Diving into an Infinite Workplace

10

October

2022

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How VR will shift our work routine

The COVID-19 pandemic caused a widespread shift in work routines from physical spaces to digital remote spaces. While this undoubtedly mitigated the spread of the virus, it also unexpectedly increased employee productivity, according to research (Natalia Emanuel & Emma Harrington, 2020). This effect came mostly from employees turning physical commuting time into fruitful working time at home. Now that the pandemic-mitigation measures have been (nearly) ultimately lifted, organizations are carefully evaluating their next steps ˗ stay fully online, implement a hybrid working model or completely return to the physical workplace. While the positive effects on productivity might suggest that staying online is the way to go, organizations fear that the current digital tools that facilitate such an approach do not provide the employee with an authentic connection to their workmates. However, the rapid development of Virtual Reality (VR) might be a solution to this dilemma.

The past few years have been the bottom line for an explosion in mainstream adoption of VR technology, which has been boosted by the recent hype that the Metaverse has caused. Accordingly, organizations look upon the developments of VR favourably. In essence, the implementation of VR technology as an enabler of remote communication would allow the creation of digital immersive workspaces, replicating the physical office in the virtual world. This could make employees feel as if they were in the same location as their teammates and grasp the workplace experience, while still enjoying all the features of digital collaboration (Murray, 2022). Such a space would work as a creation and collaboration platform where the possibilities are infinite from deeply interactive group meetings to real-time product prototyping and co-edition. Additionally, the immersive nature of VR would make workers perceptually ‘leave’ their homes and ‘enter’ the workplace without factually leaving their houses.
As this possibility gains momentum, several tech organizations have taken the first steps by developing promising virtual workspace VR platforms. Meta seems to be the one leading the race with the development of Infinite Office, a digital collaboration platform meant to replicate the physical office in the Metaverse. This space allows the employee to define the boundaries of their virtual office through a complete customization and availability of a wide range of tools that can improve their output and productivity (Chakraborty, 2022).

The implementation of such technology within the workplace is still relatively far considering several potential drawbacks that developers and organizations must carefully evaluate. Substantially, business data privacy continues to be a great concern for organizations, which must ensure the digitalization of their operations does not compromise their confidentiality. Additionally, employee mental health is a delicate issue to be assessed in this regard. A fundamental replacement of physical connections between the workforce might undermine the value obtained from real-world interactions between employees (Giusino & Toscano, 2021). But if this new virtual world is to arrive, organizations will have to cautiously adapt to this revolution and try to create a win-win situation between them and their employees.

References

Chakraborty, K. (2022, August 23). The Future of Remote Work: 7 Technologies to Watch. Techopedia.com. Retrieved October 10, 2022, from https://www.techopedia.com/the-future-of-remote-work-7-technologies-to-watch/2/34559

Giusino, D., Bowman, N., & Toscano, F. (2021, July 28). Work From Home (WFH) During COVID-19: Is Virtual Reality (VR) a New Solution to New Problems? Journal of Occupational &Amp; Environmental Medicine, 63(10), e755–e756. https://doi.org/10.1097/jom.0000000000002339

Murray, A. (2022, April 4). Inside an “infinite” workspace: What it’s like to do your job completely in VR. ZDNET. Retrieved October 10, 2022, from https://www.zdnet.com/article/inside-an-infinite-workspace-what-its-like-to-do-your-job-completely-in-vr/

Natalia Emanuel & Emma Harrington. (2020b, November 16). “Working” Remotely? Selection, Treatment, And the Market Provision of Remote Work. Harvard University. Retrieved October 10, 2022, from https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/eharrington/files/harrington_jmp_working_remotely.pdf

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Back to the office or does remote working stimulate the quality of life?

26

September

2021

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There has been clear communication that advocates two opposing views adopting cloud based (remote) working for the quality of life: a firm should stimulate remote working versus a firm should stimulate offline working. According to C. Jalagat and M. Jalagat (2019), remote working can be defined as performing work – from any location where Wi-Fi is present and  Cloud Computing is adopted by the company – other than the location of the employer. I believe that adapting cloud computing is beneficial for our daily life. Even after the Covid-19 pandemic as well (see Figure 1).

