A systemic approach to interpersonal relationships and activities among French teleworkers

Psychological Distress, Japanese Teleworkers, and Supervisor Support During COVID-19

OBJECTIVE

During the COVID-19 pandemic, teleworking became the new workplace norm, creating a new challenge for workplace communication. This study investigated the association between source-specific workplace social support and psychological distress among Japanese teleworkers and nonteleworkers.

METHODS

A total of 15,045 workers were extracted from a cross-sectional web-based survey that assessed psychological distress, workplace social support from supervisors and coworkers. After grouping participants into four groups based on their positions (managers, staff members) and teleworking arrangements (teleworking, nonteleworking), multiple logistic regression analyses were performed separately.

RESULTS

Teleworkers with less supervisor support demonstrated the highest risk of psychological distress (adjusted odds ratio = 2.55, P = 0.024).

CONCLUSIONS

Insufficient supervisor support for teleworking staff members may be a key occupational risk factor for psychological distress in the postpandemic future.

Coworking spaces vs. home: Does employees' experience of the negative aspects of working from home predict their intention to telework in a coworking space?

In this study, we investigated the determinants of employees' intention to telework in a coworking space, with the assumption that employees' experience with the negative aspects of teleworking from home would impact their intention to telework in a coworking space in the future. A sample of 268 French teleworkers answered an online questionnaire measuring their experience of several negative aspects of teleworking from home (e.g., perceived social isolation), and their opinion toward teleworking in a coworking space (perceived usefulness, perceived feasibility, attitude and behavioral intention). Results indicate that perceived social isolation and perceived lack of working comfort when working from home directly impacted how useful participants perceived teleworking in a coworking space to be, and indirectly their intention to telework in a coworking space in the future. Budget, management agreement and job compatibility were, however, identified as factors mitigating participants' intention to telework in a coworking space, even if perceived as potentially beneficial.

Benefits and Risks of Teleworking from Home: The Teleworkers’ Point of View

Using a qualitative research-based approach, this study aimed to understand (i) the way home-based teleworkers in France perceive and organize their professional activities and workspaces, (ii) their teleworking conditions, (iii) the way they characterize the modalities and the nature of their interactions with their professional circle, and more broadly (iv) their quality of life ‘at work’. We performed a lexical and morphosyntactic analysis of interviews conducted with 28 teleworkers (working part-time or full-time from home) before the COVID-19 crisis and the associated establishment of emergency telework. Our results confirm and complement findings in the literature. Participant discourses underlined the beneficial effects of teleworking in terms of professional autonomy, flexibility, concentration, efficiency, performance, productivity, and being able to balance their professional and private lives. Nevertheless, they also highlighted the deleterious effects of teleworking on temporal workload, setting boundaries for work, work-based relationships and socio-professional integration. Despite the study limitations, our findings highlight the need for specific research-based and practical strategies to support the implementation of a sustainable telework organization in the post-COVID-19 pandemic era.

Influence of Working From Home During the COVID-19 Crisis and HR Practitioner Response

The pandemic has changed the way people work, and more and more people are choosing to work from home (WFH). Unlike traditional work patterns, this approach has limitations and has had a significant impact on both organizations and individuals. It also brings many challenges to the work of HR practitioners. HR practitioners, as key players in strategic human resource management, need to take advantage of management innovations under the crisis to improve employees’ work flexibility and effectively address the impact of working from home. This study aims to address the need for employee skill improvement, psychological stress relief, work-family balance, and company culture reinforcement from an HRM perspective because of the impact of WFH work patterns during the COVID-19 crisis.

Teleworking in Times of COVID-19: Effects on the Acquisition of Personal Resources

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many employees to introduce different degrees of teleworking, leading to a transformation of the psychosocial work environment. In this study, we analyzed whether the relationship between a labor resource, social support, and a personal resource, vigor at work, is affected by the work modality (face-to-face, hybrid that includes face-to-face work and telework time, and telework caused by the current pandemic situation). Five hundred and forty-three employees answered an online questionnaire about their perceptions of the levels of social support, vigor experienced in the last month, and work modality. Seniority in the organization and the gender of the employees were controlled for. The model fit was significant [F _{(7, 535)} = 20.816, p < 0.001], accounting for 21% of the variation in vigor (R ² = 0.21). The interaction was also significant [F _{(2, 535)} = 4.13, p < 0.05], with an increase of 1% in the explanation of the variance in vigor at work (ΔR ² = 0.01). Differences were found in the positive relationship between levels of social support and vigor at work, among the face-to-face and telework modalities (hybrid and telework), but not between teleworking modalities. As a result, we posit that the different forms of telework moderate (buffer) the relationship experienced between labor resources (social support) and personal resources (vigor at work). This implies that, for the design of teleworking conditions, it is necessary to provide work resources similar to those in face-to-face settings, such as social support.

Parental peritraumatic distress and feelings of parental competence in relation to COVID-19 lockdown measures: What is the impact on children's peritraumatic distress?

The objective of this study was to measure, via an online survey, the peritraumatic impact of COVID-19-related lockdown measures on parents and their sense of parental competence, as well as the link with their children's peritraumatic distress. We investigated the links between the distress felt by the parent and the distress felt by the child in the lockdown from March to May 2020. Participants were 287 parents and 161 children. The results of our study indicated that there is a significant association between the parents' and the children's peritraumatic stress. We also found a significant relationship between the sense of parental competence and the trauma suffered as a result of the lockdown. We also showed that people who usually felt more stressed have lower peritraumatic distress. In addition, the data indicated that mothers were more affected than fathers by the lockdown, whereas there was no difference between girls and boys in the sample of children. The peritraumatic feelings appeared to be more related to the difficulty of combining teleworking with the daily management of children than to the fear of the virus itself. All these results bear witness to the differences in the experience of lockdown between mothers and fathers, and the impact on their children's well-being.

