IS THIS (TELE)WORKING? A path model analysis of the relationship between telework, job demands and job resources, and sustainable employability

BACKGROUND

Technological advancements and the COVID-19 crisis have accelerated the adoption of telework, impacting employees' work dynamics. Moreover, an aging workforce emphasises the need for sustainable employability. With reference to the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) Model, this study explores how telework relates to job demands and job resources and, subsequently, to sustainable employability.

OBJECTIVE

The present study investigates the repercussions of increased telework on employees' sustainable employability. Hypotheses posit direct and indirect (i.e., mediated) relationships, providing insights for evidence-based telework policies.

METHODS

Data from 552 government employees was collected through an online survey. Data collection occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic when widespread teleworking was prevalent. A path model was employed to analyse associations between telework, job demands (specifically work pressure), job resources (social support, workplace communication, and role clarity), and sustainable employability dimensions, including vitality, work ability, and employability.

RESULTS

Our path model reveals that heightened telework was associated with elevated work pressure and diminished role clarity. Surprisingly, a positive association emerges between work pressure and sustainable employability. Notably, no significant relationship is found between telework, social support, and workplace communication. Role clarity is likely to be pivotal, positively influencing vitality and employability.

CONCLUSIONS

This study provides valuable insights into the effects of telework on job demands, resources, and sustainable employability. The unexpected positive association between work pressure and sustainable employability challenges conventional stressor paradigms. The relationships between telework, job demands, job resources, and sustainable employability uncovered in this study can contribute to evidence-based teleworking policies and strategies that support employee health and employability amidst evolving work structures.

Practical Considerations of Workplace Wellbeing Management under Post-Pandemic Work-from-Home Conditions

As a natural experiment or "stress test" on the rapidly shifting work environment from office to home during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, staff wellbeing has been considered as the most critical issue in organizational change management. Following an overview of the relevant literature and recent official statistics, this essay aims to (i) address the major considerations and challenges in light of the transformation and re-design of the mode of work in the new normal and (ii) inform practical decisions for overall staff wellbeing under post-pandemic work-from-home (WFH) conditions with recommendations. For the sake of both staff healthiness and safety, as well as organizational competitiveness, senior management should take reasonable steps to enhance occupational safety in their WFH policy in line with practical recommendations on five areas, namely, (i) ergonomics, (ii) stress and anxiety management, (iii) workplace boundaries, (iv) work-family conflicts, and (v) other factors regarding a negative work atmosphere (e.g., loneliness attack, burnout, and workplace violence) particularly on virtual platforms. With the suggested evidence-based practices on WFH initiatives, senior management could make a difference in optimizing the overall workplace wellbeing of staff after the pandemic.

Feeling Supported as a Remote Worker: The Role of Support from Leaders and Colleagues and Job Satisfaction in Promoting Employees' Work-Life Balance

Due to the increasing use of remote work, understanding the dynamics of employee support and its implications for job satisfaction and work-life balance is crucial. Utilizing the Conservation of Resources (COR) theory as a theoretical framework, this research investigated how feeling supported by leaders and colleagues at work fosters work-life balance and job satisfaction among remote employees. The study involved 635 remote workers (females = 61%, mean age, 46.7, SD = 11) from various service-based industries and public administration in Italy. Results from the structural equation model showed a total mediating effect of job satisfaction in the link between colleague support and work-life balance (χ2(22) = 68.923, p = 0.00, CFI = 0.973, TLI = 0.955, RMSEA = 0.059 (90% CI = 0.044-0.075, p = 0.158), SRMR = 0.030), emphasizing the role of interpersonal relationships within the workplace in enhancing remote workers' job satisfaction and, consequently, their work-life balance. Contrary to expectations, the study found no significant direct or indirect link between leader support and work-life balance. This research highlights the significance of fostering strong social connections and ensuring employee satisfaction to promote well-being and work-life balance in remote work arrangements.

The Influence of Workplace Violence, Psychosocial Working Conditions on Depressive Symptoms Among Female Workers in South Korea

Workers' depression is an important issue, with the prevalence higher in women than in men. This study aimed to identify the effects of workplace violence exposure and psychosocial working conditions on depressive symptoms in female workers in South Korea. This study included 15 605 female wageworkers who participated in the fifth Korean Working Conditions Survey. Logistic regression analyses were implemented to identify the factors that affected their depression. The female workers reported increased frequency of symptoms of depression when there was humiliating behavior from co-workers (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 1.999) or physical violence from clients (aOR = 1.609). In psychosocial working environments, they reported a greater frequency of depressive symptoms with high quantitative demands (aOR = 1.498), high emotional demands (aOR = 1.085), lower colleague's support (aOR = 1.566), or lack of support from supervisors at the workplace (aOR = 1.707). An emphasis should be put on preventing humiliating behaviors from co-workers as well as violence from clients in the workplace.

Receptivity towards Remote Service Delivery among Social Work Clients and Practitioners during COVID Times: A Systematic Review

PURPOSE

This systematic review aims to identify and synthesize the available evidence on the receptivity toward, perceived advantages and challenges of remote service delivery among social work clients and practitioners during the context of COVID-19.

METHOD

Two electronic databases were searched from 2020 to 2022. Identified papers were screened against the established eligibility criteria, yielding 15 papers. Two additional papers were further identified through hand-search. As heterogeneity of studies was high, a narrative synthesis was performed to summarize the overall evidence.

RESULTS

Our review provides evidence that remote service delivery holds the potential to increase access to services among selected client populations as well as promote a sense of empowerment for clients and opportunities for practice enhancement for practitioners.

DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION

The findings from our study highlighted the need for innovative solutions and practical considerations for ongoing remote service, including the careful considerations of social work clients' and practitioners' suitability, the need for provision of training and ongoing support to optimize practitioners' well-being. As the delivery of services transition to face-to-face or remain remote, further research is needed to assess the promise of remote practice in optimizing overall service delivery, while maintaining client-reported satisfaction.

A Systematic Review of the Impact of Remote Working Referenced to the Concept of Work-Life Flow on Physical and Psychological Health

BACKGROUND

COVID-19 accelerated the adoption of remote working in which employers' obligations for employees' health and well-being extended into the home. This paper reports on a systematic review of the health impacts of remote working within the context of COVID-19 and discusses the implications of these impacts for the future role of the occupational health nurse.