The first benefit of remote working is that the sickness rate is 0.5 lower among people who work remotely compared to those who work in the office (PWC, s.a.). PWC hypothesizes that remote workers can give more attention to their children, their stress levels drop significantly, and burnout problems are prevented. The second benefit is that remote working via cloud services – most of that eco-friendly generated – increases air quality and protects our climate; in city of Phoenix it resulted in 1.3 million fewer miles driven, which equates to over 47,000 pounds less air pollutant emissions each day (Irwin, 2004). Higher air quality is correlated with a longer average life span, and therefore, it is important that we ensure our own future and the future of today’s youth. 

There are also two disadvantages. The first disadvantage is that companies that encourage remote working deliberately expect their employees to be available at all times (Bijen, 2021). She argues that remote workers are continuously busy with finishing their notifications after work hours; it disrupts daily routines such as eating or raising children (Manocka , 2020). The second drawback is that remote working contribute to the disappearance of many management positions. Current technology is capable of continuously tracking and assessing employees for productivity, thus, companies are experiencing a lesser need for managers to make decisions on behalf of their employees (Morse, 2020). 

I believe that our health and prevent air pollution is central to the quality of life. Quality of life is  subjective and is complicated to measure. However, what is our life worth if we experience health issues, or if in five years’ time it is determined that we will not meet the Paris Agreement? One could argue against my position that health can be maintained without remote working. While people are indeed capable of taking personal responsibility for maintaining their health, we must remember that people cannot tackle this problem individually. There is also concern that remote working may mean that companies expect us to sacrifice our free time for work. However, the Dutch government is working on a bill that would give homeworkers more rights to remain unreachable after work (Bijen, 2021). As a well-known saying goes, “Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important in life”.

Figure 1: Worldwide Public Cloud Services End-User Spending Forecast (Millions of U.S. Dollars)

References:

Jalagat, C., & Jalagat, M. (2019). RATIONALIZING REMOTE WORKING CONCEPT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS ON EMPLOYEE PRODUCTIVITY. Global Journal of Advanced Research, 95-100.

PWC. (z.j.). The costs and benefits of working from home. PWC.

Irwin, F. (2004, Januari). GAINING THE AIR QUALITY AND CLIMATE BENEFIT FROM TELEWORK. Retrieved from http://pdf.wri.org/teleworkguide.pdf

Bijen, M. (2021). Wetsvoorstel: thuiswerker moet recht krijgen onbereikbaar te zijn buiten werktijd. Retrieved from Het Parool: https://www.parool.nl/nederland/wetsvoorstel-thuiswerker-moet-recht-krijgen-onbereikbaar-te-zijn-buiten-werktijd~b88e4da5/?referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F

Morse, J. (2020, December). Amazon announces new employee tracking tech, and customers are lining up. Retrieved from Mashable: https://mashable.com/article/amazon-aws-panorama-worker-customer-tracking-technology-smart-cameras/?europe=true

Manocka, I. (2020). Covid-19: Teleworking, Surveillance and 24/7 Work. Some Reflexions on the Expected Growth of Remote Work After the Pandemic. Political Anthropological Research on International Social Sciences (PARISS).

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Work From Home: How Covid Has Revolutionised Businesses

24

September

2021

5/5 (1)

The global pandemic of the last 1,5 years has left the world with some significant consequences that we, one way or another, have to deal with. When talking about these changes in our daily life, society seems to consider them as negative by default. However, the covid crisis has brought some opportunities to light that are not as malicious as we first thought. Working from home is definitely one of them, as companies worldwide have accepted this new concept and it seems here to stay.

The Work-From-Home concept is not necessarily something completely new, as some companies have already accepted the method with open arms1 and during the pandemic, it was no surprise that it were these companies who thrived more than others. As we are (hopefully) approaching the end of this global crisis, business are starting to see the advantages of this working strategy, rather than just having to adapt to it, because of regulations.

One big advantage is naturally the reduction of traffic in and around cities. In recent covid times, we have seen immense global reductions in air pollution, due to less activity in the transportation sector2. The fact that employees were more at home than even before played a significant role in this reduction. Moreover, not having to deal with traffic every day leads to reduced amounts of stress3, which will come te improve the quality of work later that day. Furthermore, companies do not need as much space in the office as they did before, which should lead to more financial health of the organisations, as well as more room for other construction to be build, such as more houses.

