Discretionary technology bootlegging tensions in institutional healthcare work

We explore individuals who take some of their technology use ‘underground’, described as ‘bootlegging’, to enhance healthcare work. We find that healthcare professionals’ informal use of mobile applications in healthcare work sometimes ‘sticks out’ and this produces professional identity tensions: (1) conflict with perceptions of professional behaviour, and (2) defilement of expert judgment. Our analysis, moreover, reveals that identity work (i.e. ‘accepting’ and ‘sensemaking’) provides a coping mechanism to deal with these unresolved professional identity tensions. This paper contributes to a better understanding of the constitutive entanglements and two‐way interactions of discretionary technology bootlegging, professional identity and autonomy in institutional healthcare work.     

Boundary management in an ICT‐enabled project‐based organising context

This paper explores the boundaries that emerge and exist within an information and communication technology (ICT)‐enabled project‐based organising context and the ways knowledge workers manage these boundaries through the use of technology. This is done through an exploratory qualitative case study of an early instance of the phenomenon in a knowledge‐intensive professional services organisation. Through the experiences of a group of knowledge workers who started to work in project‐based ways that were highly mediated by ICT, this study aims to understand the boundaries that they faced and the practices they undertook to manage these boundaries. In so doing, this study contributes to the existing literature on new forms of work and organisation, particularly on the issue of boundaries where ICT‐enabled project teams are used. In particular, this study extends our current understanding of boundaries through expanding the lens of investigation beyond a predominant focus on work–home boundaries and considers boundaries within the work sphere.     

Why and When Are the Self‐Employed More Satisfied with Their Work?

Analysis confirms that the self-employed are more satisfied with their jobs because their work provides more autonomy, flexibility, and skill utilization and greater job security. These underlying mechanisms have been stable over the last 30 years and are not due simply to personality differences. The self-employed job satisfaction advantage is relatively small or nonexistent among managers and members of the established professions—occupations where organizational workers have relatively high autonomy and skill utilization.     

Controlling teleworkers: supervision and flexibility revisited

This article revisits the issue of control and autonomy in telework using interviews with professional, managerial and sales teleworkers in a large Canadian telecommunications company. It finds that the changes in control and autonomy are limited to restructuring of the work schedules and the differences across teleworkers are reproduced.     

Work Pressure in Europe 1996–2001: Trends and Determinants

Diverse theories have predicted a trend towards growing work pressure in advanced capitalist societies, while pointing to quite distinct causal factors. This paper seeks to assess these arguments using data from two surveys of employees in European Union member‐states carried out in 1996 and in 2001. It finds there is no evidence of a trend towards higher work pressure over this period. There is, however, support for some of the main arguments about the types of factors that affect work pressure: for instance, skill, job control, new technology and current job security are clearly important. But the trends in job control and job security have not been those predicted, while changes in another major determinant — the length of working hours — have tended to reduce work pressure. There are substantial and relatively stable differences in work pressure between countries, but to a considerable extent, these reflect compositional differences with respect to the main determinants of work pressure.     

Flexible work designs and employee well‐being: examining the effects of resources and demands

Advances in communication technology continue to expand the possibilities for redesigning work environments to allow for temporal and spatial flexibility. Although flexible work designs (FWDs) are typically launched with high expectations, recent research shows that FWDs also pose challenges to employees and can even impede employee well‐being. Based on the Job Demands–Resources model, we argue that FWDs offer both advantages (FWD‐related resources) and challenges (FWD‐related demands) to employee well‐being. The results (n = 999) show that FWDs are related to employee well‐being through several positive and one negative pathways. FWDs are positively associated with employee well‐being through enhanced work/life balance, autonomy, and effective communication and negatively associated with employee well‐being through increased interruptions. Thus, we introduce a framework that reveals the underlying positive and negative mechanisms in the relationship between FWDs and employee well‐being.     

