In recent decades technology has revolutionised the way companies do business and workers do their jobs. In the modern, technology-driven work environment, it is now possible to dictate what employees do when they are outside the workplace as well as in it. While one's 'free' time should normally be free of work demands, the ability to contact someone at any hour of the day by email or telephone often means that it is often interrupted by work. These new demands on non-work time via technology represent a form of soft control over workers and a new frontier in unpaid overtime. To explore the p
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In recent decades technology has revolutionised the way companies do business and workers do their jobs. In the modern, technology-driven work environment, it is now possible to dictate what employees do when they are outside the workplace as well as in it. While one's 'free' time should normally be free of work demands, the ability to contact someone at any hour of the day by email or telephone often means that it is often interrupted by work. These new demands on non-work time via technology represent a form of soft control over workers and a new frontier in unpaid overtime. To explore the phenomenon of polluted time, in July 2011 The Australia Institute carried out an online survey of 1,384 Australians, of which 845 reported being in paid work. Most respondents (60 per cent) reported doing some kind of work task outside of their normal working hours in the past week. One in four (23 per cent) said that working at home outside of normal hours was expected in their workplace, while 15 per cent said that it is necessary to do such work often in order to meet the expectations of their job. By contrast, only eight per cent of respondents indicated that working outside normal hours was discouraged in their workplace. Polluted time is an affliction that is more likely to be experienced by people on middle and higher incomes, that is, people in skilled jobs. One in four respondents (24 per cent) indicated that their employer had provided them with some kind of technology or device that allowed them to work outside the workplace, such as a mobile phone or laptop. These people were twice as likely to say that they often needed to work outside of normal working hours than those whose work did not provide them with such technology (25 per cent compared with 12 per cent). Seven out of eight respondents with a device provided by their employer (83 per cent) said that they had worked outside of normal work hours in the past week, compared to around half of those without a device (52 per cent). Email was the most commonly reported intrusion on free time; more than phone calls, meetings, travel and other types of work. Our survey findings suggest that in a workforce of 11.4 million people, some 6.8 million workers experience some degree of time pollution in any given week, while 1.75 million workers regularly have their free time polluted by work demands. Although there are many factors contributing to time pollution, survey results clearly show that the use of information and communication technology for work purposes plays a major role.
Published summary from The Australia Institute website.
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