Telecommuting can make it more difficult for employees to identify with their organizations. Box 5.2 specifically discusses this topic. As we have read already, organizations are comprised of people and their different cultures, the work environment, the organization's goals and values, etc. It is difficult for those who are not physically present in the workplace to get a feel for all these things and as a result they end up being more detached. I think it will be interesting to see as telecommuting becomes more prominent, how individuals identify with their organizations. There are some people that telecommute almost 100% of the time. These people would have a much more difficult time identifying with their company. On the flip side, companies would have to work harder to motivate these employees and create loyalty.
3 comments:
I find this very interesting as well. Working for a company that is has so many employees who telecommute 100% of the time and the rest telecommute at least once a week I think that this will definitely effect the way that individuals are socialized into the culture. I think that sometimes you can get a sense of your team over the phone just based on interactions that occur in meetings that you call into but the little, day-to-day interactions that occur face-to-face that seem insignificant, truly make a difference in culture, attitudes, and climate of an organization.
I think at my company it is easy to understand the culture of the entire organization because they are very proud of it and make it very clear to internal and external stakeholders but it becomes more difficult when the interactions become more personal. One of my co-workers telecommutes from Lake Tahoe 100% of the time. I have always felt like I knew her because of all the time we spent on the phone. I finally met her a few weeks ago after working with her for almost 9 months and she said I was exactly what she thought I would be like and she was exactly what I thought she would be like. I feel like we knew because of our interactions remotely even though we had never met face-to face. It could go either way. If someone is very in tune to the culture and people around them, whether it is electronically mediated or not, they will be able to get a sense of it easily but if a person is just naturally out of tune with that then it will be difficult for them whether they were face to face or not.
From my personal experience, I think telecommuting also improves communication between peers or between employees and managers in such situations. At my work place,our group director now works from a remote location and visits office once every fours months for a week. He makes sure that we have a face to face meeting with him each time he visits. This was not the case when he was working from office full time, we hardly ever had any conversation with him. Some of my friends working in other companies also feel that they or their managers normally spend more time communicating with remote teams in different location or countries than people working in the same office, as they feel it is important to communicate with them as they are in present in person all the time and they do not take the issue with same seriousness with people working locally.
Also, I feel people socialize more with people working remotely when they meet in person than with people who work with them in person as they feel they are the host for people working in some other location and visiting.
There is an important discovery in Box 5.2:
"Those who teleworked part-time [...] were more identified with their work team, employer, and occupation than those who teleworked less than one day per week or those who teleworked more than 50% of the week" (113).
This brings us to an interesting formula:
If you telework...
0-20% you have LESS corporate identity.
20-50% you have MORE corporate identity.
50-100% you have LESS corporate identity.
So they actually recommend that everyone should telework 20-50% of the week. If you consider, working from home (or a nearby office) has many benefits, including flexibility in schedule, multitasking around the home, and less time in traffic. It seems that telecommuting is actually advisable for the satisfaction and positive identification of employees!
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