scholarly journals Working in a post Covid-19 world: Towards a conceptual framework for distributed work

2021 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael S. Henry ◽  
Daniel B. Le Roux ◽  
Douglas A. Parry
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Work Practices ◽  
Remote Work ◽  
Distributed Work ◽  
Conceptual Integration ◽  
Technological Environment ◽  
Work Settings

Purpose: Against the backdrop of the increased prevalence of telework practices as a result of Covid-19, the purpose of the present article is to address the conceptual confusion, overlap and ambiguity characterising much of the published literature in this domain through the development of an integrated conceptual framework describing distributed work practices at various levels of organisations.Design/methodology/approach: To develop the framework, a collection of definitions for distributed work concepts were systematically selected and reviewed. These concepts include telework, remote work, distributed work and virtual work, as well as telecommuting, virtual teams, virtual organisations and distributed organisations. The reviewed definitions were systematically analysed to elicit the key principles underlying each concept, and then integrated to produce the conceptual framework.Findings: Our analysis suggests that virtuality and distributedness can be defined as distinct continua which, when combined, can be used to describe particular work settings. Additionally, we identify four factors which impact organisational policy in terms of virtuality and distributedness: interdependence of tasks, nature of work, technological environment and temporal distance.Practical implications: The framework offers managers a foundation for establishing distributed work policies and determining policy implications. Additionally, researchers conducting empirical investigations of distributed work practices can utilise the framework to differentiate between and describe particular work settings.Originality/value: The conceptual integration of virtuality, distributedness and organisational levels present a novel and important development. As organisations adapt to the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, the framework we propose serves as a useful artefact to support and inform their decision making.

scholarly journals A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW: SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS FOR TIME-MANAGEMENT IN REMOTE WORK SETTINGS

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ivan Gjorgjievski ◽  
◽  
Daniela Karadakov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Time Management ◽  
Data Transfer ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Rapid Development ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Remote Work ◽  
Work Location ◽  
Work Settings ◽  
Average Worker

Ever since the onset of the Internet and the rapid development in communications, a paradigm shift has been occurring between the human resources and the management systems in place. That shift has already rendered plenty of legacy management systems obsolete and ineffective. Evidently, the acceleration of data transfer speeds has produced a side effect in decreasing the location dependency of the average worker in certain industries, which in turn created a new challenge for the contemporary manager especially when dealing with remote teams and time-management of the same. This work-location decoupling meant that new systems had to be created, new studies to be introduced and plenty of modernization to the legacy control systems had to be implemented. And fast! This paper contains a systematic review of available software solutions for time management, location independency, virtual work and work teams and will provide analytic insight.

Fostering work engagement in geographically-dispersed and asynchronous virtual teams

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 2-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niki Panteli ◽  
Zeynep Y. Yalabik ◽  
Andriana Rapti
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Work Engagement ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Work Settings ◽  
Team Meetings ◽  
Geographically Dispersed ◽  
Use Of Resources ◽  
Archive Project ◽  
Appropriate Practices

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the factors that enable work engagement to develop when asynchronous communication is used in virtual team (VT) projects. Design/methodology/approach Using a qualitative approach, a longitudinal study of an eight-month long VT project was carried out. Data collected included an extensive e-mail archive, project documentation, observation of team meetings and interviews with project members and leaders. Findings The findings show that VT leaders can actively promote work engagement through the effective use of resources along with appropriate practices that foster its development. They can also sustain and nourish work engagement throughout the different phases of the VT lifecycle project. Research limitations/implications The study has examined work engagement in asynchronous mediated settings. Future work should involve studying the effect of synchronous communications on work engagement within VTs. Practical implications Organizations that are interested in promoting effective virtual work practices need to train VT managers on how to keep VT members engaged throughout the various phases of the VT project. Social implications It is posited that developing work engagement is not a one-off practice, but instead, requires ongoing effort that should be evident and supported across the different phases of the VT lifecycle. Originality/value This paper forwards an important debate on work engagement in alternative, non-permanent, work settings.

scholarly journals Challenges for Romanian Entrepreneurs in Managing Remote Workers

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaoyu Zhan ◽  
◽  
Delia Mioara Popescu ◽  
Valentin Radu ◽  
◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Rapid Development ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Remote Work ◽  
Work Processes ◽  
Organizational Boundaries ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
Remote Workers

In an increasingly globalized society managing remote work allows entrepreneurs to compete favorably and increase profit. Moreover, with the rapid development of information and electronic media, decentralized work has become much more comfortable, faster, and more efficient in response to the globalization of work processes. Dynamic environments have introduced virtual work teams that collaborate through communication technologies across geographical, temporal, cultural, and organizational boundaries to achieve a common goal in the results of their organizations. Remote working grows in popularity, but with it also increases the need of the organization to demand high performance from their members through their projects and activities. All over the world, statistics showed in 2019 a steep increase in the number of virtual workers. Both managers and companies face a high number of challenges to keep their employees satisfied and their “numbers” up. This article focuses on the emergence of Virtual Teams in Romania, primarily through the real necessity of remote workers. We highly discuss the advantages and disadvantages of working from home for Romanian Entrepreneurs, especially in the current pandemic state of the entire world.

scholarly journals Virtual Leadership: A Review Paper

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (4-1) ◽  
pp. 183-193
Author(s):  
Khurram Mehtab ◽  
Amjad ur Rehman ◽  
Saira Ishfaq ◽  
Raja Ahmed Jamil
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Review Paper ◽  
Performance Enhancement ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Team Leadership ◽  
Business Environment ◽  
Work Setting ◽  
Virtual Leadership ◽  
Work Settings ◽  
High Level

