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Technology and the humanness of organizations

 

Like, what colour is a conversation with a colleague? All those bits that might not be reflected in the calendar.
The research I undertook for my Professional Doctorate (completed in 2017) explored how technology alters organizational processes and structures. The above quote relates to the use of the Outlook calendar to manage workload in a health clinic.

Some of the findings anticipated the transformation of work that was accelerated by the pandemic and enabled by technology.  For example, I showed how technology transports work across an organization’s usual boundaries of time (9-5) and place (the office).

The affordances of technology (i.e. what it enables) have many positive aspects, such as maintaining delivery of critical services during a global pandemic. Society’s capacity to deliver its core functions was many times greater in 2020 that it was 10 or 50 years earlier. Some impacts were unexpected – such as accelerating the decline in physical newspaper sales because people weren’t going into the office, and some were unwelcome – such as the isolation of workers from their colleagues and support systems. Where these individuals were managing highly complex, stressful and demanding work – such as the critical workers of the pandemic – this may have had negative impacts on their capacity to undertake their role, as well as their health. Consider the following comment from one of the participants (a Psychiatrist):

I mean I love the fact that I can get home in time for tea sometimes and then I can do my notes at home.

One of my conclusions was that, unless implemented in thoughtful ways, technology shifts the workload from something that is held collectively – in a department and regulated by a manager – onto the individual employee who has to manage alone. At the same time – by facilitating mobile and ‘agile’ working – it can disrupt the very team structures and relationships that people rely on to manage the anxiety of complex tasks and high pressure situations.

I think a lot of people would prefer to have more members of staff than more devices and then we wouldn’t have to be superhuman robotic agilely working, going from one patient to the next and writing our notes up in our cars.

The impact will be sector specific and some individuals and teams will be better able to manage change than others. The quality of management is a key factor in how well teams and individuals adjust to transformations in their work.

All change, including technological change, has positive and negative effects. The role of the leader, manager or consultant is to maximize the former and mitigate the latter.

The answer cannot be to undo the multiple benefits afforded by new technologies, but to take time to reflect on the impact of these changes on people, the humanness of organizations, and ultimately on their capacity to deliver effectively for clients, consumers, audiences and service users.

Further reading

Vansina, L. (ed.) (2013). Humanness in Organisations: A Psychodynamic Contribution. London: Karnac Books Ltd.

Waggett, N. 2017. Technology at Work: An Investigation of Technology as a Mediator of Organizational Processes in the Human Services and the Implications for Consultancy Practice. Available via my blog https://unstickwork.blogspot.com/

 


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