Dataset Information

Contemporary Knowledge Workers and the Boundaryless Work-Life Interface: Implications for the Human Resource Management of the Knowledge Workforce.

ABSTRACT: In the last decade, knowledge workers have seen tremendous change in ways of working and living, driven by proliferating mobile communication technologies, the rise of dual-income couples, shifting expectations of ideal motherhood and involved fatherhood, and the rise of flexible working arrangements. Drawing on 54 interviews with Australian knowledge workers in the information technology sector, we argue that the interface between work and life is now blurred and boundaryless for knowledge workers. By this, we mean that knowledge workers are empowered and enslaved by mobile devices that bring work into the home, and family into the workplace. Knowledge workers take advantage of flexible working to craft unique, personal arrangements to suit their work, family, personal and community pursuits. They choose where and when to work, often interweaving the work domain and the home-family domain multiple times per day. Teleworkers, for example, attain rapid boundary transitions rending the work-home boundary, thus making their experience of the work-life interface boundaryless.

SUBMITTER: Field JC

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6283975 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Contemporary Knowledge Workers and the Boundaryless Work-Life Interface: Implications for the Human Resource Management of the Knowledge Workforce.

Field Justin Craig JC Chan Xi Wen XW

Frontiers in psychology 20181130

In the last decade, knowledge workers have seen tremendous change in ways of working and living, driven by proliferating mobile communication technologies, the rise of dual-income couples, shifting expectations of ideal motherhood and involved fatherhood, and the rise of flexible working arrangements. Drawing on 54 interviews with Australian knowledge workers in the information technology sector, we argue that the interface between work and life is now blurred and boundaryless for knowledge work ...[more]

PMID: 30555399

Similar Datasets

Project description:ImportancePhysician work hours are an underexplored facet of the physician workforce that can inform policy for the rapidly changing health care labor market.ObjectiveTo examine trends in individual physician work hours and their contribution to clinical workforce changes over a 20-year period.Design, setting, and participantsThis cross-sectional study focused on active US physicians between January 2001 and December 2021 who were included in the Current Population Survey. Outcomes for physicians, advanced practice professionals (APPs), and nonphysician holders of doctoral degrees were compared, and generalized linear models were used to estimate differences in time trends for weekly work hours across subgroups.Main outcomes and measuresPhysician and APP workforce size, defined as the number of active clinicians, 3-year moving averages of weekly work hours by individual physicians, and weekly hours contributed by the physician and APP workforce per 100 000 US residents.ResultsA total of 87 297 monthly surveys of physicians from 17 599 unique households were included in the analysis. The number of active physicians grew 32.9% from 2001 to 2021, peaking in 2019 at 989 684, then falling 6.7% to 923 419 by 2021, with disproportionate loss of physicians in rural areas. Average weekly work hours for individual physicians declined by 7.6% (95% CI, -9.1% to -6.1%), from 52.6 to 48.6 hours per week from 2001 to 2021. The downward trend was driven by decreasing hours among male physicians, particularly fathers (11.9% decline in work hours), rural physicians (-9.7%), and physicians aged 45 to 54 years (-9.8%). Physician mothers were the only examined subgroup to experience a statistically significant increase in work hours (3.0%). Total weekly hours contributed by the physician workforce per 10 000 US residents increased by 7.0%, from 13 006 hours in 2001 to 2003 to 13 920 hours in 2019 to 2021, compared with 16.6% growth in the US population over that time period. Weekly hours contributed by the APP workforce per 100 000 US residents grew 71.2% from 2010 through 2012 to 2019 through 2021.Conclusions and relevanceThis cross-sectional study showed that physician work hours consistently declined in the past 20 years, such that physician workforce hours per capita lagged behind US population growth. This trend was offset by rapid growth in hours contributed by the APP workforce. The gap in physician work hours between men and women narrowed considerably, with diverging potential implications for gender equity. Increasing physician retirement combined with a drop in active physicians during the COVID-19 pandemic may further slow growth in physician workforce hours per capita in the US.

Project description:ObjectiveThe study aimed to investigate perceptions and determinants of the overall impact on life and work domains among a community of knowledge workers after 18 months of forced work from home due to the pandemic.MethodsA cross-sectional study with a retrospective assessment was conducted early in 2022 at the National Research Council of Italy. Five single-item questions explored the perceived impact on life domain while a 7-item scale the impact on the work domain. Bivariate analyses and multivariate regressions were used to evaluate the associations between impacts and some key factors defined by 29 ad hoc closed questions.ResultsMore than 95% of the 748 respondents reported a perceived change in at least one item of the life domain. For each of these items, although a large group of subjects has reported that working from home had no impact (from 27 to 55%), in the rest of the sample the positive evaluation (from 30 to 60%) clearly prevailed over the negative one. Overall, most of the subjects (64%) rated the impact on the work experience positively. Relationship with colleagues and participation in the work context were the items where the greatest number of negative rates was concentrated (27 and 25%, respectively). On the other hand, positive perceptions prevailed over both negative perceptions and lack of impact perceptions on the subjects of organizational flexibility and quality of work. The frequency of work-room sharing, home-work commute time and changes in sedentary lifestyle, have been identified as common explanatory factors of perceived impacts on both domains.ConclusionOverall, respondents reported positive rather than negative perceived impacts of forced work from home in both their lives and work. The obtained results suggest that policies to promote the physical and mental health of employees, strengthen inclusion and maintain a sense of community are necessary to improve workers' health and prevent the effects of perceived isolation on research activities.

Dataset Information

Contemporary Knowledge Workers and the Boundaryless Work-Life Interface: Implications for the Human Resource Management of the Knowledge Workforce.

Publications

Contemporary Knowledge Workers and the Boundaryless Work-Life Interface: Implications for the Human Resource Management of the Knowledge Workforce.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets