholic type personalities that are an integral part of succeeding within a professional environment.

The very behaviour used by these professionals to showcase their workplace dedication, escalated tacitly into a normative expectation by others of what it means to operate within that particular professional environment. The individual actions of each professional subtly changed the collective behaviour of all professionals, increasing ‘the pace and volume of communication in the network, raising expectations of responsiveness and accessibility and leading to a collective reduction of autonomy as workers began to engage with work at all times’. i.e. the normative expectations around quick response times to emails became the very thing that restricted the personal autonomy that these professionals were trying to live out and capitalise on in their daily working lives, and to showcase their level of commitment to their jobs.

Read the original article here

If you are unable to access the web page, you can read a PDF of the article here.

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Scheduling-Autonomy

There is a Difference Between Job Control and Autonomy

by Autonomy, Flexibility and Job Control

Those who are allowed either job control and/or autonomy within their role are more likely to experience lower levels of stress, anxiety and perceived burnout.

The simple explanation of the difference between these two concepts is that:

  • Schedule Control is the ability to schedule working hours within the course of a day.
  • Job Autonomy is schedule control plus the freedom to decide what and how to get the job done.

Schedule control is often associated with flexible working practices. In 2014 the UK Government passed the Flexible Working Regulations. These regulations allowed for all employees to apply for flexible working, rather than only caregivers and working parents. However, the decision to approve an employee’s flexible work request is the remit of each individual company. These regulations do seem, therefore, to be more of a token gesture, than a viable solution for those who would benefit from flexible working practices.

When it comes to remote and hybrid working, schedule control comes into its own. In research I conducted during Lockdown 1.0 amongst working parents, those who were able to schedule their working day to allow for homeschooling and other home commitments, seemed to be less stressed than those who couldn’t. This was especially important for those who had children under 6 years old (especially as they engage in higher levels of active childcare).

Job autonomy, prior to March 2020, was mostly the remit and privilege of those in particular professional occupations, who had extensive work experience or were in more senior managerial roles. Essentially, job autonomy is the ability and freedom a worker has to make independent, job-related decisions and to choose how and when the tasks get completed.

In theory, this would be an enviable position for many – allowing for a greater ability to manage a more robust work-life balance. However, research has found that instead of technology-aided autonomy allowing workers greater levels of freedom to manage their work role, workers tended to rather spend increased amounts of time on their phones. They effectively diminished their autonomy by justifying extra hours of unpaid work through rationalising the perceived expectation that others had of them.

Research conducted just prior to March 2020, already showcased how workplace norms and the pace of work demands mean that workers felt constantly tethered to their technology. With seniority (and social status synonymous that comes with autonomy), came an additional perception of being indispensable to others. This includes an expectation of needing to keep an eye on project-related communications, ensuring projects are kept moving forward and subordinates are given continuous guidance and answers. This inability to disconnect actually reduced workers’ autonomy and increases their overall job stress.   

Referred to as “The Autonomy Paradox”, the very flexibility and freedom granted to workers – allowing them the ability to work and engage in professional technology-related communication anytime and anywhere, can be the very thing that binds workers to the company, their colleagues and clients every waking hour.

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Please get off your phone

We need to minimise our phone use

by Individual Differences and Impact

There are a number of articles around at the moment about Burnout. They all have good points and good advice to follow. However, there is one small thing I would like to point out. Research has shown that employees are not always aware that they are heading toward burnout.

Although there are a number of reasons people burn out, a lot of the blame is laid at the foot of increased workloads and workplace job pressure. Yes, this is true, but we forget that we are also to blame for ‘allowing’ this to happen. E-anxiety that is one of the causes of burnout comes from excessive email monitoring in private hours.

Monitoring emails and work-based communication when you should be taking time out from work can have a detrimental effect on you as a worker, your significant other and your family. Signs of burnout are often manifested first in home-based conflict. Partners and children start getting frustrated and annoyed with you not being fully present with them, prioritising a project or work colleague/supervisor over them.

Catching burnout before it catches you is something we can do something about. Some people say that they have no choice, but they actually do. We can put our phone down, turn off notifications, switch the phone (or computer) off, walk away, do something else, be more present in our private time. You are not irreplaceable at work, you are irreplaceable at home.

