Patient-related outcomes in patients referred to a respiratory clinic with persisting symptoms following non-hospitalised COVID-19

Survivors of COVID-19 can present with varied and persisting symptoms, regardless of hospitalisation. We describe the ongoing symptoms, quality of life and return to work status in a cohort of non-hospitalised COVID-19 survivors with persisting respiratory symptoms presenting to clinic, who consented and completed patient-reported outcome measures. We identified fatigue, reduced quality of life and dysregulated breathing alongside the breathlessness. Those with co-existent fatigue had worse mood and quality of life and were less likely to have returned to normal working arrangements compared to those without fatigue. For non-hospitalised people with persisting symptoms following COVID-19 referred to a respiratory assessment clinic, there was a need for a wider holistic assessment, including return to work strategies.

Daily Self-Leadership and Playful Work Design: Proactive Approaches of Work in Times of Crisis

This study investigates how employees may use proactive work strategies to satisfy their basic psychological needs during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. We use self-determination theory to hypothesize that daily self-leadership (e.g., goal setting, constructive cognition) and playful work design (PWD; redesigning work to be more fun/challenging) satisfy basic psychological needs and facilitate job performance. We also predict that the use of these proactive strategies is particularly important when individuals ruminate a lot about the COVID-19 crisis. Daily diary data collected among a heterogeneous group of employees largely confirm these theoretical predictions. For organizational practitioners, this study thus suggests that it is important to encourage employees to be proactive. Although this may be challenging during crises, leaders could provide autonomy and feedback to foster self-leadership and PWD. In addition, organizations may offer training interventions so that employees learn to apply these proactive work strategies.

Post COVID-19 Work Strategies and Implications: Insight on Indian it Sector

The purpose of this paper is to examine the work strategies adopted by leading Indian IT companies post COVID-19 and their institutional and individual level implications. Following the exploratory sequential mixed-method approach, in the first phase, the data were collected from 8 leading IT companies in India to understand the work strategies implemented post COVID -19 to ensure employees’ safety without disrupting client deliverables. In the second phase, the primary qualitative interviews were conducted and selected IT companies’ financial statements with a systematic analysis of financial indicators were used to gauge the impact of new work strategies. The study reveals the selected IT companies were embracing Work-From-Home or Work-From-Anywhere as their work strategies by ensuring little to no disruption, were armed with a host of technology tools that allowed employees’ swathes to new work-norm within hours. The study findings manifold implications of the new work-norm are that it has no negative impact on the companies’ client deliverables and profitability. The paper confirms that the remote-working approach has resulted in reduced carbon footprint, work-life balance, and de-urbanization while identifying the flip side of this approach as the negative impact on team cohesiveness and employee emotional wellbeing. This research confirms the critical lesson learned from COVID-19 is agile companies must plan for a range of incomprehensible contingencies to ensure business continuity and growth. The research findings contribute towards understanding the Indian IT sector experiences in adopting the remote-work strategies and taken as lessons that can be useful for other global IT sectors.

The Impact of COVID-19 on Small Businesses’ Performance and Innovation

This study looked at the impact of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on the revenues of small businesses operating in industrial sectors and at the extent to which these businesses changed or adjusted their business activity, or changed the extent to which they utilized open innovation tools and implement innovation promotion processes. The findings show that, despite COVID-19’s far-reaching impact in all areas of life, the revenues of most small businesses in industrial sector were not adversely affected by the pandemic, and most of them did not change or adjust their business activities or the extent to which they employed open innovation tools and engage in innovation promotion processes. The findings also indicate that small businesses, most of whose revenues derive from subcontracting work to other businesses business to business (B2B) and from long-term agreements, are likely to cope better during periods of economic difficulty and under conditions of economic uncertainty. The findings also show that businesses that are active in the international markets have succeeded in adapting that activity to the changing demands and various trade restrictions. This study’s theoretical contribution lies in its focus on small businesses in the industrial sector and its examination of how the subcontracting strategy and international operations help such businesses contend with problems and conditions of economic uncertainty. On the practical plane, the findings suggest that policymakers should foster programmes that assist small businesses with these work strategies, which can help them survive, enhance their stability and thereby also promote the economy’s ability to withstand crisis situations

440Women and children’s experiences of international male migration for labour in Nepal

