Search results

The working day has always comprised frequent interruptions. Yet the frequency and intensity of these disruptions appear to be on the rise as a result of advancing technology, increasing interdependent work processes, and changing work environments (e.g., open-plan offices). Interestingly, there have only been a handful of studies on workplace interruptions, and the primary focus among researchers has been on the effects of interruptions on task completion. In this chapter, we argue that interruptions at work can be conceptualized as emotion-inducing events. We draw on research across different disciplines to develop a framework to show how the work-enhancing or work-hindering effects of different types of interruptions are, in part, determined by the employees' capability to manage (regulate) their emotional responses.

We initially review the literature regarding workplace interruptions. We then develop a framework for understanding the different types of interruptions experienced by individuals at work and then use this framework to develop a model linking interruptions to emotion regulation drawing on Affective Events Theory (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996). In essence, we advance our understanding of work interruptions by considering these as events that are able to produce positive or negative affective reactions that may enhance or hinder work performance.

The framework presented in this chapter increases understanding of the different types of workplace interruptions and shows how emotion regulation impacts subsequent work-related outcomes. This chapter provides valuable insights into the nature of work interruptions to identify both positive and negative aspects of work interruptions to establish two different domains of work interruptions that may improve (work-enhancing interruptions) or thwart (work-hindering interruptions) work-related outcomes. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

The authors investigate the relationship between instant messenger (IM) use and work performance, mediated by interruptions and two key indicators of the stress associated with technology use: overload and complexity.

The authors validate this research model using partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) with data collected through a survey of 416 working professionals.

The data reveal that while IM use contributes minimally to work interruptions and to a greater extent to technological complexity, these two constructs fully mediate the direct influence of IM use at work on technology overload, and meanwhile significantly and directly contribute to work performance.

This research provides theoretical insights into the deployment of IM and its actual impacts in the workplace. To improve the generalisation of the findings, the authors call for more IM-related research in other countries, with more native theories and various methodologies in this domain.

The level of stress generated through IM use is moderate, considering IM is not a significant contributor to work interruptions. Thus, despite the potential negative effects of IM communication, the positive effects of using IM at work prevail. As a result, the technology can be promoted as long as employees, their managers and the organisation as a whole are well prepared. Employees can transfer skills and behaviour from the personal setting to their work environment and thus may find an intrinsic motivation to make better use of the IM technology at work.

The authors argue that this research model is novel for its perspective on evaluating the actual impacts of IM use at work instead of the reasons of using it. The authors conceptualise the process to explain how IM contributes to interruptions and other technostress indicators in the working context, and the impact on performance. Contrary to some prior research, the authors find that overall IM applications do not have a negative impact on work performance, and instead may enhance it.

Work interruptions (WIs) due to social media are becoming more and more common in the daily lives of organizations. However, the relationship between WI and work performance of employees is still unclear. This study aims to investigate the effects of WIs due to social media on employees' work performance in terms of different mechanisms; it also considers the moderating role of social media usage.

Using the jobs demands-resource (JD-R) model, this paper proposes a research model to investigate the effects of WIs on employee work performance from the perspective of the enabling mechanism and burden mechanism. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the data of 444 employees.

The results show that (1) with regard to the enabling mechanism path, WI has a positive effect on employees' sense of belonging, which further has a positive effect on employees' work performance; (2) with regard to the burden mechanism path, WI has a positive effect on employees' interruption overload; however, the effect of employee interruption overload on employees' work performance is not significant, and (3) social media used for either work or social purposes can strengthen the relationship between WI and interruption overload, while social media used for work-related purposes can reduce the relationship between WI and a sense of belonging.

First, this paper contributes to the WI literature by clarifying how WI affects employees' work performance through different mechanisms, namely the enabling mechanism and the burden mechanism. Second, this paper contributes to the WI literature by revealing a boundary condition, namely social media use, between WI and a sense of belonging and between WI and employees' interruption overload.

Interruptions are prevalent in knowledge work, and their negative consequences have driven research to find ways for interruption management. However, these means almost always leave the responsibility and burden of interruptions with individual knowledge workers. System-level approaches for interruption management, on the other hand, have the potential to reduce the burden on employees. This paper’s objective is to pave way for system-level interruption management by showing that data about factual characteristics of work can be used to identify interrupting situations.

The authors provide a demonstration of using trace data from information and communications technology (ICT)-systems and machine learning to identify interrupting situations. They conduct a “simulation” of automated data collection by asking employees of two companies to provide information concerning situations and interruptions through weekly reports. They obtain information regarding four organizational elements: task, people, technology and structure, and employ classification trees to show that this data can be used to identify situations across which the level of interruptions differs.

The authors show that it is possible to identifying interrupting situations from trace data. During the eight-week observation period in Company A they identified seven and in Company B four different situations each having a different probability of occurrence of interruptions.

The authors extend employee-level interruption management to the system-level by using “task” as a bridging concept. Task is a core concept in both traditional interruption research and Leavitt's 1965 socio-technical model which allows us to connect other organizational elements (people, structure and technology) to interruptions.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the experience, impact and likelihood of an acute business interruption, along with the perceived ability to intervene, influences the “threat orientation” of owner-managers in small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the UK. The concept of “threat orientation” is introduced in this study as a way to eschew the binary view of whether an organisation does or does not have processes and capabilities to respond to acute interruptions.

“Threat orientation” is operationalised and survey data are collected from 215 SMEs in the UK. Data from owner-managers are analysed using multiple regression techniques.

The results of this study provide empirical evidence to highlight the importance of firm age rather than size as a determinant of the propensity to formalise activities to deal with acute interruptions. Recent experience and the ability to intervene were statistically significant predictors of threat orientation but the likelihood and concern about specific types of threat was not found to positively influence threat orientation.