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Productivity signalling while remote working

by Workplace Norms, Expectations and Responsibilities

Research prior to Lockdown 1 around remote working, suggested that there was a productivity bias related to those not physically present in the office.

The results of many studies showed that those who were either actively or passively present within the geographical office were more likely to be promoted, have higher salaries and were given more learning and career opportunities than those who spent more time away from the office. 

Those not (always) in the office were perceived as less dependable, potentially slacking off and less productive than those in the office. 

To counterbalance this bias, those who worked either in a hub office, while away from the office or at home, spent a lot of time and energy ‘signalling’ their working hours and productivity to their managers and others in their teams. 

This signalling behaviour came in the form of:

  • Attending every video conference meeting they were invited to
  • Taking on last-minute projects to showcase their willingness to participate in work
  • Sending emails throughout the course of the day
  • Working longer hours than the traditional in-office worker

This ‘productivity signalling’ is now happening on a much wider scale and has inadvertently changed the working hour norms – extending them into what was previously commuting time. 

Traditionally, commuting time was spent catching up on emails,  reading, listening to music, thinking about the tasks needing to be worked on and planning ahead. All relatively lower-level cognitive tasks. 

Now that time is spent doing higher-level cognitive tasks, which use higher levels of energy and are more likely to lead to longer-term cognitive exhaustion. 

Additionally, commuting time traditionally served as a distinct intersection between one life-realm and another. 

It was a signal to the subconscious brain that ‘we’re now shifting from this part of life into this other part’. We got to mentally shift gears. 

When we were working from home, there was: 

  • Regular and constant cognitive shifting between our various life realms
  • Limited transition time to help us catch up, plan and decompress from a day in the office or a stressful morning getting everyone ready for the day ahead. 

Longer working hours result in our brains still whirling by the time we go to bed – reducing both the depth and duration of our sleep. 

This results in lower levels of productivity and being more prone to distraction from notifications, emails, messages and self-distraction activities. 

We substitute for the lower productivity levels by working longer hours to get the same level of work done, leading us into a downward spiral of cognitive, physical and emotional tiredness. 

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Automated Behaviour and Cyber Security

Have we established muscle memory around remote working and what impact does this have on us as individuals?

by Individual Differences and Impact

A number of us have been working remotely for the past 18 months. We often hear statements around how work has ‘shifted’. With that phrase comes the expectation that we’ve had plenty of time to adapt to this ‘new normal’ and should be working effectively and efficiently at this stage. Haven’t we all become used to this way of working?

There is a perception that remote working is now an established norm, but it isn’t. Our working environment is still in constant flux. It is still shifting. It will still be shifting for a few years yet – until we become more certain around how to manage this epidemic. Even then, it will take another few years before we establish and start entrenching specific workplace norms in line with variations of hybrid working practices.

When it comes to our everyday functioning and adapting, the processing part of our brain has limited ability to process conscious, intentional activities. Every time something changes in our environment and how we do things, we have to adapt and readapt. Think about when you start a new role or take up a new hobby, you have to really think about what you are doing until it becomes a habit. Then you do a lot of it without thinking. It becomes automated behaviour.

However, things have been in constant shift and flux since March 2020. Our children are at home schooling. They are at school. It’s term time and lateral flow tests. They’re on summer holiday. Do they need masks or don’t they? Do I have enough tests in the house or do I need more? Am I going into the office this week or working from home? Do we still need to keep 2 meters apart? Why are they (not) wearing a mask? Should I elbow bump, or can I shake hands with them? Is that meeting in Zoom, Teams or Google Meet? Where was that link? What day am I in the office this week again? My programme doesn’t seem to be working, where did I write down how to fix it? What’s the name of that new IT person again?

We continuously absorb sensory information through all 5 of our senses. Our working-memory has to work hard to filter out a lot of that information, while simultaneously processing our thoughts, actions and behaviour. We cope best when we are able to automate a large portion of the behaviour we do every day. From making hot drinks, to driving our car, to finding our way to the office/home, to most of life’s ‘little things’ that we don’t give much daily thought to. If these things shift, we have to consciously think through how to perform and execute them effectively. This takes up substantial cognitive effort and can lead to cognitive exhaustion if we aren’t able to automate much of our daily behaviour.

