Influences of The Virtual Office on Aspects of Work and Work/Life Balance
TL;DR: In this paper, a study of IBM employees explored influences of the virtual office on aspects of work and work/life balance as reported by virtual office teleworkers (n = 157) and an equivalent group of traditional office workers (n= 89).
Abstract: Millions of employees now use portable electronic tools to do their jobs from a “virtual office” with extensive flexibility in the timing and location of work. However, little scholarly research exists about the effects of this burgeoning work form. This study of IBM employees explored influences of the virtual office on aspects of work and work/life balance as reported by virtual office teleworkers (n = 157) and an equivalent group of traditional office workers (n= 89). Qualitative analyses revealed the perception of greater productivity, higher morale, increased flexibility and longer work hours due to telework, as well as an equivocal influence on work/life balance and a negative influence on teamwork. Using a quasi-experimental design, quantitative multivariate analyses supported the qualitative findings related to productivity, flexibility and work/life balance. However, multivariate analyses failed to support the qualitative findings for morale, teamwork and work hours. This study highlights the need for a multi-method approach, including both qualitative and quantitative elements, when studying telework.
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TL;DR: Everyday role transitions involving home, work, and other places is focused on boundary-crossing activities, where one exits and enters roles by surmounting role boundaries, spanning high segmentation to high integration.
Abstract: We focus on everyday role transitions involving home, work, and other places. Transitions are boundary-crossing activities, where one exits and enters roles by surmounting role boundaries. Roles can be arrayed on a continuum, spanning high segmentation to high integration. Segmentation decreases role blurring but increases the magnitude of change, rendering boundary crossing more difficult; crossing often is facilitated by rites of passage. Integration decreases the magnitude of change but increases blurring, rendering boundary creation and maintenance more difficult; this challenge often is surmounted by boundary work.
1,934 citations
TL;DR: A theoretical framework and meta-analysis of 46 studies in natural settings involving 12,883 employees found that telecommuting had small but mainly beneficial effects on proximal outcomes, such as perceived autonomy and (lower) work-family conflict.
Abstract: What are the positive and negative consequences of telecommuting? How do these consequences come about? When are these consequences more or less potent? The authors answer these questions through construction of a theoretical framework and meta-analysis of 46 studies in natural settings involving 12,883 employees. Telecommuting had small but mainly beneficial effects on proximal outcomes, such as perceived autonomy and (lower) work–family conflict. Importantly, telecommuting had no generally detrimental effects on the quality of workplace relationships. Telecommuting also had beneficial effects on more distal outcomes, such as job satisfaction, performance, turnover intent, and role stress. These beneficial consequences appeared to be at least partially mediated by perceived autonomy. Also, high-intensity telecommuting (more than 2.5 days a week) accentuated telecommuting’s beneficial effects on work–family conflict but harmed relationships with coworkers. Results provide building blocks for a more complete theoretical and practical treatment of telecommuting.
1,473 citations
TL;DR: A review of the telework literature can be found in this article, where the authors seek answers to three questions: who participates in telework, why they do, and what happens when they do.
Abstract: Summary Telework has inspired research in disciplines ranging from transportation and urban planning to ethics, law, sociology, and organizational studies. In our review of this literature, we seek answers to three questions: who participates in telework, why they do, and what happens when they do? Who teleworks remains elusive, but research suggests that male professionals and female clerical workers predominate. Notably, work-related factors like managers’ willingness are most predictive of which employees will telework. Employees’ motivations for teleworking are also unclear, as commonly perceived reasons such as commute reduction and family obligations do not appear instrumental. On the firms’ side, managers’ reluctance, forged by concerns about cost and control and bolstered by little perceived need, inhibits the creation of telework programmes. As for outcomes, little clear evidence exists that telework increases job satisfaction and productivity, as it is often asserted to do. We suggest three steps for future research may provide richer insights: consider group and organizational level impacts to understand who telework affects, reconsider why people telework, and emphasize theory-building and links to existing organizational theories. We conclude with lessons learned from the telework literature that may be relevant to research on new work forms and workplaces. Copyright # 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
1,122 citations
Cites background from "Influences of The Virtual Office on..."
...Few studies have examined the impact of telework on the organization as a whole, or even on smaller work groups (for an exception, see Hill, Miller, Weiner, & Colihan, 1998 )....
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TL;DR: Bond et al. as mentioned in this paper examined the influence of perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work on work-family balance and found that perceived job flexibility is related to improved family balance after controlling for paid work hours, unpaid domestic labor hours, gender, marital status, and occupational level.
