SESSION 12 - Managing employees use of mobile technologies Flashcards
Whats the article about?
- mobile technologies are affecting how work gets done and how we live or lives
- in many sectors: need to access systems and information, coordination with employees across time and space and constant connectivity
- many benefits of using technology in workspace but also some helplessness from constant intrusion of technologies into personal life
- sustained lack of work-life-balance (WLB) arising from temporal servitude (‘being on call all the time’) can affect worker health, psychological well-being, commitment & productivity
- purpose of article: report findings of WLB concerns of employees using mobile technologies as part of work & explain organisational strategies designed to address these issues
What are the most notable benefits of using mobile technology?
1) potential for 24x7 connectivity 2) increased flexibility 3) improved coordination 4) increased productivity through flexibility in time management 5) pleasure and enjoyment 6) availability of multiple media and genres of communication suited for different scenarios
What are the drawbacks of using mobile technology?
1) constantly raising expectations of availability
2) blurring boundaries of work and personal time
3) coordinating among co-workers becomes difficult
4) compulsion to feel like being constantly on top of technological developments
What are the three perspectives of work-life relationships?
compartmentalized, overlapping, encompassing
Whats the compartmentalized perspective?
- total separation of work and life: any spill-over of work into life is regarded as unacceptable
- need for speed of response/reaction now dominates IT workers life compartmentalised-perspective-workers need to strive harder to keep domains separate
- view of work: personal life is primary, work secondary; utility of work = means to living a good life; work is burden, preventing to achieve what is truly desired
- characteristics of perspective-holders: individuals whose careers have plateaued; individuals with significant family responsibilities
- mobile technology use patterns: see it as something to get work done with efficiently but do not use it voluntarily after work hours; some manually disable certain functions after work (fear of being tracked)
Whats the overlapping perspective?
- no clean separation of work and life: not desired or feasible
- perspective most consistent with current working environment: held by 60% of interviewees
- overlapping: there are physical & temporal boundaries between the two domains but emotional and behaviour overlaps lead to affecting of each of two domains greater degrees of conflict when attempting to balance the domains
- view of work: necessary aspect of fulfilling life; keen to limit importance of work to avoid being totally swamped by it
Whats the encompassing perspective?
- total interconnection of work and life: success in work domain equates to success in life domain
- view of work: do not see boundaries between work and life, often see benefits that work life brings to non-work life, prioritise work over personal commitments
- characteristics of perspective-holders: individuals who 1) are driven to succeed or progress rapidly in orga 2) live to work 3) who see growth opportunities if they excel in particular phase of career
- mobile technology use patterns: positive view of technology as these support work styles by providing 24/7 connectivity
What are the four strategies in order to address WLB issues?
1) Compensation
2) Negotiation
3) Integration
4) Protection
Whats the compensation strategy?
Compensation strategy: setting up incentives that are provided to employees as fair exchange for allowing specific (and limited) amount of spill-over from work to life domain
* does not really address work-life imbalance but merely provides incentives to overlook the problem
* relevant for: 1) workers holding compartmentalised view but can be motivated by financial incentives 2) worker holding overlapping view to provide reassurance that firm appreciates
Whats the negotiation strategy?
Negotiation strategy: limiting stress by taking into consideration personal situations & capabilities of individual, harmonising
* preparation needed from manager side: allow employees to provide input on preferences and circumstances, understand their situations currently mainly implemented by mid-level managers in form of informal procedures, norms and rules
* relevant for: 1) workers holding compartmentalised view 2) workers holding overlapping view
Whats the integration strategy?
Integration strategy: creating inviting environment where employees experience life in workplace (work and life are interconnected) bring your dog to work, fitness room at work etc
* relevant for: only 1) workers holding encompassing view
Whats the protection strategy?
Protection strategy: 1) orga ensures that expectation of sustained connectivity does not affect health and personal well-being of individuals 2) orga must enact policies that protects workers not relating to integration of work and life domains from those wanting to impose encompassing view on them
* relevant for: all workers
What are guidelines for managing a mobile workforce?
Guideline 1: acknowledge that individuals perceive relationship between work & life differently
Guideline 2: universal strategies for use of mobile technology are unlikely to be effective
Guideline 3: strategies to meet organisation’s overall mobility goals should cause minimal work-life conflict for individual employees
Guideline 4: mobile technologies should be implemented consistent with workers WLB perspectives (eg allowance to switch of phone for compartmentalised; two sim cards for overlapping; 24/7 access applications for encompassed)
Guideline 5: effective management of mobile technology use requires entire orga to work together
Guideline 6: WLB-related strategies & suggestions should be applied with caution