The role of ICTs in the servitisation and degradation of IT professional work

Recently IT work has been subjected to management approaches that apply production methods to service work. Specialised information and communication technologies (ICTs) used by IT professionals have played an important role in this ‘service turn’, but this has not been adequately explored in the literature. Via a qualitative study of IT professionals situated across the servitised IT functions of five UK‐based organisations, this article considers how these ICTs are inscribed with managerial logics that afford control benefits to managers while undermining professional autonomy and job quality. The article makes two main contributions to the literature. Firstly, it sheds light on how ICTs introduced into organisational IT functions support managerial control objectives and impact the job quality of IT professionals. Secondly, it suggests that ICTs may infect the logic of professionalism that takes pride in the quality of the work performance with a dominant managerial logic that places an emphasis on meeting management objectives.     

Restructuring Managerial Labour in the USA,the UK and Japan: Challenging the Salience of ‘Varieties of Capitalism’

This article provides a cross‐national, qualitative investigation into the experiences of middle managers in large organizations in the USA, the UK and Japan, following organizational restructuring. Despite well‐documented national differences in administrative heritage, institutional regimes or ‘varieties of capitalism’, our data point towards considerable similitude across the three countries in terms of a general expression of the need for change, and the concrete impacts of organizational reforms on managerial work. Specifically we analyse the changing nature of work roles, career paths, working hours and spans of control of mid‐level managers in five large firms in each of the three countries. The data demonstrate that middle managers in all three countries face fundamental changes to key areas of their work experience. In Japan, although changes do not amount to a genuine shift towards ‘Anglo‐Saxon’ institutions or business practices, the robust use of organizational reforms with very similar aims and underpinning assumptions to those used in the USA and the UK entails similar impacts in terms of work processes of middle managers across the three nations. This shared experience involved the augmentation of middle management skill levels, responsibilities and span of control, but alongside the downgrading of career expectations, and increased workload and work intensity. We argue that these changes are in keeping with some, but not all, of the features explained and predicted in Bravermanian labour process theory.     

Skilled maintenance trades under lean manufacturing: Evidence from the car industry

This article explores how skilled maintenance trades have fared under lean automotive manufacturing, a cohort of workers relatively neglected in the literature. Historically, such trades possessed a distinct ‘craft consciousness’ derived from apprenticed-acquired skill, autonomy in job execution, strict job boundaries and relative occupational status and prestige. The article assesses how lean has impacted this craft tradition over time, drawing on a case study of one UK car plant to assess its trajectory across three decades. Four different skilled cohorts—electrical, mechanical, control engineers and die maintenance fitters—are examined to gauge respective trends in skill, autonomy, demarcation and status. While the study finds variation in experiences across different trades, the general trend points to a deterioration in work conditions on all four benchmarks of assessment. The article concludes by inferring implications for the future trajectory of skilled trades considering recent accounts provided in Industry 4.0 narratives.     

De‐escalation Mechanisms in High‐technology Product Innovation

Many decision‐makers struggle to reduce commitment to failing endeavors. While de‐escalation mechanisms have been documented and tested in information technology, accounting, psychology, and organizational behavior, little work has addressed de‐escalation in innovation. This study identifies and examines the applicability of de‐escalation mechanisms specifically in new product development (NPD) projects. Initially, we conducted an extensive literature review to identify de‐escalation mechanisms found in research across different academic disciplines. Subsequently, we conducted a qualitative study using semistructured interviews to gather primary data. In total, using a sample of organizations that compete in high‐technology industries, 31 managers and engineers in 15 NPD projects that were terminated prior to completion were interviewed regarding mechanisms used to de‐escalate commitment to failing new product innovation projects. Several mechanisms reportedly used for innovation projects parallel those identified in the previous literature. More importantly, the authors uncover novel and previously undocumented ways to discontinue or redirect poorly performing projects. Specifically, internal competitions, feature‐level de‐escalation, continual assumption assessment, benchmarking, roadmaps, and comprehensive product testing are particularly well suited for innovation projects. These findings extend the body of extant literature on de‐escalation of commitment to include innovation, notably in high‐technology settings. The study also highlights that organizations may want to accept or even encourage failure, thereby increasing the efficacy of resource use. Implications for further research and practice are offered.     

