Title: MOBILE WORKING – SELECTED SOCIO-ECONOMIC ASPECTS

Mobile Working – Selected Socio-Economic Aspects

Author(s):  

1. Dr. Martin Meints (ICPP) 

Abstract: 

In this presentation, the changes of identity caused by mobile work in combination with mobile communication were highlighted. Organisational requirements that have to be met by enterprises introducing mobile work were analysed using the model of partial identities. Five of these requirements showed the potential to cause changes in identity: 

1. Flexible working hours 

2. IT security 

3. Autonomy and flexibility in mobile work 

4. Communication and contacts in various communicational contexts and 

5. Privacy and data protection 

When mobile work in combination with mobile communication and flexible working hours is introduced, the kind of changes and the invasiveness of changes in the employee’s identity can show a big variety. In general two effects can be observed: 

1. Borders between communicational contexts can change; identifiers used in private communicational contexts can shift into work-related communicational contexts as well. 

2. This change of borders can cause a change in control of the identifiers. In some cases the control of policies dictating how to use the identifiers (and thus how to communicate) may shift to the employer.