The Experience of Teleworking with Dogs and Cats in the United States during COVID-19

Simple Summary

During Spring 2020, the public health threat created by the novel coronavirus (SAR-CoV-2), commonly referenced as COVID-19, prompted employers across the United States to allow, encourage, or require their employees to work from home. This exploratory, survey-based study compared individuals’ perceptions of working from home and from their employer’s workplace, paying particular attention to how these experiences differed for individuals with and without dogs and/or cats. Participants reported they had more opportunities to socialize with other people and experienced less work-family conflict when they worked at the office. When working from home, participants indicated they spent more quality time with their pets and family members, and compared to those without dogs, dog owners were more likely to report socializing with others and getting a healthy amount of physical activity. Follow-up studies are needed to investigate whether these findings persist after the threat of COVID-19 abates and to see how characteristics of pet owners (e.g., personality, job type) and pets (e.g., species, age, behavior) impact any benefits or costs associated with being in the company of pets while teleworking.

Abstract

In Spring of 2020, the novel coronavirus (SAR-CoV-2) prompted an unprecedented number of individuals across the United States to begin working from home. Prior research has identified both positive and negative impacts of teleworking on employee well-being, and this study built on that research to explore perceptions regarding how companion animals factor into the teleworking experience. Individuals who had experience working from home and from their employer’s office completed an online survey about those experiences. Participants reported spending more quality time with their companion animals and family members when they worked from home. Furthermore, when working from home, individuals with dogs were more likely than those without dogs to report they socialized with other people, got a healthy amount of physical activity, and took at least one 15-min walk during the workday. Some participants, particularly those in households containing both dogs and cats, indicated that their pets created distractions during the workday. Future studies can build on this research by investigating whether the findings persist once the novel coronavirus is no longer a threat, and by paying close attention to the characteristics of pets, owners, and household dynamics that may influence the effects of pet ownership on the teleworking experience.

Far Away, So Close? The Role of Destructive Leadership in the Job Demands–Resources and Recovery Model in Emergency Telework

During the Covid-19 pandemic, people started teleworking intensively, which has led to some benefits in terms of economic continuity, but also some complaints. International teams of scholars have pointed out the new work-related challenges, underlining leaders’ role in successfully managing them. This study aimed at investigating the role of destructive leadership in the job demands–resources and recovery model during the Covid-19 pandemic. In detail, this study intended to assess (1) whether destructive leadership is positively associated with off-work-hours technology-assisted job demand (off-TAJD) and cognitive demands, as well as whether it decreases autonomy, (2) whether two demands—off-TAJD and cognitive demands—and two resources—social support and autonomy—are respectively negatively and positively related to recovery, and (3) whether recovery mediates the relationship between demands, resources, and exhaustion. A total of 716 French remote workers (61% were women) took part in this study. Data were collected using a self-report questionnaire. A multi-group structural equation model was used to test the hypotheses. The findings confirmed a significant association between destructive leadership, the two job demands, and autonomy; furthermore, all three variables mediated the relationship between destructive leadership and recovery. The findings showed the key role played by recovery as a mediator between, on one hand, off-TAJD, cognitive demands, autonomy, and social support, and, on the other hand, exhaustion. This study highlighted the role of destructive leadership, job resources, job demands, and recovery as determinants of exhaustion, illustrating their relationships in a sample of remote workers. Practical implications are discussed.

Co-workers working from home and individual and team performance

The number of firms supporting work from home has risen dramatically as advances in communication technology have fundamentally transformed the way humans cooperate. A growing literature addresses working from home, but focuses only on individual workers, overlooking potential influence of co-worker engagement. Our aim is to study the influence of co-workers working from home on individual and team performance. We use unique data from a large-scale survey involving nine European countries, 259 establishments, 869 teams and 11,011 employees to show that the impact of working from home by co-workers on performance is considerable and has remained hidden in past studies because they did not account for co-worker effects. While working from home may be useful for some workers, it does bring issues for them as well. Specifically, we demonstrate that co-workers working from home negatively impact employee performance. Moreover, team performance is worse when more co-workers are working from home.

Identifying Work-Related Internet's Uses-at Work and Outside Usual Workplaces and Hours-and Their Relationships With Work-Home Interface, Work Engagement, and Problematic Internet Behavior

Many studies have analyzed the uses of information and communication technologies (ICTs) for work, with some focusing on use at the office and others on use outside the traditional workplace and workday. However, there is little research encompassing all work uses of ICTs, both in and out of the office, and on the ways in which they affect employees' attitudes toward their work and quality of life. Thus, the present study aims to (a) explore the links between intensity, places, and time periods of using the Internet for work; (b) examine whether Internet uses for work are related to the perceived impact of work on personal life, work engagement, and Internet addiction. An empirical study was conducted based on a questionnaire survey of 502 executives. We measured their use of the Internet for business purposes both in and outside of the standard workday/workplace; the perceived impact of work on their personal life; their work engagement; and their relationship to the Internet. Four categories of Internet use for work were identified (Cluster analysis). They differed with respect to intensity, places, and time periods dedicated to Internet uses (at standard workplace, at home, while traveling; during a typical workday, a day off, or vacation). The results obtained from Multinomial Logistic Regression show that technological devices provided by the employer and personal uses of the Internet are related to the intensity, places, and time periods of executives' work-related Internet uses. Furthermore, ANCOVAs reveal that high-intensive, extensive, and porous Internet uses for work appear to foster the permeability between work and personal life, diminish managers' dedication and vigor at work, and favor Internet addiction. Based on these findings, we discuss the importance of the "right to disconnect" and prevention programs regarding Internet uses, two major issues that attract the attention of organizations as well as public health authorities.