METHOD

The review protocol was registered with PROSPERO (CRD42021258517) and followed the PRISMA guidelines. The review covered 2020-2021 to capture empirical studies of remote working during the COVID-19 pandemic, their physical and psychological impacts and mediating factors.

RESULTS

Eight hundred and thirty articles were identified. After applying the inclusion criteria, a total of 34 studies were reviewed. Most studies showed low to very low strength of evidence using the GRADE approach. A minority of studies had high strength of evidence. These focused on the reduced risk of infection and negative effects in terms of reduced physical activity, increased sedentary activity, and increased screen time.

CONCLUSION/APPLICATION TO PRACTICE

The synergy of work and personal well-being with the accelerated expansion of remote working suggests a more active role in the lives of workers within the home setting on the part of occupational health nurses. That role relates to how employees organize their relationship to work and home life, promoting positive lifestyles while mitigating adverse impacts of remote working on personal well-being.

"Make it the done thing": an exploration of attitudes towards rest breaks, productivity and wellbeing while working from home

OBJECTIVE

Taking regular rest breaks while working positively impacts productivity and wellbeing. While home and hybrid working styles have become a popular choice for employees, the impact of, and perceptions towards, taking breaks while working at home is poorly understood. The current research aimed to explore attitudes towards taking rest breaks while working from home and capture levels of breaks taken, wellbeing and productivity in a sample of UK white-collar workers.

METHODS

A mixed method approach was applied where self-report data from an online survey were gathered from individuals (N = 140) from one organisation. Open-ended questions regarding attitudes and perceptions towards rest break behaviours were obtained. Further quantitative measures included the number of breaks taken while working from home, levels of productivity (measured by the Health and performance Presenteeism subscale) and mental wellbeing (measured by the Short Warwick-Edinburgh Mental wellbeing scale). Both quantitative and qualitative analysis approaches were applied.

RESULTS

Qualitative responses indicated two overarching themes (1) Personal and (2) Organisational sat above four further themes including Movement outside, Structure of home working, Home environment and Digital presence. Additionally, quantitative findings indicated that the number of breaks taken outside was associated with positive changes in wellbeing.

CONCLUSION

Employers could aim to support employees working from home in taking outside breaks through flexible working patterns, authentic leadership, and a change in company social norms around break behaviours. Such organisational changes could help to improve workforce productivity and wellbeing.

Homeworking and Employee Job Stress and Work Engagement: A Multilevel Analysis from 34 European Countries

Working from home (WFH) has had both positive and negative impacts on the work conduct. To maximise the benefits of homeworking, previous literature mainly focuses on creating self-help strategies for homeworkers to reduce work stress and maintain work engagement. However, fewer studies take on the policymaker perspective and evaluate optimal working conditions in the homeworking context. Using the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model, this study evaluates the effects of various work characteristics (job demands and resources) on the stress and engagement of infrequent and frequent homeworkers. Using the sixth European Working Conditions Survey 2015 which contains 5090 participants from 34 European countries, we studied 6 job demands and 5 job resources via Exploratory Factor Analysis. After testing the model's fitness using Confirmatory Factor Analysis, multiple mixed-effects models were used to test the job demands and resource effects on worker stress and engagement. Dominance Analysis was then used to identify the relative importance of each job demand and resource when explaining employee stress and engagement. We found emotional demands, time pressure, and workload to be the top three demand factors that cause work stress across the groups. Other than daily homeworkers, a positive and fair social climate is the most prominent resource able to boost job engagement across all of the other groups. By identifying the homeworkers' most influential demands and resources, this study will help managers better understand the steps to take to provide healthy job conditions for homeworkers.

Exploring the relationship between working from home, mental and physical health and wellbeing: a systematic review

Background

Understanding the impact of working from home on health and wellbeing is of great interest to employers and employees alike, with a strong need for up-to-date guidance. The aim of this systematic review was to identify, appraise and synthesise existing research evidence that explores the impact of home working on health and wellbeing outcomes for working people and health inequalities in the population.

Methods

We conducted a systematic review of qualitative, quantitative and observational studies. We searched databases, reference lists and UK grey literature and completed citation searching of included papers. We extracted and tabulated key data from the included papers and synthesised narratively. Factors associated with the health and wellbeing of people working at home reported in the literature were displayed by constructing mind maps of each individual factor which had been identified. The findings were combined with an a priori model to develop a final model, which was validated in consultation with stakeholders.

Results

Of 96 studies which were found to meet the inclusion criteria for the review, 30 studies were published before the COVID-19 pandemic and a further 66 were published during the pandemic. The quality of evidence was limited by the study designs employed by the authors, with the majority of studies being cross-sectional surveys (n = 59). For the most part, for studies which collected quantitative data, measures were self-reported. The largest volume of evidence identified consisted of studies conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic which looked at factors which influence the relationship between working from home and measures relating to mental health and wellbeing. Fifteen studies which considered the potential for working at home to have different effects for different subgroups suggested that working at home may have more negative consequences during the COVID-19 pandemic for women and in particular, mothers. There was very little evidence on age (two studies), ethnicity (one study), education or income (two studies) in terms of moderating home working effects, and very limited evidence from before the COVID-19 pandemic. The concept of enforced working from home and having 'no choice' was reported in only one paper prior to the pandemic and two papers reporting on working from home as a result of COVID-19. However, the concept of lack of choice around working from home was implicit in much of the literature - even though it was not directly measured. There were no clear patterns of wellbeing measures which changed from positive to negative association (or vice versa) during the pandemic.

Limitations

The quality of the evidence base was very much limited by study designs, particularly for studies published during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the majority of studies consisting of data collected by cross-sectional surveys (often online). Due to the rapidly expanding nature of the evidence on this topic, it is possible that new studies were published after the final citation searches were conducted.

Discussion

The evidence base for the factors which influence the relationship between home working and health-related outcomes has expanded significantly as a result of the need for those whose work could be done from home to work at home during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our findings suggest that there are factors relating to the external context, the role of employers and the circumstances of the employee which contribute to determining whether someone works at home and what the associated impacts on health and wellbeing may be. Learning from the COVID-19 lockdown experience will be important to inform future policy on home and hybrid working.