Besides these economical reasons, working from home has proven to have its personals reasons as well. Employees tend have a higher job satisfaction when they can work from home4, less sickness is reported with remote workers5 and, partially due to the eliminated travel time, people have more time for personal activities, such as fitness. On the other hand, critics may say that the quality of work reduces once an employee works from home, but in a Chinese experiment conducted in 20146, it was found that remote workers were 13 percent more efficient than colleagues based at the office.

Naturally some of these benefits can vary per business and employee, since there are also companies where physical labour is performed who simply cannot work remotely. Eventually, it is up to the business to decide whether their employees can work from home, fully or partially. With the developments we have seen and the benefits they clearly lead to though, it is not unlikely that will see more office-styled homes in the future.

Reference List

  1. https://5ca.com/customer-experience-solutions/
  2. Venter, Zander S., et al. “COVID-19 lockdowns cause global air pollution declines.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117.32 (2020): 18984-18990.
  3. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/21/upshot/stuck-and-stressed-the-health-costs-of-traffic.html
  4. Golden, Timothy D., and John F. Veiga. “The impact of extent of telecommuting on job satisfaction: Resolving inconsistent findings.” Journal of management 31.2 (2005): 301-318.
  5. https://www.pwc.nl/nl/actueel-publicaties/assets/pdfs/pwc-the-costs-and-benefits-of-working-from-home.pdf
  6. Bloom, Nicholas, et al. “Does working from home work? Evidence from a Chinese experiment.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 130.1 (2015): 165-218.

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Remote work: Surveillance vs. Privacy

5

October

2020

No ratings yet. During these Covid-19 times, working from home has become the norm after the applied measures worldwide in order to help maintaining social distancing. Due to the inability of checking on their employees as they work from home, many companies have been afraid of a decreasing productivity at work. Consequently, employers have increasingly felt the need to introduce more and more surveillance tools that would help them monitor and track how their employees are spending their time as they work from home.

From applications that help keeping track of the time spent on each tool, to software that tracks the steps you take every day. Companies are going one step beyond basic time-tracking tools such as Toggl, and are beginning to opt for the introduction of ever more invasive programs such as Hubstaff – a software that monitors employees’ performance by taking snapshots of their monitors and calculating a productivity score based on the keystrokes, mouse movements, time spent and websites visited.

A software that is programmed to take snapshots of an individual’s screen as they are having a confidential videoconference; or that tracks down the user’s GPS coordinates as they go to the nearest cafeteria for a short coffee break, surely raises too many ethical concerns as it violates both the employees’ privacy as well as the privacy of those with whom they interact.

Not only does it raise ethical concerns, but it has also been proven that employee surveillance reduces trust between employees and their employers, driving down motivation and engagement. The ‘stress-inducing, demotivating and dehumanizing’ practice of monitoring – as described by a manager in the report Workplace technology: the employee experience – hinders employee autonomy and proactivity, both of which are necessary for a healthy and thriving company in the current digital era.

The use of surveillance software was initially intended to keep workers engaged and ensure their productivity. However, an unsurprising counter-effects occurs due to the implement of these tools: employee engagement and productivity declines together with the quality of the work they do. This is not a “vindictive reaction” to the application of such tool, but simply the result of feeling controlled and uncomfortable at (remote) work.

In a time where GDPR laws are being enforced to protect people’s privacy, how can such surveillance tools be accepted? Why are they still being implemented despite the evidence on its counter-effects?

Monitoring might be necessary and helpful to companies to make sure the work is being done and to collect data that might be used to improve the company’s strategy – especially when remote-work becomes the norm. However, managers must think through very carefully the techniques they are going to use: how will they be implemented, to what degree will they invade their employee’s privacy, and what are the possible consequences. In a time where remote work is the model to follow, how do we find the balance between tracking for improvement and respect for people’s privacy?

 

Satariano, A. How my boss monitors me while I work from home. The New York Times, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/06/technology/employee-monitoring-work-from-home-virus.html

Jones, L. “I monitor my staff with software that takes screenshots”. BBC News, 2020. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-54289152

Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). Workplace technology: the employee experience. July 2020, UK. https://www.cipd.co.uk/Images/workplace-technology-1_tcm18-80853.pdf

Kensbock, J.M., Stöckmann, C. “Big brother is watching you”: surveillance via technology undermines employees’ learning and voice behavior during digital transformation. J Bus Econ, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11573-020-01012-x

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