Background At least 10% of the Nepalese population is estimated to be working abroad. Typically, those abroad are young men with families from agricultural backgrounds. Research regarding the impact on the family left behind in Nepal is growing but has focused on singular issues rather than the multifaceted effects of migration. This study aimed to gain an in-depth understanding of the challenges and benefits of migration for wives and children left behind. Methods Thirty-two qualitative semi-structured interviews were undertaken in Kathmandu and Kaski districts of Nepal. Eligible participants were women who had a husband who had migrated abroad for work and a child under the age of five. Interviews were conducted in Nepali, translated and transcribed to English, then coded and analysed using inductive Thematic Analysis. Results Three overarching themes were developed: Migration as a livelihood strategy, Migration as a trade-off, and Adaptation to the situation. The financial benefits of migration included improvements in children’s education and access to food and housing. Challenges identified were women’s increased labour burden inside and outside the home, psychosocial stress, and changed child-father relationships. Change in women’s empowerment was dependent on socio-demographic factors. Conclusions Migration often resulted in the improvement of economic circumstances. However, challenges being faced by women and children largely shifted from financial to emotional. Key messages The effects of migration are mediated by contextual factors. Given the ongoing reliance on migration for work, strategies should be employed to optimise the benefits and mitigate the consequences of those who remain.

Modeling the Effects of Machine Rigidities on Joint Work Strategies

One of the challenges in designing resilient human-machine systems is that machine capabilities are inherently rigid. A resilient joint cognitive system can anticipate and adapt to changing work demands effectively, but limitations of machines can make this adaptation constrained and less fluid. By identifying and accommodating for these rigidities in the design of human-machine system architectures, developers can build human-machine systems that support multiple contexts. This paper proposes a work-modeling approach for analyzing joint human-machine work strategies, focusing on identifying interdependencies that would support opportunistic adaptation and reduce the risk of machine rigidity leading to brittle failures of a human-machine system. The approach is applied to a case study in space operations to demonstrate how interdependencies can be identified and evaluated. The results of this analysis provide early insight into how team adaptation and machine limitations can be systematically accounted for in system architecture design.

Project work strategies in fusion research

In this article, we examine and discuss observations on projectification from organizational and management studies and contextualize them with recent insights from the discourse around social acceleration. Against the backdrop of these debates, we ethnographically inquire into project work strategies in fusion research. First, we briefly survey existing scholarship that interrogates acceleration and projectification of research. Second, we explain why we focus on projects in fusion research and introduce the site of our investigation. In the third section, we identify three project work strategies in fusion research: content adjusting, temporal stretching, and (de)consolidation. In the final part, we argue that the highlighted project work strategies emerge as a product of the dialectical interplay of projectification and stabilization contexts that yields new spaces and opportunities for crafting agency and negotiating time in research that go beyond the reductive fast/slow dichotomy that nowadays tends to characterize contemporary accounts of temporality in and of research.

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF EXECUTING PROBATIONARY NON-CUSTODIAL PENALTIES IN VARIOUS RISK GROUPS CONCERNING THE RECIDIVISM OF PROBATIONERS

Based on cross-sectional studies, this article evaluates the effectiveness of probation offi cers. The classifi cation of convicts into risk groups is intended to improve public security and adjust the type and intensity of treatment by probation offi cers to the profile of the probationers. In this way, it is possible to adjust the methodological measures used by probation offi cers to the work strategies of worldwide probation services based on the case management model. The effectiveness of supervision conducted by probation offi cers largely depends on their commitment to the resocialisation process and the way of treating probationers. The conclusions resulting from this text will be especially useful in the work of resocialisation offi cers and probation offi cers.

Preventing Petrochemical Plastics Pollution: Sustainable Material Alternatives

Achievement of some of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals will not be possible if global trends in pollution associated with petrochemical-based plastics continue. Alternatives to petrochemical plastics have been researched intensely, but they have not been developed to replace current plastic products in a commercially viable way. The demand for single-use plastic personal protective equipment created by the COVID-19 pandemic has stimulated urgency in developing pollution prevention strategies that transcend reliance on highly variable consumer behavior. Biological material plastics are potentially sustainable because their manufacture utilizes renewable resources, and they are biodegradable. In this paper, challenges facing the sustainable management of discarded single-use petrochemical plastics are discussed, and a material lifecycle perspective is proposed that would be integrated into a circular economy of biological plastics. Preventing petrochemical plastics pollution requires a shift to fossil-free feedstock and energy and the design of biopolymers with desired properties. In this work, strategies for improving the performance and recyclability of biological plastics by designing polymers with diversified functionalities are presented.