Although the data are self-report in nature, the respondents in the study are the chief decision and policy makers in their organisations and thus it is essential to understand the influences on their threat orientation. Results are generalisable only to UK SMEs.

The findings of the paper contribute to a nascent understanding of planning for acute interruptions in SMEs and (despite the cross-sectional nature of the study), the findings clearly reinforce the need for continuing longitudinal research into how resilience develops in smaller organisations.

According to literature, interruptions during drug administration lead to a significant proportion of medication errors. Evidence on the effectiveness of interventions to reduce interruption is still limited. The purpose of this paper is to explore main reasons for interruptions during drug administration rounds in a geriatric ward of an Italian secondary hospital and test the effectiveness of a combined intervention.

This is a pre and post-intervention observational study based on direct observation. All nurse staff (24) participated to the study that lead to observe a total of 44 drug dispensing rounds with 945 drugs administered to 491 patients in T0 and 994 drugs to 506 patients in T1.

A significant reduction of raw number of interruptions (mean per round from 17.31 in T0 to 9.09 in T1, p<0.01), interruptions/patient rate (from 0.78 in T0 to 0.40 in T1, p<0.01) and interruptions/drugs rate (from 0.44 in T0 to 0.22 in T1, p<0.01) were observed. Needs for further improvements were elicited (e.g. a greater involvement of support staff).

Nurse staff should be adequately trained on the risks related to interruptions during drug administration since routine activity is at high risk of distractions due to its repetitive and skill-based nature.

A strong involvement of both MB and leadership, together with the frontline staff, helped to raise staff motivation and guide a bottom-up approach, able to identify tailored interventions and serve concurrently as training instrument tool.

Knowledge workers live and work in a technology-enabled, push-notification world full of interruptions that create information overload, often requiring these workers to utilize task switching as a mechanism to meet multiple competing tasks' demands. Previous research has examined both the positive and, more often, negative effects from interruptions and task switching on knowledge workers' performance. However, this paper aims to examine knowledge workers' agentic approach to managing interruption signals and consequent task switching to remain dedicated to the task at hand.

Using an inductive grounded theory approach, we analyzed data from semi-structured interviews with knowledge workers regarding their experiences with task management strategies in interruption-heavy environments.

The results indicate the emergence of a new construct that we define as “task adherence.” We identified behavioral and technological mechanisms that knowledge workers employ to adhere to tasks, and we also categorized a host of environmental, personal and task-related factors that influence a knowledge worker's task adherence level.

This study offers a novel conceptualization of key determinants of knowledge workers' task management. Through insights into how knowledge workers purposefully prepare for and address potential interruption signals, as well as manage task switching from subsequent interruptions, managers may be able to design new work processes to improve task performance.

In a world of interruptions, task adherence adds to and clarifies a missing element in the time and task management dilemma that can enhance future efforts in designing strategies that enable knowledge workers to be more productive.

Career interruptions of employees imply important issues for both firms and individuals, including a possibly lower compensation after returning to a job. Different compensation components are explored, as bonus payments frequently complement fixed salaries for many employees, making various channels of lower compensation possible. This paper aims to discuss this issue.

This study is based on a yearly salary survey among a rather homogeneous group of professionals and middle managers from the German chemical sector, which contains detailed information on compensation components next to individual and job characteristics. The incidence and duration of past career interruptions act as the most important independent variables. Mincer-type wage regressions are complemented by estimations on wage increases.

The results show that career interruptions are more related to lower subsequent bonus payments than they are to fixed salaries. Furthermore, interruptions caused by unemployment are associated with higher interruption pay gaps than those resulting from other reasons such as parental leave. The results even hint for catch-up effects following parental leave with regard to higher wage increases compared to individuals without interruptions. Career interruptions are more prevalent for female managers offering an explanation for a considerable part of gender pay gaps. Wage losses after career interruptions are more pronounced for male employees than they are for females, though.

This study extents the literature by disentangling the relation of career interruptions and different compensation components, bonus payments next to fixed salaries in particular. The role of interruption type and gender are also taken into account so that the paper deepens the understanding of the role of past career interruptions for employees’ remuneration.

The article notes that, sometimes explicitly but always implicitly, the “time management” literature condemns interruptions. The article reports on two studies of interruptions experienced by principals in primary and secondary schools in New South Wales, Australia. Data were gathered via structured, non‐participant observations of principals at work. Analysis reveals the frequency, length, source and type of interruptions sustained. Contrary to the literature, principals did not view interruptions as hindering their tasks as school leaders. Time spent on interruptions is regarded essentially as time invested rather than time lost.

The purpose of this paper is to identify optimum crew formations at unit execution level of repetitive projects that minimize project duration, project cost, crew work interruptions and interruption costs, simultaneously.

The model consists of four modules. The first module quantifies uncertainties associated with the crew productivity rate and quantity of work using the fuzzy set theory. The second module identifies feasible boundaries for activity relaxation. The third module computes direct cost, indirect cost and interruption costs, including idle crew cost as well as mobilization and demobilization costs. The fourth module identifies near-optimum crew formation using a newly developed multi-objective optimization model.

The developed model was able to provide improvements of 0.2, 16.86 and 12.98% for minimization of project cost, crew work interruptions and interruption costs from US$1,505,960, 8.3 days and US$8,300, as recently reported in the literature, to US$1,502,979, 6.9 days and US$7,222, respectively, without impacting the optimized project duration.

The novelty of this paper lies in its activity-relaxation free float that considers the effect of postponing early finish dates of repetitive activities on crew work interruptions. The introduced new float allows for calculating the required crew productivity rate that minimizes crew work interruptions without delaying successor activities and without impacting the optimized project duration. It safeguards against assignment of unnecessary costly resources.