Autonomy at work in the gig economy: analysing work status,work content and working conditions of independent professionals

This paper offers a critical perspective on the debate surrounding autonomy at work for a specific category of non‐standard workers: independent professionals. The increasing numbers now working this way as well as their spread into all sectors, industries and occupations, mean that their work arrangements can no longer be dismissed as non‐standard or atypical. Defining them by what they are not is quite simply no longer an option. Our paper examines the various components intertwined behind the taken‐for‐granted concept of autonomy. Drawing on debates from the legal through to the sociological and HR literatures, we identify three underlying dimensions to autonomy. When combined, they provide the basis for an analytical matrix that may assist policy makers, practitioners and individual workers to understand the challenges and opportunities linked to new ways of working.     

All in a day's work,at home: teleworkers’ management of micro role transitions and the work–home boundary

Based on boundary theory, this study analysed the cues and rituals home‐based teleworkers use to facilitate transitions between work and home roles. Qualitative findings revealed that teleworkers primarily engage in strategies aimed at segmenting work from home roles, although some utilise cues to integrate work and home. Teleworkers used time, space, technology and communication as cues to aid role transitions and manage the work–home boundary. Overall, teleworkers appeared to grapple with the tension between the desire for flexibility and the need for structure, and use cues and rites of passage in order to facilitate this balance. Female teleworkers were more likely to use segmenting cues relative to male teleworkers. Teleworkers with children living in the home were less likely to integrate work and home roles. Extensive teleworkers used space more frequently than less extensive teleworkers, but otherwise, both groups reported similar use of cues.     

Cross‐constituency Organizing in Canadian Unions

This article explores cross‐constituency organizing inside three Canadian unions that involves dual, parallel and integrated structures. It assesses these approaches with reference to the conceptual frame of intersectional political practice. In particular, this study highlights the institutionalization of intersectionality through constitutional, organizational and representational intersectionality. The paradigm of autonomy and integration is used to identify effective mechanisms for cross‐constituency vehicles. Cross‐constituency organizing is a form of coalition‐building inside unions It is a vehicle for building solidarities across identities and advancing equity organizing in Canadian unions that supports, at one and the same time, union revitalization and the union equity project.     

Online boundary work tactics: an affordance perspective

Studies of work/life balance have focussed on offline settings, and even though technology is considered as a boundary‐influencing feature, social media have not been the focus. Social technologies challenge the relationship between work and private life in new ways, due to their identified affordances: visibility, persistence, association and editability (Treem and Leonardi, 2012). In this paper, we present the results of a study of social media use (Facebook and Twitter) by employees of non‐governmental organisations (NGOs), and show how, through their affordances, these technologies influence the relationship and boundaries between work and non‐work, increasing visibility and reducing individual privacy. Consequently, we observe boundary work tactics that aim to protect private life from both public and professional scrutiny, in prohibitive, reactive or active ways. Our results call for organisations to develop explicit policies or guidelines for social media use, in both their own interests and those of their employees.     

Uberizing the Legal Profession? Lawyer Autonomy and Status in the Digital Legal Market

The online gig economy has disrupted many occupations in the past decade, but only more recently has it had an impact on professional fields. The recency of this trend indicates a need for understanding the impact of the online gig economy on professional workers. Using interview data from lawyers who work on one of China's most successful online legal service platforms, this study finds that supplementary income and flexibility are the two major motives for lawyers to work online. Nevertheless, when working online, lawyers face lower intra-professional status and lower professional autonomy. Despite its growth, the digital legal market is imposing a minimal threat to the traditional legal market due to the lack of interference in labour supply and demand between these two markets.     

Work Roles and Careers of R&D Scientists in Network Organizations

Despite the burgeoning literature on the network organization as a new mode of innovation, we know little about how the flow of knowledge across organizational boundaries is intertwined with careers. This study explores the implications of the network model of R&D organization for the work roles and careers of R&D scientists within the changing relationship between industry and the academia. It examines how firms seek to resolve the tension between science and business by developing closer human resource ties with universities. It argues that firms have sought to construct "extended" internal labour markets (EILMs) between themselves and the universities with which they collaborate, leading to the formation of a hybrid scientific community straddling the two sectors.     