Future work

There is a need for better-quality studies of the health impact of home working, in particularly studies which recruit a range of participants who are representative of the working population and which are designed to minimise sampling/recruitment biases and response biases.

Funding

This project was funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Public Health Research programme (project reference 18/93 PHR Public Health Review Team) and will be published in full in Public Health Research; Vol. 11, No. 4. See the NIHR Journals Library website for further project information. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care.

Study registration

This study is registered as PROSPERO 2021 CRD42021253474.

Factors Driving the Workplace Well-Being of Individuals from Co-Located, Hybrid, and Virtual Teams: The Role of Team Type as an Environmental Factor in the Job Demand-Resources Model

(1) Background: An essential task for public health and industrial and organizational psychology specialists is maintaining employees' workplace well-being. This has become more difficult with pandemic-induced changes (i.e., the shift to remote work and the rise of hybrid teams). This research adopts a team perspective to explore the issue of workplace well-being drivers. It is hypothesized that the team type (co-located, hybrid, or virtual) should be recognized as a unique environmental factor, resulting in the need for different resources for members of these teams to maintain their well-being. (2) Methods: A correlational study was conducted to systematically compare the relationship (its significance and importance) of a wide range of demands and resources with the comprehensively measured workplace well-being of members of co-located, hybrid, and virtual teams. (3) Results: The results confirmed the hypothesis. The significant drivers of well-being in each team type were different, and the ranking of the most important drivers within each team type varied. (4) Conclusions: Team type should be considered a unique environmental factor, even for individuals from different job families and organizations. This factor should be considered in practice and research employing the Job Demand-Resources model.

Positioning Technostress in the JD-R Model Perspective: A Systematic Literature Review

This paper aims to describe the effects of Technostress on employees' well-being and productivity. We adopted the Job Demands Resources Model as a theoretical framework to analyze the "Technostress" phenomenon in order to clarify whether and how technology can be considered a job demand, a job resource, or part of the effects of personal resources in the workplace. The sources search and selection process was conducted according to the PRISMA guidelines and regarded papers published from 2010 to 2022. Overall, the findings show that most selected papers consider ICT a job demand negatively affecting human behavior, thoughts, and attitudes. In contrast, some report that ICT acts as a job resource, thus reducing the impact of job demands and their physiological and psychological costs. Finally, a third category of studies does not consider the effects of ICT itself but gives more space to the interaction among ICT, the organizational context in which it is used, and the personal characteristics of ICT users. More specifically, the findings show how individual features and organizational procedures can shape the interpretations employees make about their ICT-related experiences at work and, consequently, their performance or well-being. Findings suggest that when ICT tools are strategically planned and used within organizations, they can enrich the employee experience at work, positively affecting the individual and the organizational level.

Telework: A Social and Emotional Perspective of the Impact on Employees' Wellbeing in the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic gives us the largest telework experiment ever conducted globally, that will most likely leave visible and lasting marks on the organization of the labor market in the future. The purpose of this approach is to investigate the wellbeing from the social and emotional perspective of the individual, considering relevant relational communication, emotional dimension, work intensity, organization, autonomy and work-life balance, customized in the context of teleworking. The information was collected using a semi-structured questionnaire. The wellbeing assessment was performed based on the correlation analysis and the regression analysis. The results of the studies reveal that the existence of adequate communication and work-life balance ensure the wellbeing of telework employees, while the increase in work intensity degrades it. Furthermore, good communication moderates the relationship between organizational skills and wellbeing. The comparative analysis of wellbeing in relation to the explanatory variables considered by including the gender and age perspective reveals the existence of different configurations, with specific signs and statistical meanings.

Working from home during the COVID 19 pandemic: a longitudinal examination of employees' sense of community and social support and impacts on self-rated health

BACKGROUND

The COVID 19 pandemic resulted in the introduction of public health measures including mandated and recommended work from home orders to reduce transmission. This provided a unique opportunity to examine sense of community and social support within the workplace and self-rated general health. This paper examines employees' workplace sense of community and social support across one year of the COVID 19 pandemic and associated self-rated general health.

METHODS

Analysis of longitudinal data (October 2020, May 2021, and November 2021) from the Employees Working from Home study conducted in Victoria, Australia during the COVID 19 pandemic was undertaken. Trajectory analyses were used to describe workplace sense of community and social support over time. Multinomial logistic regression was used to determine the associations between demographics, gender, caring responsibilities, and group membership based on the Growth Mixture Modelling. Generalised Mixed Models were used to measure effects of sense of community and social support on self-rated health.

RESULTS

Increasing sense of community and social support in the workplace resulted in increased self-rated health. Trajectory analysis found two stable and distinct groups for sense of community. Social support varied with time; however, trajectory membership was not dependent on gender or caring responsibilities and had no relationship with return to the office.

CONCLUSION

Sense of community and social support in the workplace are important determinants of employees' health, and as such, workplace strategies to improve sense of community and social support are required not only for employees working from home, but also those who have returned to the office, particularly as hybrid work arrangements become more common.

Evaluation of Work Mode and Its Importance for Home-Work and Work-Home Relationships: The Role of Resilience, Coping with Stress, and Passion for Work

The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated and facilitated the introduction of telework in organizations. This has also impacted the workers' relationship between work and private life. The aim of the current study was to examine the links between resilience and mode of work (stationary vs. remote) and the work-home and home-work relationships, and whether they are mediated by passion for work and strategies of coping with stress. The study was carried out on a sample of 1251 participants from Great Britain, India, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, and Vietnam. The following measures were used: The Survey Work-Home Interaction, The Brief Resilience Coping Scale, The Passion Scale, and the Brief COPE. Results showed that the more stationary the mode of work, the lower the intensity of the negative influence of personal life on work. Resilience was revealed to have a positive effect on worker functioning. The study also showed a relationship between education and gender and passion for work. Finally, the importance of furthering the knowledge on the home-work and work-home relationships among teleworkers is discussed.

