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1 – 10 of over 34000Barry P. Haynes, Louise Suckley and Nick Nunnington
The paper aims to explore the relationship between office occupier work activity and workplace provision. It tests the proposition that location-fixed office workers are not…
Abstract
Purpose
The paper aims to explore the relationship between office occupier work activity and workplace provision. It tests the proposition that location-fixed office workers are not well-supported in the working environment as location-flexible office workers. The research also explores the perceptions of the workplace provision based upon the types of tasks completed at the desk-location, whether this was collaborative or focussed.
Design/methodology/approach
The research adopts a cross-sectional approach using an online questionnaire to collect data from several offices in the Middles East. The dataset consists of 405 responses. One-way analysis of variance was conducted to understand the relationship between location flexibility and perception of productivity. In addition, a series of t test were used to evaluate the relationship between work activities and office environment.
Findings
The results show that those workers who were location-fixed perceived the workplace provision to have a more negative impact on their productivity than those who had a greater level of location-flexibility, particularly with regards to noise levels and interruptions. In terms of types of activities, those that undertook more collaborative tasks valued the facilitation of creativity and interaction from the workplace provision.
Research limitations/implications
The research has limitations as data collection was at one-point in time and therefore lacks the opportunity to undertake longitudinal analysis. However, the research gives greater insights into the alignment of office environments based on flexibility and work activity.
Practical implications
The paper identifies implications for the design and development of office environments by identifying the need for office occupier activity profiles. These profiles can underpin data-led design which should promote a tailored choice appropriate work setting that can maximise productivity.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the research area of workplace alignment. It establishes that optimal workplace alignment requires a better understanding of office occupier needs based on location-flexibility and work activity.
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Shengsheng Huang and John Cantwell
This paper proposes locational ambidexterity as a location-specific factor based on an operation flexibility perspective, and explores why and how multinational corporations…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper proposes locational ambidexterity as a location-specific factor based on an operation flexibility perspective, and explores why and how multinational corporations (MNCs) proactively deal with uncertainty by valuing locational ambidexterity in making location decisions.
Design/methodology/approach
Location choice data for foreign direct investment (FDI) at a sub-national level in China is used to test the role of locational ambidexterity.
Findings
We find that FDI generally prefers locations with high ambidexterity. Moreover, investments from a heterogeneous country context are more sensitive to locational ambidexterity than those from a similar country context. However, there is no significant evidence that wholly owned investments favor locational ambidexterity more than do international joint ventures.
Research limitations/implications
An alternative operationalization of locational ambidexterity may be needed. Future research could explore the sources of locational ambidexterity, identify other firm- and industry-level factors that could alter the value of ambidexterity, investigate how MNCs integrate locational ambidexterity into organization-specific option creation strategies and test the ambidexterity perspective with micro-level location choice data.
Practical implications
Locational ambidexterity may reduce the overall risk and adjustment cost of future changes. FDI may choose a location with high ambidexterity, i.e. a balanced portfolio of location-specific determinants, under uncertainty about the future.
Originality/value
Drawing on the notion of location flexibility from Buckley and Casson (1998), this study identifies a new location character, locational ambidexterity, and proposes that MNCs address uncertainty by choosing ambidextrous locations that offer more flexibility for MNCs to change or respond to potential volatility. Selecting locations with high ambidexterity is thus an alternative and complement to the organization-specific flexibility creation strategies suggested by the literature on real option and flexibility.
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The purpose of this paper is to create a resilient supply chain (SC) plan to contain disruptions and risks in the overall operations of a business.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to create a resilient supply chain (SC) plan to contain disruptions and risks in the overall operations of a business.
Design/methodology/approach
The study integrates resilience considerations in a business planning model that formulates resilience performance (RP) of SC functions in terms of flexibility, reliability, and similar system factors. It evaluates the RP of SC plans and determines their vulnerability considering required and planned resources. The model estimates the possible effects of disasters on vulnerable functions using a scenario-based analysis and plans containment options. It also includes decision options for deploying resources to achieve the expected levels of resilience by preventing potential vulnerabilities. The model takes optimum decision in a what-if approach by comparing performance of the existing business plan, with options for containing the vulnerabilities inherent in not considering potential risks when planning to fulfill market demand, and the performance of a resilient plan that includes decision options to prevent vulnerabilities where possible and mitigate them otherwise.
Findings
It is possible, for example, to evaluate RP of SC plans, identify vulnerable functions, and decide optimum option to create resilient business system.
Research limitations/implications
The present study takes a generic approach and creates bases to explore its application in any industry-based case.
Originality/value
The research introduces formulations for RPs and vulnerability indices that can be included in a planning model to create a resilient SC.
