In the Finnish work life many new forms of organizing work have been widely adopted, at least on nominal level. For example four out of five work organizations employ some form of team work. Likewise, four out of five white collar workers have flexible working time as well as a third of the manual labourers. Yet, teleworking (or e-Work) is still relatively rare: only one percent of all the employees has an agreement on having a full telework day a week or more. However, the telework potential is many times greater. Both the employees and the employers agree that nearly a fifth of all the employees, and a third of the upper white collar workers, could in principle have one full teleworking day per week. However, management sees no intrinsic benefits in telework and thus have no concrete interest in increasing the number of teleworkers.

The research data is comprised of a representative sample of 106 work organizations with at least 10 employees.

The data has three layers: an employee survey (N=1177), an organization level survey (N=104) and qualitative interviews of managers and ship stewards. The analysis in this report relies extensively on the manager interviews. The management perspective is supplemented by and compared with that of the employees (quantitative analysis) as well as some extracts from the interviews of the shop stewards.

Ministry of Labour. Labour Policy Studies no. 314.

Two things are common to most types of flexible work arrangements: reciprocity and the fact that most formal arrangements are often supplemented by less formal and incidental flexibility. Even if the formal work organization is not be particularly flexible in nature, in most organizations temporary flexible arrangements can often be negotiated in times of urgent personal needs.

Reciprocity implies in this context that for example flextimers more often also adjust their working time to the needs of the organization, often extending the working time voluntarily beyond ordinary. At it’s best, flexible working time can serve both the interests of the employees and those of the organization enhancing both employee well being and organization efficiency. Team work at it’s best can also be seen as having positive outcomes for both sides. The interviewed managers consider team work as having contributed to employee initiative, responsibility, independence and commitment to the organization goals. In team work the skills and potentials of the employees can also be utilized better. Team work provides also more positive work experience for the employees and can thus consolidate trust and commitment to the organization. This however is conditioned by the level of team autonomy. The previous holds true only in the conditions of at least relatively high autonomy.

In concordance with previous research the researchers also observed reciprocity in the development of trust and commitment. Positive work experiences enhance trust and organizational commitment. Independent, interesting and “fittingly” challenging work tasks in which one can realize his/her true potential provide employees with these positive experiences. This assumes most often functional flexibility and trust-based management. Thus, when the management chooses to trust employees and let go of some of the control, the employees reciprocate with trust and loyalty towards the management. Fair and considerate leadership, thanks-giving, personal feedback, and recognition of the employee in general are often much more effective incentives than impersonal performance based pay-systems, which of course can also have an effect. Work is experienced positively when the work-load and the skill requirements are in balance with the competencies and resources of the individual employee (person-job-fit). When the experienced psychological, social and material benefits are in balance with the individual work input, we can say that the individual psychological contract is valid. This strengthens trust in the management and commitment to the organization. Conversely, insecurity about the employment relationship or threat of redundancy or lay-off can be considered a violation of this psychological contract and can have detrimental effects on trust and commitment.

Another key observation in this analysis is that organizational rearrangements and other changes in the work place, be they then positive or negative, can often damage the work atmosphere. For example, both increasing and decreasing profitability seems to be connected to lower levels of trust and commitment in the organization. This may be explained by the fact that all changes bring about insecurity either in a general manner or due to concerns related to the consequences. These concerns are often about the risks related to the employment security or about the fear of becoming generally useless and “dispensable”, and the associated psychological stress experiences.

Ministry of Labour
P.O. Box 34
00023 Government
Finland
Phone: + 358 10 60 4001
kirjaamo.tyoministerio@mol.fi
http://www.mol.fi

02/05/2006

Tero Mamia and Harri Melin (edit.)

research

Urban Policy > Economy knowledge & employment > Working patterns

Remote working, Flexible working