How do remote workers perform during COVID-19 lockdowns? Examining professional isolation, cynicism and psychological hardiness

Purpose

With the spread of COVID-19, governments have initiated lockdown procedures and forced organizations to switch to remote working. Employees working remotely in isolated and confined situations are experiencing great stress and uncertainty. This study aims to investigate how remote workers perform during lockdowns.

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing on social information processing theory, this study developed and tested hypotheses linking professional isolation, cynicism and task performance. This study was comprised of 497 remote workers in the financial industry in China.

Findings

The findings revealed that professional isolation is positively related to cynicism, and cynicism is negatively related to task performance. Cynicism mediates the relationship between professional isolation and task performance. The results indicated that psychological hardiness moderated the mediation effect of professional isolation on task performance through cynicism.

Practical implications

This research offers implications for managers and practitioners on reducing employees' feeling of isolation through effective communication, collaboration and support via online platforms and preventing and reducing cynicism by introducing clear organizational policy and practice to balance job demands and job resources. Meanwhile, managers can develop commitment, control and challenge components of employees' psychological hardiness to enhance job performance.

Originality/value

This study extends the remote working literature in a crisis situation and fills the gap in the cynicism literature by understanding the role played by cynicism for remote workers. The current study also adds to the literature by highlighting the importance of psychological hardiness for remote workers during the pandemic.

The pros and cons of remote work in relation to bullying, loneliness and work engagement: A representative study among Norwegian workers during COVID-19

Remote work became the new normal during COVID-19 as a response to restrictions imposed by governments across the globe. Therefore, remote work’s impact on employee outcomes, well-being, and psychological health has become a serious concern. However, the knowledge about the mechanisms and outcomes of remote work is still limited. In this study, we expect remote work to be negatively related to bullying and assume that bullying will mediate remote work’s impact on work engagement and loneliness. To test our hypothetical model, we applied a cross-sectional design using data from a large representative sample of 1,511 Norwegian workers. The data were collected in September 2021 during a period of COVID-19 restrictions in Norway. The results confirmed our hypotheses: remote work was positively related to loneliness and work engagement but negatively related to bullying. Further, bullying was positively related to loneliness and negatively related to work engagement. Moreover, bullying was also found to play a partial mediating role, supporting our hypothesis. This study suggests that remote work is related to both positive and negative mechanisms in the workplace. Remote work can potentially reduce bullying and have a protective function in preventing bullying. However, since remote work has positive relations with both loneliness and work engagement, this study illustrates that organizations should be cautious and perhaps consider a moderate level of remote work. Hence, the results have several implications for HR policies and management.

Flexible working and its relations with work-life conflict and well-being among crowdworkers in Germany

BACKGROUND

New forms of digital work such as crowdwork promise to increase potentials for flexible working. As crowdworkers can work highly autonomous and from anywhere at any time via the internet, they may be able to make work and private demands more compatible and avoid role conflicts between the life spheres, and in turn, experience enhanced well-being.

OBJECTIVE

This research asked whether crowdworkers benefit from flexible working potentials. It investigated the association of the use of different dimensions of flexible working (flex-time, flex-place, and task autonomy) in crowdwork with work-life conflict and well-being. Moreover, it explored whether the relationship between flexible working and well-being was mediated by work-life conflict.

METHODS

The study drew upon a sample of 470 crowdworkers from a cross-sectional self-assessment survey on four different German crowdwork platforms. Structural equation modeling was conducted to estimate the effects of flexible working on work-life conflict, somatic health symptoms, and life satisfaction. Indirect effects were estimated to test the mediation hypothesis.

RESULTS

The findings suggest that if crowdworkers use temporal and task flexibility, they experience fewer work-life conflict, fewer somatic health symptoms, and greater life satisfaction. This does not apply to flex-place. The relationship between flexible working and well-being is partly mediated by work-life conflict experiences.

CONCLUSION

This study supports that crowdwork offers a high potential for working highly autonomous and flexibly in time and place. It is associated with lower levels of work-life conflict and enhanced well-being, but the benefits of this flexibility are not universally included in crowdwork.

Team identification relates to lower burnout-Emotional and instrumental support as two different social cure mechanisms

Team identification is associated with less exhaustion and disengagement through more social support and higher collective self-efficacy. However, previous studies did not distinguish between emotional and instrumental support, even though both forms of support may relate differently to collective self-efficacy. By distinguishing between both support forms, we expected an indirect effect-the 'supportive structure' mechanism-of team identification on burnout mediated via emotional support. For a second mechanism-the 'supportive action' mechanism-we expected an indirect effect serially mediated by instrumental support and collective self-efficacy. We tested our hypotheses among N _T1  = 567 employees in a four-wave study with 3-month time lags between measurement points. Partially in line with our expectations, emotional support (T2) mediated the relation between team identification (T1) and disengagement (T4), but not emotional exhaustion (T4). Moreover, as expected, the results showed an indirect association between team identification (T1) and emotional exhaustion and disengagement (T4) via instrumental support (T2) and collective self-efficacy (T3). Accordingly, employees benefit from both support forms but through different mechanisms. We discuss our findings and implications for future research.

A Moderated Mediation Analysis of New Work-Related Stressors, Psychological Distress, and Absenteeism in Health Care During a Pandemic: Is Recognition the Cure for Preventing Falling in Battle?

OBJECTIVES

We aimed to evaluate the effects of new work-related stressors on psychological distress and absenteeism and the role of recognition in these relationships.

METHODS

Moderated path analyses were carried out on a sample of 1128 health care workers.

RESULTS

Increased workload related to COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) ( β = 1.511, P ≤ 0.01) and fear of COVID-19 ( β = 0.844, P ≤ 0.01) were directly associated with a higher level of psychological distress and indirectly ( β = 2.306, P ≤ 0.01; and β = 1.289, P ≤ 0.05, respectively) associated with a higher level of absenteeism. Recognition ( β = 0.260, P ≤ 0.001) moderated the association between teleworking and psychological distress. Furthermore, this significant moderation effect had a significant impact on absenteeism ( β = 0.392, P ≤ 0.05). Regardless of the workplace (on site or teleworking), high recognition was beneficial for psychological distress. This effect seems more important when working on site.

CONCLUSIONS

The results propose that specific new work-related stressors should be addressed in the context of organizational change (eg, a pandemic).