Although we have indeed already built up some normative practices around remote working, each shift that we have to do requires us to extend higher levels of cognitive effort that takes ‘processing power’ that otherwise could be used to fulfil ‘deeper work’. To get into the flow that allows us to be productive, acquire any new skills or think deeply about our work, we need to have a lot of our day-to-day behaviour shifted into automatic functioning. This is the reason we develop habits and routines, it is also why we allocate spaces in our house (or our desk) for specific objects. It means they are easier to find, and we don’t need substantial cognitive effort to locate them.

We get stressed when things are different, or we have to think consciously about a particular process. Just think about how stressed you can get when you can’t find something you are looking for (especially if they aren’t in their normal place). Every time we ask people to shift how they do things, increases their levels of non-automatic behaviour and raises stress levels. It is cognitively exhausting to be regularly stressed in this way and when the majority of our behaviour isn’t given time to become automated.

So, all of this shifting, shifting and shifting that is constantly happening around our ways of working, and the continuous need to adapt to workplace norms, means we have to think so much harder about things that should otherwise be automated behaviour. It leaves us with less cognitive energy and capacity to focus on our ‘real work’ and to think deeply about the problems and issues we have to resolve. These extra cognitive thinking efforts and additional stress from shifting workplace norms, reduces our ability to be vigilant and spot errors in our work and fraudulent emails. Things we would otherwise have spotted, because we have the cognitive thinking-space to do so, we are a lot less vigilant about.

This is one of the reasons why we are generally experiencing higher levels of cyber scams and those who may otherwise be super-vigilant, are less able to do so. It’s not just that our home-based online security is at lower levels than we’d have in the workplace. It’s that our general cognitive ability to spot and correctly respond to phishing emails and scams is substantially compromised by how much harder we are having to think and adapt to our daily workplace and homebased shifting demands.  

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Parental Fatigue

Parental Burnout, an unintended consequence of a pandemic

by Individual Differences and Impact

‘Parental Burnout’ is “an exhaustion syndrome, characterised by feeling physically and mentally overwhelmed” (first identified by Isabelle Roskam and Moïra Mikolajczak in the early ’80s). Simultaneously working, managing a home and raising children involves complicated and frequent role-switching. Each of these roles requires different cognitive functioning and does not allow the brain enough time to deep-dive into the productive functioning that each requires. This means that what we do takes longer and does not to the same level of quality that deep-diving allows.

Research conducted by Seville et al. (2020) during Lockdown 1.0 showed that although fathers took on a much greater role (versus pre-pandemic) in home and childcare, mothers took on a proportionately greater level of responsibility (30% versus 47% respectively). Mothers were more likely to engage in active childcare such as meals and bedtime, whereas fathers were more likely to engage in more passive childcare such as playtime and screentime.

Stories have been emerging for some time now of parents experiencing deep levels of Compassion Syndrome, which leaves parents feeling overwhelmed, stressed, guilty and isolated. A few ‘real-life’ stories are told in a recent Guardian article. Compassion Syndrome has historically been associated mostly with those in the care industry. However, parents are starting to experience this in untold measure, especially when they are also managing a diverse team of staff.

In reality, we don’t know we are experiencing burnout until we actually do burnout. It is essential to start putting some strategies in place to give you time to mentally and emotionally recover each day to help mitigate against long-term stress and burnout:

* If possible, carve out at least 30 min’s of alone-time each day – although playing electronic games can help with feelings of ‘escapism’, it still uses up cognitive energy doing so – put your phone down and use the time to rest your brain. Take a bath, go for a walk, sit on your balcony or in the garden, listen to an audiobook, engage in a hobby or craft, bake… the key is to ‘switch off’ the analytical, thinking part of your brain and give your creative, divergent part of your brain a bit of exercise.

* If you don’t already do so, start journaling. If you don’t have time to write things down, do voice recordings. A big part of therapy is the process of ‘releasing’ the thoughts from your head. Running water is a lot fresher than stagnant water. Ruminating tends to stagnate thoughts.

* Try putting a few more firm boundaries in place, both for you and for family members. If possible, delegate more tasks. Done is better than perfect.

Self-care is so important. Don’t wait until breaking point before reaching out to family, friends, or colleagues. Reach out to the Mind Charity or Samaritans or try searching on PsychologyToday, BPS or BACP databases for a therapist near you or one you think could help you. Video therapy is a norm now, and finding the best therapist in a different part of the country is better than finding an ok therapist near you.

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