Measuring the telework potential of jobs: evidence from the International Standard Classification of Occupations

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has triggered and accelerated the shift of firms and businesses to adopt flexible alternative work arrangements such as teleworking or working from home (WFH) set-ups. To effectively transition to the ‘new normal’ of work, this paper measures the telework potential of jobs or the degree to which a job can be feasibly done at home or offsite. Using the task-based framework, this paper constructs continuous ‘teleworkability’ indices by implementing a classification process of the occupational tasks listed in the International Standard Classification of Occupations 2008 (ISCO-08) and based on the telework indicators in the literature. The correlates of these indices are estimated. Also, the indices are applied to Philippine occupations. The primary contribution of this paper is the set of ‘teleworkability’ indices for all 427 occupations (4-digit ISCO) to describe the telework potential of jobs in countries which pattern their local occupational codes to ISCO-08.

The relationship between justice perceptions and organizational commitment among alternative work arrangement participants and non-participants

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of auditor alternative work arrangement (AWA) participants’ and non-participants’ perceptions of procedural and distributive justice on organizational commitment. Design/methodology/approach Using survey data from 110 auditors in the USA, this study uses a regression model to explore how AWA participants’ and non-participants’ perceptions of procedural and distributive justice affect organizational commitment. Findings As predicted, results show both participants’ and non-participants’ perceptions of procedural justice significantly affect organizational commitment. However, neither groups’ perceptions of distributive justice significantly affect their organizational commitment. Originality/value Organizational justice literature has shown that procedural and distributive justice influence organizational commitment. However, no study has controlled for AWA participation. The authors extend research by investigating the effects of procedural and distributive justice perceptions on organizational commitment for both participants and non-participants. The authors also extend accounting research that has narrowly examined AWA benefits and drawbacks, support, viability and perceptions of subordinate career success. Furthermore, there is limited AWA auditing research and this study offers a view prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Growing up Puritan

Chapter 1 chronicles the family background of Benjamin Franklin, whose English Protestant father, Josiah, emigrated from Northampton in England to Boston, Massachusetts, in 1683. The chapter describes Franklin’s childhood, including the Boston background of his maternal grandfather, Peter Folger, also an English emigré, and the influence of his uncle, Benjamin Franklin the elder. The chapter indicates the family’s religious affiliations, including their close associations with pastors Samuel Willard and Ebenezer Pemberton. Family friends included the parents of Charles Chauncey, whose adult convictions differed from those of Benjamin. The chapter explains how Josiah originally intended his youngest son to take up a career in the ministry, but came to understand that he lacked some of the requisite convictions. It relates how the search for alternative work in various trades led to an onerous apprenticeship in printing under his brother James. Ben learned about both the trade and himself—by his late teens, he realized that he needed other outlets for his independence of mind.

A Word of Caution to Students: Public Accountant Perceptions of Alternative Work Arrangements

This study provides updated insights regarding attitudes and beliefs about alternative work arrangements (AWAs) in public accounting so that educators are equipped with current empirical analysis to advise students on how to successfully navigate work-life balance in public accounting. We examine current attitudes and beliefs about AWAs by surveying public accountants from firms of various sizes on different dimensions of AWA support and asking firm partners to provide advice for students. Respondents indicated more agreement with the benefits of AWAs than they did with the perceived costs to the organization and the perceived costs to the participants’ future career. Collectively, results suggest attitudes regarding AWAs may be more positive than in the past. Results identify significant differences in the perceptions about AWAs between females and males, as well as AWA participants and non-participants. Qualitative results are consistent with general support for AWAs but also provide cautionary advice to students.

"Vestirme de hombre y montar a caballo". Androginia y mujer moderna en la novela autobiográfica "Oculto sendero", de Elena Fortún

The writer Elena Fortún (Madrid, 1886-1952) is famous for her paradigmatic fictional character for children: the imaginative, frisky Celia. This article aims to analyze the most alternative work of the author, Oculto camino, published for the first time in 2016 after decades hidden in a suitcase: the author did not want to have it published while she was alive. It is an autobiographical work where Fortún uses the character of the painter María Luisa Arroyo to talk about her own process of discovering a sexual orientation that an authoritarian mother, marriage and social pressure prevented her from fully living. This article studies the link between the concept of «modern woman» and the taking up of an androgynous aesthetic, based on the story of María Luisa.

Job Satisfaction and Work-Life Balance of Workers of a Manpower Agency in a Highly Urbanized City

The rapid growth of industrialization and diversification worldwide diverted the trend in the labor market to be shifted towards alternative work arrangements, also known as Non-standard Employment (NSE). In the Philippines, these alternative forms of employment of NSE can be greatly observed. Workers can be under different employment types, namely, regular, probationary, fixed-term or contractual, casual, project, or seasonal. The majority of workers under NSE arrangements fall under a fixed-term or are contractual employees. This enticed the researcher to investigate how alternative work arrangements influence or affect workers' overall job satisfaction and work-life balance, specifically for workers under contractual arrangements or those hired by service contractors or manpower agencies. Thus, the study described and correlated the level of job satisfaction and work-life balance of the manpower agency workers in a highly urbanized city in Negros Occidental.

Alternative Work Arrangements

Alternative work arrangements, defined both by working conditions and by workers’ relationship to their employers, are heterogeneous and common in the United States. This article reviews the literature on workers’ preferences over these arrangements, inputs to firms’ decisions to offer them, and the impact of regulation. It also highlights several descriptive facts: The typical worker is in a job where almost none of the tasks can be performed from home, work arrangements have been relatively stable over the past 20 years, work conditions vary substantially with education, and jobs with schedule or location flexibility are less family friendly on average. This last fact explains why women are not more likely to have schedule or location flexibility and seem to largely reduce their working hours to get more family-friendly arrangements.