Is teleworking at odds with social sustainability and organizational learning?

Purpose

The well-being of individuals is an essential issue of sustainability research. This study aims to focus on the particular case of teleworkers and the work conditions which may hinder their well-being. More specifically, this study analyses the impact of social isolation and work overload on the work engagement and life satisfaction of teleworkers during COVID-19 pandemic.

Design/methodology/approach

With a sample of 188 workers from the Portuguese banking sector, the authors use structural equations modelling to test a conceptual model. The authors carry out data analysis with partial least squares.

Findings

Social isolation and work overload are both negatively associated with the three dimensions of work engagement, namely, vigour, absorption and dedication. In turn, vigour is positively associated with life satisfaction. Social isolation and work overload are indirectly associated with life satisfaction through vigour. Results from multi-group analysis show that the negative relationship between social isolation and dedication is stronger for less senior teleworkers. By contrast, the negative relationship between work overload and dedication is stronger for more senior teleworkers. Additionally, the positive relationship between vigour and life satisfaction is stronger for permanent workers than for temporary ones.

Originality/value

This study tests the assumptions of the job demands-resources under the novel conditions of telework during COVID-19, focusing its ubiquitous conditions – social isolation and work overload. For human resources managers, this study highlights the need to take seniority and job stability in consideration when devising onboarding and working arrangement strategies for teleworkers.

Explaining individual job performance in work from home (WFH) arrangements

Purpose

This study investigates which factors are conducive to individual job performance in large-scale work from home (WFH) arrangements that rely on the current generation of technology, such as information and communications platforms.

Design/methodology/approach

The researchers proposed a research model based on research on WFH arrangements. The model was tested based on a survey of 1,183 respondents who engaged in large-scale WFH arrangements during an extensive national COVID-19 lockdown.

Findings

The proposed research model explains 41% of the variance in individual job performance in WFH arrangements. The findings show that the strongest positive predictors for job performance are home office quality and the reach and communication quality of information and communications platforms. A sense of professional isolation was found to have a negative impact.

Originality/value

This study is based on a unique situation of large-scale mandatory WFH arrangements that are comparable to a natural experiment, and it is one of the first studies to conduct an extensive exploration of WFH that relies on the current generation of digital technology.

External Support for Elderly Care Social Enterprises in China: A Government-Society-Family Framework of Analysis

As Chinese population ageing becomes increasingly severe, the disjunct between supply and demand for pension services is becoming increasingly serious. The development of elderly care social enterprises plays an important role in solving this disjunction. Such development comes from both the enterprise's own capacity building and from external support. There are abundant studies on the capacity-building of pension social enterprises in the existing literature, but there are relatively few studies on their external support. In order to better study the external support of elderly care social enterprises in China, we adopted the case study method; we selected GY (a typical elderly care social enterprise in China) as a case study according to certain criteria, and we conducted a series of discussions. Firstly, an analytical 'government-society-family' framework was constructed. Second, it was argued that there is insufficient external support for elderly care social enterprises. At the government level, there is a lack of policies, difficulties in implementation and significant geographical differences; at the social level, there are weak support platforms and lack of community supports; and at the family level, there are constraints in regard to traditional concepts and the ability to pay. Finally, an external support system of Chinese elderly care social enterprises was constructed to help more elderly care social enterprises overcome the lack of external support in the development process.

Work-from-home (WFH) during COVID-19 pandemic – A netnographic investigation using Twitter data

Purpose

This paper aims to create a better understanding of the challenges posed by work from home (WFH) during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, to investigate the public sentiment toward this transition, and to develop a conceptual model incorporating the relationships among the factors that influence the effectiveness of WFH.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper uses netnography method to collect data from the Twitter platform and uses Python programming language, Natural Language Processing techniques and IBM SPSS 26 to conduct sentiment analysis and directed content analysis on the data. The findings are combined with an extensive review of the remote work literature to develop a conceptual model.

Findings

Results show the majority of tweets about WFH during the pandemic are positive and objective with technology and cyber security as the most repeated topics in the tweets. New challenges to WFH during pandemic include future uncertainty, health concerns, home workspaces, self-isolation, lack of recreational activities and support mechanisms. In addition, exhaustion and technostress mediate the relationship between the antecedents and outcomes of WFH during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, the fear of pandemic and coping strategies moderates these relationships.

Originality/value

This paper is one of the first efforts to comprehensively investigate the challenges of WFH during a crisis and to extend the remote work literature by developing a conceptual model incorporating the moderating effects of fear of pandemic and coping strategies. Moreover, it is the first paper to investigate the tweeting behavior of different user types on Twitter who shared posts about WFH during the ongoing pandemic.

Out of Sight, Out of Mind? A Longitudinal Investigation of Smart Working and Burnout in the Context of the Job Demands–Resources Model during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The academic interest in smart working, a form of flexible work characterized by the use of technology to conduct one’s work, has dramatically increased over recent years, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Building on the job demands–resources (JD-R) model, in this study we investigate whether smart working affects the longitudinal association between perceived work characteristics, such as workload and social support (SS), and workers’ health and well-being, in terms of exhaustion. Overall, 185 workers completed a self-report questionnaire at two time points (four-month time-lag) during the COVID-19 outbreak. The results from moderated multiple regression analysis partially support our predictions. The longitudinal association between workload and exhaustion was positive—although marginally significant—for smart workers, but nonsignificant for in-person workers. Contrarily, the longitudinal association between SS and exhaustion was negative for in-person workers, but nonsignificant for smart workers. Overall, this study suggests that, to support employees’ health and productivity, work characteristics—both physical and psychosocial—should fit the new way of working as well as remote workers’ specific needs and expectations. Hence, to promote sustainable work, interventions should be aimed at helping smart workers to manage their workload effectively, as well as reducing professional and social isolation.