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Debolina Dutta, Chaitali Vedak and Anasha Kannan Poyil
The COVID-19 pandemic found deliberate and idiosyncratic adoption of telecommuting and other flexibility practices across industries. With the pandemic waning, many organizations…
Abstract
Purpose
The COVID-19 pandemic found deliberate and idiosyncratic adoption of telecommuting and other flexibility practices across industries. With the pandemic waning, many organizations adopted various models for employee work locations. Based on Self-Determination Theory and Social Comparison Theory, the authors examine the impact of the dissonance between employee preference for their work location and enforced work location norms and its impact on general well-being and organizational commitment.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors’ empirical study is based on a sample of 881 respondents across multiple industries in India over six months of the COVID pandemic. The authors use PLS-SEM for data analysis to examine the model and the moderating influence of individual resilience on control at work.
Findings
The authors find that increased dissonance between work locations reduces general well-being, control and work. Further, higher individual resilience reduces the impact of this dissonance on control at work.
Practical implications
The study informs policy and practices that choice of work location is important for employees to feel a higher sense of control, impacting their affective commitment and general well-being. While implementation of policies across an organization for varying job roles and complexities presents a challenge, practitioners may ignore this need of employees at their peril, as employees are likely to demonstrate lower well-being, engagement and organizational commitment and eventually leave.
Originality/value
This study is significant as it provides relevant scholarship based on the COVID-19 pandemic, guiding practice on future ways of working. This study further supports the impact of an individual's sense of control on where work is done. The authors build a strong theoretical foundation to justify the impact of the lack of autonomy in the emerging working norms on employees' general well-being and organizational commitment.
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Patricia Martinez and Carolina B. Gómez
This study aims to examine how the amount and type of flexibility in work schedule (flextime) and work location (telecommuting) may be related to receiving fewer training and…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine how the amount and type of flexibility in work schedule (flextime) and work location (telecommuting) may be related to receiving fewer training and development opportunities. Given that under flextime, employees remain at the work location, while under telecommuting employees are removed from the regular work site and social system, the paper expects that as employees have more telecommuting flexibility, they will receive fewer training opportunities, which in turn will be associated with more negative job attitudes and behaviors.
Design/methodology/approach
Participants (n=298) were recruited from a healthcare and a software development firm. Employees provided self-report ratings of their intentions to quit and supervisor supportiveness. Supervisors rated employees' citizenship behaviors and the flextime, telecommuting and training and development practices for the job positions.
Findings
As employees possess greater flexibility to telecommute, they received fewer training and development opportunities, while employees with greater work schedule flexibility (flextime) actually received more training opportunities. Additionally, the paper finds that training and development mediates the negative relationship between telecommuting flexibility and organizational citizenship behaviors. Thus, as employees had greater telecommuting flexibility, they exhibited lower levels of organization citizenship behaviors.
Research limitations/implications
This study provides evidence of how greater telecommuting flexibility that leads to decreased training and development opportunities may negatively influence employees' citizenship behaviors. The study also supports that flexibility to work away from the regular work location and not schedule flexibility, is the key antecedent. The findings suggest that supervisors should monitor the amount of training opportunities provided to employees with telecommuting flexibility.
Originality/value
This is one of the few studies to examine telecommuting flexibility: the extent to which employees can work at home and modify their schedule in order to do so. It is also one of the few studies to compare how work schedule and work location flexibility may be differentially related to training and development. The paper examines the potential trade-offs between this flexibility and receiving fewer training and development opportunities.
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Eunhwa Yang, Yujin Kim and Sungil Hong
This study aims to understand how knowledge workers working from home during COVID-19 changed their views on physical work environments and working-from-home practices.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to understand how knowledge workers working from home during COVID-19 changed their views on physical work environments and working-from-home practices.
Design/methodology/approach
This study conducted a survey targeting workers in the USA recruited via Amazon Mechanical Turk. A total of 1,651 responses were collected and 648 responses were used for the analysis.
Findings
The perceived work-life balance improved during the pandemic compared to before, while the balance of physical boundaries between the workplace and home decreased. Workplace flexibility, environmental conditions of home offices and organizational supports are positively associated with productivity, satisfaction with working from home and work-life balance during the pandemic.
Research limitations/implications
While the strict traditional view of “showing” up in the office from Monday through Friday is likely on the decline, the hybrid workplace with flexibility can be introduced as some activities are not significantly affected by the work location, either at home-based or corporate offices. The results of this study also highlight the importance of organizations to support productivity and satisfaction in the corporate office as well as home. With the industry collaboration, future research of relatively large sample sizes and study sites, investigating workers’ needs and adapted patterns of use in home-based and corporate offices, will help corporate real estate managers make decisions and provide some level of standardization of spatial efficiency and configurations of corporate offices as well as essential supports for home offices.
Originality/value
The pandemic-enforced working-from-home practices awaken the interdependence between corporate and home environments, how works are done and consequently, the role of the physical workplace. This study built a more in-depth understanding of how workers who were able to continue working from home during COVID-19 changed or not changed their views on physical work environments and working-from-home practices.