Abstract In today’s competitive business environment, virtual work settings present a growing challenge for rapid solutions of organization’s complex problems. This enables an organization to pool talent and expert employees by eradicating the time and space barriers. In accordance, companies are profoundly investigating on virtual teams’ performance enhancement. Virtual work settings revolutionize workplace by providing high level of responsiveness and flexibility. Virtual work setting has also many issues and challenges which must be addressed in order to enhance the team’s performance. Hence one of the major challenge of modern work setting is virtual leadership. This review paper presents an introduction to virtual leaderships, advantages of virtual work environment, challenges and recommendations for virtual leaders to enhance the performance of virtual teams. This article also offers review of earlier published researches and reports the findings on virtual team leadership in a struggle to the present the current state of work on this topic.

Fairness in Virtual Teams

2010 ◽  
pp. 365-377 ◽  
Author(s):  
Constant D. Beugré
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Organizational Justice ◽  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Management Practice ◽  
Employee Perceptions ◽  
Work Environments ◽  
Perceptions Of Fairness

Using organizational justice as a conceptual framework, this chapter discusses the importance of fairness in managing virtual teams. It introduces a new construct, e-organizational justice, defined as employee perceptions of fairness in virtual work environments. The chapter also posits that fairness is essential to building and maintaining the cohesiveness and effectiveness of virtual teams. The chapter ends with a discussion on e-organizational justice’s implications for further research and management practice.

COLLABORATECOM SPECIAL ISSUE ANALYZING DISTRIBUTED WHITEBOARD INTERACTIONS

2012 ◽  
Vol 21 (03) ◽  
pp. 199-220
Author(s):  
LUTZ GERICKE ◽  
RAJA GUMIENNY ◽  
CHRISTOPH MEINEL
Keyword(s):  
Internal Structure ◽  
Team Work ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Distributed Work ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Work Settings ◽  
Simplified Analysis ◽  
Digital Whiteboard

We present the digital whiteboard system Tele-Board, which automatically captures all interactions made on the all-digital whiteboard and thus offers possibilities for a fast interpretation of usage characteristics. Analyzing team work at whiteboards is a time-consuming and error-prone process if manual interpretation techniques are applied. In a case study, we demonstrate how to conduct and analyze whiteboard experiments with the help of our system. The study investigates the role of video compared to an audio-only connection for distributed work settings. With the simplified analysis of communication data, we can prove that the video teams were more active than the audio teams and the distribution of whiteboard interaction between team members was more balanced. This way, an automatic analysis can not only support manual observations and codings, but also give insights that cannot be achieved with other systems. Beyond the overall view on one sessions focusing on key figures, it is also possible to find out more about the internal structure of a session.

Telework and Remote Work

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matti Vartiainen
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Electronic Devices ◽  
Digital Tools ◽  
Individual Autonomy ◽  
Remote Work ◽  
New Ways Of Working ◽  
Remote Workers ◽  
Personal Devices ◽  
People Today

“Telework” and “remote work” have both increased sharply in recent years during and after the pandemic. The basic difference between telework and remote work is that a teleworker uses personal electronic devices in addition to working physically remotely from a place other than an office or company premises, whereas remote work does not require visits to the main workplace or the use of electronic personal devices. “Mobile tele- and remote workers” use several other places in addition to home for working. “Digital online telework” is a global form of employment that uses online platforms to enable individuals, teams, and organizations to access other individuals or organizations to solve problems or to provide services in exchange for payment. Often tele- and remote workers cowork in virtual teams and projects. The prevalence of various types of tele- and remote working vary. Although there are conceptual challenges to operationalizing the concept, it is estimated that hundreds of millions—and possibly more—people today earn their living working at and from their home or other places using digital tools and platforms. In the future, it is expected that new hybrid modes of working will emerge enabled by digital technologies. These changes in working increase the complexity of job demands because of the increased variety of contextual job characteristics. The main benefits of these new ways of working are organizational flexibility and individual autonomy; at the same time, unclear social relations may increase feelings of isolation and challenge the work-life balance.

The Impact of External Factors on Virtual Teams

Virtual Teams ◽  
2011 ◽  
pp. 70-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Hornett
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Virtual Work ◽  
Virtual Team ◽  
External Factors ◽  
Work Environments ◽  
Project Teams ◽  
Team Leaders ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Dynamic Forces ◽  
The Impact

Practitioners and researchers need to pay attention to how corporate organizing structures are impacting and are impacted by virtual work environments. Virtual teams are powerful organizing mechanisms, but they are not without limitations. This chapter reports on two cases in which dynamics outside the virtual project teams powerfully affected the teams. These cases, both based on studies of real project teams operating inside corporations, highlight the desirability of understanding virtual teams in context. While external factors are not unique to teamwork, their role has not been explored in depth in research on virtual teams. Dynamic forces outside teams seem more difficult to anticipate and to identify when team members are working virtually, and these powerful but invisible dynamics can be frustrating to virtual team leaders and members. Concluded in this chapter is that contrary to initial expectations, virtual teams are not replacing traditional forms of organizing. They are coexisting with traditional forms and dynamics, such as business drivers, hierarchies, departments, strategic priorities, and business needs. This coexistence can be fraught with conflict.

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