Telework and Worker Health and Well-Being: A Review and Recommendations for Research and Practice

Telework (also referred to as telecommuting or remote work), is defined as working outside of the conventional office setting, such as within one's home or in a remote office location, often using a form of information communication technology to communicate with others (supervisors, coworkers, subordinates, customers, etc.) and to perform work tasks. Remote work increased over the last decade and tremendously in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this article is to review and critically evaluate the existing research about telework and worker health and well-being. In addition, we review and evaluate how engaging in this flexible form of work impacts worker health and well-being. Specifically, we performed a literature search on the empirical literature related to teleworking and worker health and well-being, and reviewed articles published after the year 2000 based on the extent to which they had been discussed in prior reviews. Next, we developed a conceptual framework based on our review of the empirical literature. Our model explains the process by which telework may affect worker health and well-being in reference to individual, work/life/family, organizational, and macro level factors. These components are explained in depth, followed by methodological and fundamental recommendations intended to guide future research, policies, and practices to maximize the benefits and minimize the harms associated with telework, and offer recommendations for future research.

Work from Home Challenges of the Pandemic Era in Hong Kong: A Stimulus-Organism-Response Perspective

Hong Kong is an international city where almost all the companies did not have a WFH policy before the pandemic since it is a very small place. During the pandemic period, Hong Kong governments, major banks and large private organizations have adopted WFH policy. The purpose of this article is to examine impact of work from home (WFH) practice on work engagement with the company during the pandemic period in Hong Kong. According to a stimulus-organism-response model, this study explores the dark side the WFH arrangement during the pandemic period. Convenience sampling method was used to collect 206 valid responses from individuals who were working from home in Hong Kong. Partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was used in the analysis of data. It was found that teamwork climate is negatively associated with physical isolation and sense of belonging is negatively associated with psychological isolation. Work engagement was impaired. Affective social presence may not be so easily established through virtual ways. Virtual informal gatherings, such as virtual breakfasts, lunch or tea breaks where work-related matters are not discussed, could be arranged.

Exploring differences in the subjective well-being of teleworkers prior to and during the pandemic

Purpose

This study aims to find out the differences in the employee well-being of teleworkers in Hungary prior to and during the pandemic restrictions and explores whether the differences stem from (1) the presence of children or (2) the changes in the telework situation (freely chosen or forced by pandemic restrictions).

Design/methodology/approach

As the first step of this study of office workers, the authors created a “one working day” measure within the conceptual framework of positive psychology that is suitable for comparing the well-being factors experienced in various work environments. The survey was completed by two independent samples: 52 office workers regarding home office before the appearance of the virus in Europe (Phase 1) and 152 office workers during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Hungary (Phase 2).

Findings

This research reveals that teleworking during the pandemic has increased irritability and tension for all teleworkers, but the stress levels, the overall subjective well-being and the level of engagement were significantly affected only in the case of those teleworkers who raise small children. Despite the overlapping responsibilities of parents, their work-related sense of accomplishment did not change during the COVID-19 lockdown. The forced home office setup may, however, entail the strengthening of co-worker relationships in the online space.

Originality/value

By understanding the relationship between well-being predictors and the changes in the situation of remote working, the results may help develop intervention programs to promote employee well-being in challenging times.

The Impact of Technological Developments on Remote Working: Insights from the Polish Managers’ Perspective

“Stay at home” orders during the COVID-19 pandemic radically changed the day-to-day operations of many organizations and moved employees from offices to homes. The sudden crisis forced companies to reformulate their operations. Enabling employees to work from home has become a necessity for both business continuity and survival. The unexpected crisis has also proved to be beneficial for some aspects of economic activity. This research focuses on identifying and measuring the benefits of and barriers to remote work from an organizational perspective, as perceived by managerial staff in Poland. We investigate the factors that influence the assessment of the scale of benefits of and barriers to remote working. The study examines the impact of various factors on the benefits of and barriers to remote working, such as a company’s previous experience with remote working, the support provided to employees by the company, the monitoring of remote working effects, and the implementation of new IT tools. These results suggest that the way the company and employees are managed in a crisis, the approach of superiors to the evaluation and control of effects on work, and the adaptation of support to the real needs of employees, all play fundamental roles. The factors examined that influence the perceived benefits of or barriers to remote working from an organization’s perspective contribute to adoption theory.

The Study of Emotional Effects of Digitalised Work: The Case of Higher Education in the Sustainable Development

This paper reports on the experiences of working with new digital tools along with the experience of new remote work. We explore the emotional experiences of working from home during the first three months of the COVID-19 pandemic and their implications. There were two groups of respondents participating in the study, those who had experience working remotely before the pandemic [digital natives] and those who started working remotely during the pandemic [digital immigrants]. The results show that emotional experiences while working from home do not differ depending on the profession, age, gender, length of experience and from previous remote work. This suggests that the digital natives had to deal with the same emotions as the digital immigrants. The study found that independent external changes determine the growth of competence in employees, in this particular case, to work remotely. Working in conditions that are difficult for everyone obliges employees to cooperate, even across company boundaries, and increases each other's competencies. In such situations, the management is required to be emotionally involved and closer to the employee.

The Impact of Enforced Working from Home on Employee Job Satisfaction during COVID-19: An Event System Perspective

During the COVID-19 pandemic, working from home (WFH) became the only option for many organizations, generating increasing interest in how such arrangements impact employee job satisfaction. Adopting an event system perspective, this study employed an online survey to capture the WFH experiences of 256 workers from 66 Chinese enterprises during the pandemic. Using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), the study examined how satisfaction was affected by five job characteristics when working from home: longevity (time), home workspace suitability (space), job autonomy (criticality), digital social support (novelty) and monitoring mechanisms (disruption). The findings reveal that three configurations promote employee job satisfaction and that a suitable home workspace is a core condition. In the absence of a suitable workspace, digital social support and an appropriate monitoring mechanism, long-term WFH was found to undermine job satisfaction. However, job autonomy is not a necessary condition for employee job satisfaction. These findings have clear implications for theory and practice.