Abstract: This study examines the influence of perceived flexibility in the timing and location of work on work-family balance. Data are from a 1996 International Business Machines (IBM) work and life issues survey in the United States (n = 6,451). Results indicate that perceived job flexibility is related to improved work-family balance after controlling for paid work hours, unpaid domestic labor hours, gender, marital status, and occupational level. Perceived job flexibility appears to be beneficial both to individuals and to businesses. Given the same workload, individuals with perceived job flexibility have more favorable work-family balance. Likewise, employees with perceived job flexibility are able to work longer hours before workload negatively impacts their work-family balance. Implications of these findings are presented. T he demographic composition of the United States workforce has changed dramatically in recent years. This work force now includes more dual-earner couples who have responsibility for the care of children or elderly dependents, as well as more dual-professional couples where both have careers, not just jobs (Bond, Galinsky, & Swanberg, 1998). In addition, extensive downsizing by large corporations has lengthened the average workweek for many employees. The average American worker now spends additional time equivalent to six extra 40hour weeks per year on the job, when compared with the late 1960s (Schor, 1992), and three extra 40-hour weeks compared with just five years ago (Bond et al.). This means that for many, especially for dual-career parents and those with elder-care responsibilities, juggling the demands of the workplace and the home has become a more difficult balancing act. Work-family advocates have long championed the adoption of a variety of family-friendly benefits to positively influence work-family balance (Galinsky, 1992). Flexibility in the timing
801 citations
Cites background from "Influences of The Virtual Office on..."
...The benefits documented for flexplace include greater productivity, the perception of improved morale, and better work-family balance (Hill et al., 1998)....
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TL;DR: This article discusses research findings concerning salient contextual issues that might influence or alter the impact of telecommuting, including the nature of the work performed while telecommuters, interpersonal processes such as knowledge sharing and innovation, and additional considerations that include motives fortelecommuting such as family responsibilities.
Abstract: Telecommuting has become an increasingly popular work mode that has generated significant interest from scholars and practitioners alike. With recent advances in technology that enable mobile connections at ever-affordable rates, working away from the office as a telecommuter has become increasingly available to many workers around the world. Since the term telecommuting was first coined in the 1970s, scholars and practitioners have debated the merits of working away from the office, as it represents a fundamental shift in how organizations have historically done business. Complicating efforts to truly understand the implications of telecommuting have been the widely varying definitions and conceptualizations of telecommuting and the diverse fields in which research has taken place.Our objective in this article is to review existing research on telecommuting in an effort to better understand what we as a scientific community know about telecommuting and its implications. In so doing, we aim to bring to the surface some of the intricacies associated with telecommuting research so that we may shed insights into the debate regarding telecommuting's benefits and drawbacks. We attempt to sift through the divergent and at times conflicting literature to develop an overall sense of the status of our scientific findings, in an effort to identify not only what we know and what we think we know about telecommuting, but also what we must yet learn to fully understand this increasingly important work mode.After a brief review of the history of telecommuting and its prevalence, we begin by discussing the definitional challenges inherent within existing literature and offer a comprehensive definition of telecommuting rooted in existing research. Our review starts by highlighting the need to interpret existing findings with an understanding of how the extent of telecommuting practiced by participants in a study is likely to alter conclusions that may be drawn. We then review telecommuting's implications for employees' work-family issues, attitudes, and work outcomes, including job satisfaction, organizational commitment and identification, stress, performance, wages, withdrawal behaviors, and firm-level metrics. Our article continues by discussing research findings concerning salient contextual issues that might influence or alter the impact of telecommuting, including the nature of the work performed while telecommuting, interpersonal processes such as knowledge sharing and innovation, and additional considerations that include motives for telecommuting such as family responsibilities. We also cover organizational culture and support that may shape the telecommuting experience, after which we discuss the community and societal effects of telecommuting, including its effects on traffic and emissions, business continuity, and work opportunities, as well as the potential impact on societal ties. Selected examples of telecommuting legislation and policies are also provided in an effort to inform readers regarding the status of the national debate and its legislative implications. Our synthesis concludes by offering recommendations for telecommuting research and practice that aim to improve the quality of data on telecommuting as well as identify areas of research in need of development.
760 citations
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TL;DR: Work at home telecommuting refers to the substitution of telecommunications technology for physical travel to a central work location; it usually implies that the person is working in the home as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: The term telecommuting refers to the substitution of telecommunications technology for physical travel to a central work location; it usually implies that the person is working in the home. This paper reviews organizational arrangements which allow employees to work at home on a regular basis as a substitute for attendance at the normal workplace. Two extreme cases of the implementation of such an arrangement are described. In the first, where the employee has a skill in demand and a job that is characterized by complexity and autonomy, work at home reinforces the individual's autonomy and self-control over the work. In the second case, where the employee's skill is not in demand and he or she has few other work options due to nonwork (i.e., family) constraints, the job is designed to reduce individual autonomy and may involve reduced compensation relative to comparable work performed on-site. Based on interviews with employees working at home, we examine the effects of work at home on the relationship between the employee and employer, the connection between work and nonwork domains, and gender issues. We tentatively conclude that work at home will not become a widespread trend, but there is sufficient interest in its use as a flexible work option in special cases that it should be examined more closely.
225 citations
IBM1
TL;DR: Hill et al. as discussed by the authors explored the influence of mobile telework on family life as reported by teleworkers in a large national corporation (n = 157) and compared to an equivalent group of office workers from the same corporation.
