Communications technology: Friend or foe?
Add comment January 28th, 2008
Computer, Internet and cell phone technology is supposed to make our work lives easier. And lots of the time, it does.
But all this helpful technology also can seriously blur the lines between “at work” and “not at work.” The very gadgets that are supposed to free us from the confines of an office can end up stretching our work hours to include the whole day and night — and our offices can span the whole city or even the globe.
Cell phones, PDA’s and laptops are “the ‘Trojan Horses’ of the modern world. Take them home and they transport work from the office through the walls of our personal lives,” wrote Carrie Barnett, assistant editor for Knowledge@W.P. Carey, an Internet-based guide from the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. She addressed the subject in an article entitled “Shifting workplace boundaries,” in the university’s ASU Research magazine. I’ll admit, defining those walls is tricky for me. And I know it is for others, too.
Case in point: I’ve e-mailed some of you among our business leaders on a weekend — just so I’d be sure to hear back Monday — and then was surprised to get an immediate response, and realized I wasn’t the only one blurring the line between “work” and “off work.”
Back to Barnett and her “Trojan horse” metaphor. When we’re powered by technology that enables us to work anytime and anyplace, how do we keep boundaries? Where do you draw them?