Stay Home, Work Safe: Attitudes and Beliefs of Members of a Department of Palliative Care, Rehabilitation, and Integrative Medicine Regarding Remote Work during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic compelled rapid transition to work from home for the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center Palliative, Rehabilitation, and Integrative Medicine (PRIM) department to ensure social distancing and prevention of transmission. Objectives: To survey the attitudes and beliefs of personnel toward remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: One hundred forty-eight clinical, research, and administrative PRIM department employees were invited to participate in an anonymous voluntary survey in May 2020, two months after the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and transition to work from home in the geographic location of Houston, Texas. The survey comprised 25 questions, including employee demographics and attitudes and beliefs toward working from home and the COVID-19 pandemic. Results: Ninety-four percent (139) of employees responded, with high response rates among all three employee arms. The majority of respondents were female (74%), between the ages of 30 and 59 years (87%), had broadband Internet (93%), and shared office space before working from home (59%). There were overall positive reports of experience (87%) and emotional response (79%) toward working from home, especially for those more concerned about COVID-19 illness and spread, shared office space, and those reporting adequate resources and equipment for remote work. Clinical role, however, was associated with a less positive response (80%), less productivity (29%), and higher levels of stress (62%). Most of the department also reported increased emotional exhaustion (68%). When surveyed about permanently working from home, most of the department responded favorably (69%). Conclusions: The PRIM rapid transition to remote work was associated with positive perceptions by most members of the clinical, research, and administrative teams. Insight from this survey can serve as a model for future rapid transitions in remote work and merits follow-up studies to prepare us for a postpandemic work environment. Clinical Trial Registration number NCI-2021-01265.

Understanding stressor–strain relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic: the role of social support, adjustment to remote work, and work–life conflict

This study investigates how the transition to remote work during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic is experienced by employees. We investigate to what extent perceived work stressors relate to psychological strain through perceptions of social support, work–life conflict, and adjustment to remote work. The findings expound the mechanisms underlying psychological strain in the context of sudden organizational change. Specifically, this study shows that both challenge stressors and hindrance stressors have negative impact on adjustment to remote work, whereas hindrance stressors are more strongly negatively related to social support. The study further demonstrates that there is hardly any buffering impact of job control, work structuring, and communication technology use on the implications of these work stressors. These findings contribute to our theoretical understanding and provide actionable implications for organizational policies in facilitating employees' adaptation to remote work.

An organizational analysis of how managers must understand the mental health impact of teleworking during COVID-19 on employees

Purpose

The unimagined workplace disturbance caused by the Coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, has made many organizations virtual or telework driven workplaces, often without the infrastructure and systems in place to support employees facing these sudden workplace changes (Burrell, 2020). Many stressors accompanied this transition, to include lack of childcare, home-school responsibilities and layoffs and business closings. These stressors have perpetuated concerns for the job and financial security for all workers (Fox, 2020), leading some employees to struggle with the work-life balance out of concern for being laid off due to perceived low productivity (Fox, 2020). This study aims to explore those manifestations.

Design/methodology/approach

This qualitative research case study explores the impact COVID-19 induced telework has on their job satisfaction, mental well-being and aspects of organizational commitment to fill a gap in the literature concerning emerging workplace dynamics due to COVID-19 for small real estate businesses in the USA.

Findings

The results of this qualitative research case study provide knowledge and information about the need for small businesses to be resourceful and resilient in the way that they support and engage remote workers. This qualitative research case study explores the impact COVID-19-induced telework has on their job satisfaction, mental well-being and aspects of organizational commitment for small real estate businesses. The analysis of current work-life structures through a qualitative lens provides trends among workers to gain a greater perspective of the current accelerators and barriers to worker success in a COVID-19 teleworking environment.

Originality/value

This qualitative research case study explores the impact COVID-19 induced telework has on their job satisfaction, mental well-being and aspects of organizational commitment to fill a gap in the literature concerning emerging workplace dynamics due to COVID-19 for small real estate businesses. The value of this research is that majority of the participants were African-Americans, which represents a participant group that is highly under researched.

Remote working and employee engagement: a qualitative study of British workers during the pandemic

Purpose

Through the lens of Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, this study explores how remote working inhibits employee engagement. The authors offer a fresh perspective on the most salient work- and nonwork-related risk factors that make remote working particularly challenging in the context of Covid-19.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors use data from semi-structured interviews with 32 employees working from home during the Covid-19 lockdown. Based on the interpretivist philosophical approach, the authors offer new insights into how employees can optimize work- and nonwork-related experiences when working remotely.

Findings

The authors show that the sudden transition from in-person to online modes of working during the pandemic brought about work intensification, online presenteeism, employment insecurity and poor adaptation to new ways of working from home. These stress factors are capable of depleting vital social and personal resources, thereby impacting negatively on employee engagement levels.

Practical implications

Employers, leaders and human resource teams should be more thoughtful about the risks and challenges employees face when working from home. They must ensure employees are properly equipped with the relevant resources and support to perform their jobs more effectively.

Originality/value

While previous research has focused on the benefits of remote working, the current study explores how it might be detrimental for employee engagement during a pandemic. The study provides new evidence on the most salient risks and challenges faced by remote workers, and how the unique Covid-19 context has made them more pronounced.

Working from Home During Covid-19: Doing and Managing Technology-enabled Social Interaction With Colleagues at a Distance

With the overnight growth in Working from Home (WFH) owing to the pandemic, organisations and their employees have had to adapt work-related processes and practices quickly with a huge reliance upon technology. Everyday activities such as social interactions with colleagues must therefore be reconsidered. Existing literature emphasises that social interactions, typically conducted in the traditional workplace, are a fundamental feature of social life and shape employees' experience of work. This experience is completely removed for many employees due to the pandemic and, presently, there is a lack of knowledge on how individuals maintain social interactions with colleagues via technology when working from home. Given that a lack of social interaction can lead to social isolation and other negative repercussions, this study aims to contribute to the existing body of literature on remote working by highlighting employees' experiences and practices around social interaction with colleagues. This study takes an interpretivist and qualitative approach utilising the diary-keeping technique to collect data from twenty-nine individuals who had started to work from home on a full-time basis as a result of the pandemic. The study explores how participants conduct social interactions using different technology platforms and how such interactions are embedded in their working lives. The findings highlight the difficulty in maintaining social interactions via technology such as the absence of cues and emotional intelligence, as well as highlighting numerous other factors such as job uncertainty, increased workloads and heavy usage of technology that affect their work lives. The study also highlights that despite the negative experiences relating to working from home, some participants are apprehensive about returning to work in the traditional office place where social interactions may actually be perceived as a distraction. The main contribution of our study is to highlight that a variety of perceptions and feelings of how work has changed via an increased use of digital media while working from home exists and that organisations need to be aware of these differences so that they can be managed in a contextualised manner, thus increasing both the efficiency and effectiveness of working from home.

