New Work Transformation

Abstract

The world is changing at an unprecedented speed in recent years as a result of technology advancements. Although the benefits are manifold, the impact of tech-enabled transformation can be a threat to organizations and people. This is because it causes uncertainty to the routine business and work activities. Particularly, during the COVID-19 crisis in 2020 and early 2021, it is evident that the way people continuingly conduct business and work has been unlocked by technology. The potential to perform and deliver work is no longer limited to the traditional way workers have known for decades. Today, work is non-conventional meaning that it is flexible, online, remote, collaborative and resilient. New Work is one of the emerging terms used to describe this phenomenon. However, sometimes the New Work concept can be too diverse and ideational to grasp. Hence, this research aims to close this gap by presenting available definitions of New Work. Another purpose of this research is to design self-service tools that can help organizations and their stakeholders understand New Work Transformation better. That is done by proposing a conceptual design of “an online New Work Transformation self-assessment” and “an online New Work Transformation self-guided design workshop”. Both design tools are developed based on the design science research methodology. The purpose of the tools is to support companies in identifying their current New Work transformation status, highlighting a new work paradigm and its impact, and overcoming silo views in their organization.