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Bramhani Rao and Sambashiva Rao Kunja
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between two sub-dimensions of a leader’s empathy (perspective-taking and empathic-concern) and successful…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between two sub-dimensions of a leader’s empathy (perspective-taking and empathic-concern) and successful authorization of idiosyncratic deals (developmental, location flexibility and schedule flexibility i-deals).
Design/methodology/approach
Structural equation modeling was conducted on the cross-sectional data collected from 307 managers working in software development and support companies located in major cities in India.
Findings
While empathic-concern is positively related to successful authorization of both developmental and flexibility i-deals, perspective-taking related positively to authorization of developmental i-deals and showed no significant relationship with flexibility i-deals.
Research limitations/implications
The study reiterates the importance of empathy in modern workplaces and encourages managers to be conscious of their intelligence, as well as emotions, while participating in negotiations at the workplace.
Originality/value
The paper relates i-deals to sub-dimensions of empathy which is a previously unexplored antecedent to i-deals.
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Pravin Kumar, Ravi Shankar and Surendra S. Yadav
The purpose of this paper is to identify and evaluate the relationships among the flexibility enablers and to prepare a hierarchy of these enablers to know their influences over…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to identify and evaluate the relationships among the flexibility enablers and to prepare a hierarchy of these enablers to know their influences over each other in global supply chain. The framework suggests that the priority of enablers in supply chain should be determined on the basis of their driving power and dependency.
Design/methodology/approach
Various enablers used by researchers and practitioners for flexibility management of global supply chain have been identified. These enablers have been classified as strategic, operational and performance‐based enablers. Interpretive structural modeling (ISM) is used to establish mutual relationships among the flexibility enablers and to prepare a hierarchy‐based model.
Findings
It has been observed that some enablers having high‐driving power and low dependency are of strategic importance. These enablers require more attention while other enablers based on operations and performances are dependents of strategic enablers.
Practical implications
The index of enablers based on driving power and dependency provides an insight to supply chain managers to make the entire supply chain highly flexible and help them to respond to global uncertainties.
Originality/value
Presentation of enablers in the form of hierarchy using ISM and ranking them into various driving power and dependent categories is a good effort to make flexible global supply chain.
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Heidi M. Baumann and Tanya M. Marcum
As a result of COVID-19 and associated stay-at-home orders, the number of employees working remotely reached unprecedented levels during early periods of the pandemic. Since that…
Abstract
Purpose
As a result of COVID-19 and associated stay-at-home orders, the number of employees working remotely reached unprecedented levels during early periods of the pandemic. Since that time, some employees have returned to the office; yet, there is a lasting impact on employees’ desires for remote work. In response, decision-makers in organizations should be equipped with knowledge regarding what makes remote work beneficial for both employees and the organization and also fair and compliant with the law. This paper aims to take a dual perspective spanning human capital and legal aspects of remote work to offer six practical recommendations to organizations.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper reviews the human resources (HR) scholarly literature on remote work, using principles from evidence-based management to select valid and reliable findings in which to base practical recommendations for organizations. Associated legal risks are identified through a review of the legal literature on remote work and integrated into the recommendations.
Findings
Building on a multilevel model of HR practices, the authors offer the following six practical recommendations to organizations: offer hybrid work and both location and schedule flexibility; ensure fair and compliant work schedules; acknowledge manager perceptions; ensure fair approval and evaluation of remote workers; acknowledge individual workers; and align remote work practices with diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
Originality/value
The multilevel model of remote work practices discussed in this paper offers an organizing framework for identifying advantages and disadvantages of remote work that future research may build upon. The six recommendations help bridge the research–practice gap by providing organizations with knowledge on how to maximize the benefits of remote work while mitigating potential legal risks.
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Kevin Baird, Amy Tung, Thanh Phan and Mohammed Bhuyan
This study examines the effect of Human Resource Management (HRM) policies in respect to workplace flexibility and employee empowerment on two employee behaviour related outcomes…
Abstract
Purpose
This study examines the effect of Human Resource Management (HRM) policies in respect to workplace flexibility and employee empowerment on two employee behaviour related outcomes (employee organisational commitment (EOC) and collegiality) and organisational resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Design/methodology/approach
Data were collected using an online survey questionnaire managed by Qualtrics. The questionnaire was distributed to the lower, middle and senior managers of 1,000 Australian organisations with 337 responses used in the analysis.
Findings
The findings indicate that workplace flexibility exhibits a direct and indirect (through collegiality) significant positive association with organisational resilience, and employee empowerment exhibits a direct and indirect (through both EOC and collegiality) significant positive association with organisational resilience.
Originality/value
The results highlight the importance of implementing desirable HRM policies in respect to empowering employees and enhancing workplace flexibility due to their role in facilitating organisational resilience both directly and indirectly through their influence on employee behaviour related outcomes, specifically EOC and collegiality.
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