Work and Volunteering: Longitudinal Relationships between Work‐Related Experiences and Volunteering Behaviour

This study examines the effect of work‐related experiences on employees’ engagement in community volunteering, using data from a British longitudinal panel of employees. Using a novel analytical approach that separates variation in volunteering due to within‐person changes in work conditions from variation due to between‐person work differences, we more robustly test existing and new hypotheses about the effects of work on volunteering. New to this literature, we find that commuting and satisfaction with job experiences are significant predictors of community volunteering, both the likelihood to volunteer and volunteering frequency. In turn, volunteering determinants previously explored with cross‐sectional data, such as managerial and professional jobs, employment sector and hourly paid contracts, are no longer statistically significant in the within‐person models. We discuss a number of important theoretical and practical consequences of these findings.     

Social media affordances in entry‐level employees’ socialization: employee agency in the management of their professional impressions and vulnerability during early stages of socialization

This study examined how entry‐level employees interacted with social media during three stages of organizational socialization. They navigated between four different media affordances (persistence, editability, visibility, and association) while experiencing them as both enabling and constraining in different socialization stages. Qualitative interview data analysis revealed during anticipatory socialization, job applicants realized visibility and persistence in relation to institutional and individualized socialization. During encounter, new employees managed personal and professional life boundaries carefully against the association and visibility affordances. Although some participants used both public and enterprise social media for obtaining job‐related information and understanding coworkers and company culture, during metamorphosis, most interviewees adopted passive information seeking strategies and experienced a paradoxical tension between the enabling and constraining affordances of social media. Findings are discussed with regards to employees’ exertion of agency in managing their professional impressions and coping with high levels of uncertainty and vulnerability during early stages of socialization.     

Working around technologies—invisible professionalism?

This study discusses how professionalism and work ethics influence how health care professionals work around new technologies. When people avoid using technologies, they are not necessarily ceasing to engage in their work activities. The workaround strategies presented here are rather practical expressions of professionals’ active encounter with the complexity of work situations, and can therefore be important signs of professional ethical judgement. Drawing on science and technology studies and the concept of invisible work, the study discusses workaround situations that arise in health care work in Denmark. The aim and contribution of the study is twofold. First, it attempts to revitalise the discussion on technology workaround strategies as responsible professionalism. Second, it will direct attention to and contribute to an understanding of how the normativity embedded in technological development in the health care sector is central to the work of health care professionals.     

Reputational Effectiveness in Cross-Functional Working Relationships

The work of innovation management involves cross‐functional coordination among specialists and managers with different work orientations, time horizons, professional backgrounds, and values ( Ford and Randolph, 1992 ). While strong connections across functions are critical for new product development success ( Green et al., 2000 ), some managers may be more adept at fostering effective cross‐functional relationships than others. In this article, the authors empirically examine the factors that distinguish reputationally effective innovation workers from their less effective peers. Drawing on the work of Tsui (1984, 1994) , reputational effectiveness is defined as the degree to which a manager has been responsive to the needs and expectations of constituents. This research examines the relational skills and interaction patterns of more (versus less) reputationally effective managers. A large business unit of a Fortune 500 telecommunications firm provided the context for our study. Using a two‐phase approach, the authors first captured the social network patterns of 268 managers from marketing, research and development (R&D), manufacturing, and other business functions that were involved in the new product development process. In addition, the reputational effectiveness of each person who was identified as a member of the network was measured. In the second phase, the authors examined the relational competencies (e.g., role‐taking ability, interpersonal control, openness) of the managers who participated in Phase I of the research. As predicted, the results indicate that role‐taking ability is related positively to a manager's reputational effectiveness. No support, however, was found for the relationship between interpersonal control and reputational effectiveness. Interestingly, the authors found evidence of an inverse relationship between openness and effectiveness. By sharing too much information—or alternatively information that does not relate to the task at hand—the reputational effectiveness of a manager is damaged. Importantly, the results reveal that the social network characteristics of a reputationally effective manager differ from those of less effective managers. Closeness centrality, a measure of the degree of access one has to other organizational members, was associated strongly with reputational effectiveness. The results demonstrate that managers who are successful in working across functions appreciate the cognitive and emotional perspectives of diverse constituents and develop relationship ties that provide them with ready access to others across the organization.