Looking for meanings at work: unraveling the implications of smart working on organizational meaningfulness

Purpose

This study aims to shed light on the ambiguous effects of smart working (SW) on work meaningfulness. On the one hand, SW enables people to benefit from greater work flexibility, advancing individual control over organizational activities. On the other hand, it may impair interpersonal exchanges at work, disrupting job meaningfulness. Hence, the implications of SW on work meaningfulness are investigated through the mediating role of interpersonal exchanges at work.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors investigate both the direct and indirect effects of SW on employees’ perceived meaningfulness at work. Secondary data come from the sixth European Working Conditions Survey. The study encompasses a sample of 30,932 employees. A mediation model based on ordinary least square regressions and bootstrap sampling is designed to obtain evidence of SW’s implications on meaningfulness at work through the mediating role of interpersonal relationships (IR).

Findings

The research findings suggest that SW triggers a positive sense of the significance of work. However, it negatively affects IR with peers and supervisors, entailing professional and spatial isolation. Impaired IR twists the positive implications of SW on organizational meaningfulness (OM), curtailing the employees’ sense of significance at work.

Practical implications

SW is a double-edged sword. It contributes to the enrichment of OM, enhancing the individual self-determination to shape the spatial context of work. However, its side effects on interpersonal exchanges generate a drift toward organizational meaninglessness. Tailored management interventions intended to sustain IR at work are needed to fit the design of SW arrangements to the employees’ evolving social needs.

Originality/value

The paper pushes forward what is currently known about the implications of SW on OM, examining them through the mediating role of IR at work.

Antecedents and outcomes of job embeddedness among nurses

Embedding nurses in their jobs is associated with many positive results because they have to deal with varying patient needs and sometimes make close relationships with them. Having mentioned that, we have limited knowledge of antecedents and possible outcomes of job embeddedness. Accordingly, this study aimed to explore the mediating role of job embeddedness (JE) among this group in the relationship between Team-Member Exchange (TMX), Empowering Leadership (EL), and Perceived Organizational Support (POS) with Innovative Work Behavior (IWB). Data were gathered from a group of 800 nurses, who were working in fourteen different public hospitals in the northeast of Iran. Of 800 distributed questionnaires, 723 questionnaires were completely filled. Different statistical analysis methods, such as Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), Pearson correlation coefficient, and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), were used for data analysis. The results indicate the positive influence of TMX and POS on IWB through the mediating role of JE in this group. It is worth noting that the JE-mediated effect of EL on IWB was not significant.

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.

The Impact of Work Characteristics on Social Distancing: Implications at the Time of COVID-19

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues to spread globally. While social distancing has attracted attention as a measure to prevent the spread of infection, some occupations find it difficult to implement. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the relationship between work characteristics and social distancing using data available on O*NET, an occupational information site. A total of eight factors were extracted by performing an exploratory factor analysis: work conditions, supervisory work, information processing, response to aggression, specialization, autonomy, interaction outside the organization, and interdependence. A multiple regression analysis showed that interdependence, response to aggression, and interaction outside the organization, which are categorized as ”social characteristics,” and information processing and specialization, which are categorized as “knowledge characteristics,” were associated with physical proximity. Furthermore, we added customer, which represents contact with the customer, and remote working, which represents a small amount of outdoor activity, to our multiple regression model, and confirmed that they increased the explanatory power of the model. This suggests that those who work under interdependence, face aggression, and engage in outside activities, and/or have frequent contact with customers, little interaction outside the organization, and little information processing will have the most difficulty in maintaining social distancing.

Disruptions and General Distress for Essential and Nonessential Employees During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic and outbreak response represent a global crisis that has affected various aspects of people's lives, including work. Speculation is rife about the impact of the crisis on employees. Countries and organizations worldwide have categorized some work as essential and, by extension, other work as nonessential. This study aims to investigate the impact of the pandemic by examining the relationship between work disruptions (at time 1) and general distress (at time 2) through various work stressors, contrasting the experiences of employees in essential versus nonessential work. For employees with essential jobs, there is a significant indirect effect of work disruptions on general distress through hindrance stressors. This relationship is not found for employees with nonessential jobs. The general distress of these employees is more strongly affected by disruptions through social stressors (here, social isolation). Hence, this study demonstrates how general distress is affected in different ways for employees conducting essential work and those conducting nonessential work. We further highlight the importance of considering social stressors in this relationship, especially for nonessential work. Organizational change communication quality mitigates the relationship between isolation and general distress for employees with nonessential jobs, but not for those with essential jobs.

Ergonomics and telework: A systematic review

BACKGROUND: Telework has been widely studied by public and private organizations; however, in ergonomics, studies that focused on this topic are still sporadic. OBJECTIVE: Thus, this article endeavours to systematize the qualified scientific research related to ergonomics and teleworking to determine the main benefits and disadvantages and to identify the main issues addressed by authors. METHODS: A thorough research was conducted in the Scopus/Embase and Web of Science databases for this review. The following descriptors were used for the cataloguing of articles: “teleworking”, “telecommuting”, “telecommuters”, “home office”, “ergonomics” and “human factors”. 36 studies were selected. RESULTS: The study highlights four relevant questions in the scientific literature: a) where is the discussion of these themes consolidated; b) what are the main descriptors related to the discussion; c) which journals and conferences establish a scientific debate on the topic; and d) what are its main advantages and disadvantages. CONCLUSIONS: Results suggest that telecommuting can be a valuable tool for balancing professional and family life, which helps to improve the well-being of workers; however, several factors can influence the overall remote working experience which leads to the need for companies to adopt unique strategies reflecting their unique situation.

New Technology, Work and Employment in the era of COVID-19: reflecting on legacies of research

The outbreak of COVID‐19 is having a drastic impact on work and employment. This review piece outlines the relevance of existing research into new technology, work and employment in the era of COVID‐19. It is important to be retrospective and undertake both a historically and theoretically informed position on the impact of new technologies in the current crisis and beyond. Issues of control, surveillance and resistance have been central to work on the impact of technology on work and employment and these themes have been identified as central to the experience of work in the current crisis.