Abstract: WORK AND FAMILY IN THE VIRTUAL OFFICE PERCEIVED INFLUENCES OF MOBILE TELEWORK* E. Jeffrey Hill, Alan J. Hawkins, and Brent C. Miller** Telework is a rapidly emerging reality in the workplace. This study explores the influence of mobile telework on family life as reported by teleworkers in a large national corporation (n = 157). In addition, this group is compared to an equivalent group of office workers (n = S9) from the same corporation. Mobile teleworkers reported much greater work flexibility. Some reported that their families thrived because of this flexibility. Others reported that their families struggled because workplace and schedule flexibility blurred the boundaries between work and family life. Suggestions are given for how family life educators might help mobile teleworkers ease the transition from traditional work to the virtual office. Watching masses of peasants scything a field three hundred years ago, only a madman would have dreamed that the time would have come when the fields would be depopulated, when people would crowd into urban factories to earn their daily bread. And only a madman would have been right. Today it takes an act of courage to suggest that our biggest factories and office towers may, within our lifetimes, stand half empty, reduced to use as ghostly warehouses or converted into living space. Yet this is precisely what the new mode of production makes possible: a return to cottage industry on a new, higher, electronic basis, and with it a new emphasis on the home as the center of society. ([my emphasis) Toffler, 1980, p. 210) Since Toffler's (1980) Third Wave, many futurists have written about the promise of the "electronic cottage" to benefit family life. Advocates for family-friendly work policies have long called upon companies and governments to establish work-at-home programs as part of a flexible work agenda (Galinsky, 1992). The recent advent of truly portable electronic work tools and significant changes in work organizations have created the opportunity for millions of information workers to move into this frontier of flexible work. Still, there has been little research on how flexibility in the timing and location of work affects family life. The impetus for this exploratory study is the need to look at the perceived influence of the virtual office on the personal/family life of the mobile teleworker. The Beginnings of Telework The general term for doing work away from the office via telecommunications equipment is telework (see Bureau of National Affairs, 1992; Callentine, 1995; Nilles, 1994; Olson, 1988; Pitt-Catsouphes & Marchetta, 1991; U.S. Department of Transportation, 1993). Although telework was foreseen as early as 1950, it did not become practical until the advent of personal computers and portable modems in the early 1970s (U.S. Department of Transportation, 1993). In 1973, the term telecommuting was introduced to emphasize that telework could eventually replace the daily commute to the work site (Nilles, 1994). Companies first seriously considered the possibility of telework as a means to make them less vulnerable to fuel shortages during the OPEC oil crisis in the early and mid 1970s (Tolbert & Simons, 1994). During the last decade, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of American teleworkers. Ten years ago there were fewer than one million employees who teleworked away from the office at least 8 hours per week during normal business hours (Callentine, 1995). The number of teleworkers has grown more than eightfold, to about 8.4 million today (Henkoff, 1995). The number is projected to grow about 10% to 20% per year through the end of the 1990s to about 10-20 million (Greengard, 1994). Most early teleworkers were telecommuters who voluntarily worked from home one or more days per week. In recent years, a companymandated virtual office form of telework, sometimes called mobile telework, has been a significant factor in the increase of teleworkers (Greengard, 1994). …
202 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the effect of selected variables on telecommuting productivity and satisfaction was investigated and a significant negative correlation between the ratio of tele-commuting hours to total work hours was revealed.
Abstract: While telecommuting has received considerable attention in recent years, most of the discussion is descriptive and the empirical investigations have been limited. Accordingly, the purpose of this study was to determine the effect of selected variables on telecommuting productivity and satisfaction. Respondents (N=97) were from eleven different public and private organizations. Five research propositions were examined. Among the findings, telecommuter satisfaction with the performance evaluation system was significantly correlated with both telecommuting productivity and satisfaction. Technical and emotional support received from the telecommuting supervisor was significantly correlated with telecommuting satisfaction, and the negataive correlation between family disruptions and telecommuting satisfaction was also statistically significant. A significant negative correlation between the ratio of telecommuting hours to total work hours and telecommuting productivity was revealed. Interestingly, child care issues and most demographic and occupational characteristics were not significantly correlated with either telecommuting productivity or satisfaction. A detailed discussion of the implications of the results is provided.
100 citations
Journal Article•
TL;DR: Workplace Violence Adult Violence Adult Offender Adult Victim Violence Prevention Prevention Recommendations 06-06 as discussed by the authors The U.S. Justice Department recently proclaimed the workplace the most dangerous place to be.
Abstract: In February 1992, PERSONNEL JOURNAL reported on HR's role in dealing with the aftermath of murder on the job o a phenomenon on the rise. Since that time, murder and other violent crimes have escalated in the workplace to the point that the U.S. Justice Department recently proclaimed the workplace the most dangerous place to be. As a result, today's HR must be proactive with prevention. (Abstract Adapted from Source: Personnel Journal, 1994. Copyright © 1994 by Personnel Journal) Workplace Violence Adult Violence Adult Offender Adult Victim Violence Prevention Prevention Recommendations 06-06
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