The Transformative Impacts of IS on Work in Globalized Environments
There is growing evidence that IS is fundamentally transforming work in the global environment. First, IS is influencing the place where work can be done. For instance, we have witnessed new technologies enabling offshoring and working from a distance. Such technologies range from online Enterprise Social Networks (e.g., Yammer) to more innovative technologies such as Double Robotics, tele-immersion rooms and haptic devices. While some employees and companies are in favor of working from a distance through such technologies, others (e.g., Yahoo) have now banned working from home.
Second, IS is also changing how work is organized and coordinated. For instance, IS is enabling open models of production at all stages of the product lifecycle: conceptualization (e.g., crowdsourcing), design (e.g., customer co-creation), production (e.g., open source software), and financing (e.g., crowdfunding). More broadly, we are seeing the rise of peer-to-peer production as an alternative to capitalism for both digital products (e.g., Wikipedia) and their physical counterparts (e.g., the Wikispeed car).
Third, IS is also changing who is doing the work. Increasingly, we notice that IT is purely automating jobs. Humans, both with high-skilled jobs (e.g., lawyers; doctors) and low-skilled jobs (e.g., truck drivers) are seeing technology taking over all or parts of their jobs.
There are several problems related to automation. One problem is that humans are losing skills they once used to have. Such skills may be very profound (e.g., ‘deep thinking’, as discussed by Nicholas Carr in his book The Shallows) or very job-specific (as discussed by Nicholas Carr in The Glass Cage). Eric Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee from MIT advise people not to race against machines, but to race with machines. On the other hand, several leading thinkers (e.g., Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak) have been warning of the dangers of Artificial Intelligence.
Topics of interest include but are not limited to:
- IS and the changing nature of work
- IS and changes in the structuring of work
- IS and the different sourcing models (offshoring, outsourcing, insourcing, “un”-sourcing, etc.)
- IS-enabled peer-to-peer production systems
- IS impacts in global settings
- IS and the global workforce
- Intermeshing of physical and virtual elements of work
- Digitization and work organization & coordination
- IS and automation
- “Racing with the machine”
- Social media and its impacts in creating new work models
- New ways of organizing work/organizing the global workforce
- The future of work tasks, jobs, professions, and careers