2.1. Extending Telework: New Groups, New Practices, and New Technologies
The current literature profiles telework in transition, expanding in several important respects. In recent years, there has been clear expansion in the numbers of teleworkers. Telework is moving from the phase of “early adoption” to that of “early majority” [
3], before arguably further expanding to a phase of massive use and engagement [
6]. In Sweden, telework has become routine for a sizeable fraction of the population. After decades of slow growth, regular teleworkers now comprise a quarter of all gainfully employed [
1,
7], and similar tendencies are observed in other Western countries [
8,
9,
10,
11]. Research suggests that various factors explain this recent “take-off” [
3]. These factors concern the ongoing digitization and rapid spread of advanced ICTs as the basic facilitators of flexible work, but also include several other restructuring tendencies in society and the labor market [
12,
13,
14,
15]. For example, employers’ willingness to permit telework has increased, and more work tasks are now suitable for telework [
2,
16,
17]. This implies that essential constraining features associated with managers’ trust, power, and control have been eased [
18]. Furthermore, telework is increasingly attractive in the struggle to combine and balance work and private life [
12,
19,
20,
21].
An important part of this development is that telework is expanding into “new” professions, work tasks, and employee categories. Traditionally, telework has been closely associated with privileged, highly educated, well-paid workers in knowledge-based services [
14,
22], more often men than women, living in urban areas [
13,
23] and likely having families with young children. Current studies find that while growth continues among these traditional groups (with relatively self-governing and flexible work tasks), telework is also expanding among employees with routine tasks previously inflexibly tied to the office desk, for example, case workers at the Social Insurance Agency or Public Employment Service in Sweden [
1]. This trend is assumed to be caused by employer interests, and is related to findings indicating positive effects as regards efficiency, reduced premises costs, reduced absence, and more efficient recruitment of competent staff [
24]. Technological innovation and change, introduction of new work tasks, massive digitization of existing work tasks [
25], and enhanced monitoring and control at a distance [
26] are also important drivers [
27]. Most of the telework literature has so far focused on the group of highly qualified workers, while studies are still lacking of the underlying motives and perceived work and nonwork implications of telework among newer categories of teleworkers [
5,
6]. In this study, we therefore distinguish between those belonging to the established category of “old” teleworkers with more autonomous and investigative tasks and “new” teleworking groups with more administrative and routine tasks that only recently have become possible to perform remotely from the home; we call these two categories analytical and case workers, respectively.
The current literature also identifies important expansions as regards the basic practices of telework and the associated use of ICTs. In the earliest phase of adoption, telework was largely considered full-time employment and a substitute for office work on the particular day of teleworking [
14,
28,
29]. It was highly place bound in that it was almost exclusively tied to home (i.e., a home office with stationary computer and landline phone). Gradually, more part-time and irregular telework arrangements have been added, and teleworking for parts of a day and intermittently is found to be the most widespread [
1,
12]. Telework is far from being a full-time endeavor shaping the worker’s overriding identity [
12]. While the private home has continued to be the most common place for teleworking, other places have also become sites of teleworking practice, largely thanks to the spread of mobile ICTs such as laptops and mobile phones [
8]. This especially applies to work during the commuting trip, when buses and trains often serve as important extensions of the workplace [
30,
31,
32].
Recent telework literature pays attention to how additional forms of flexible work arrangements are added to the menu of options, further extending the concept and reach of telework [
3,
6,
23,
33,
34,
35]. At the heart of this debate lie ongoing digitalization and the growth of new smart and portable ICTs. Wi-Fi, virtual offices, cloud technology, and smart devices in principle enable access to and work outside the office from any place and at any time. In particular, this new wave of ICTs is assumed to support new forms of “occasional” telework [
3,
36], referring to work activities that are sporadic, momentary, instantaneous, and distributed in time and space. Occasional telework includes activities that occur every now and then (e.g., typically involving email, messages, news, and calls) regardless of location and time of day, interrupting and going on between other activities and in intermediate places (e.g., while riding the elevator, waiting, and walking to the bus). This development is assumed to support teleworking activity that is unregulated and informal and that takes place outside regular working hours (e.g., in the evening after work, on weekends and vacations, while on sick leave, and while taking care of sick children) [
3,
6,
23]. In the literature, work that takes place outside regular working hours is rarely included in definitions and empirical investigations of telework. However, some studies have indicated that this practice is extensive and even more common than regular forms of telework [
6,
23,
34]. In this study, this aspect is further explored by distinguishing between teleworking practices taking place during and outside regular working hours. Furthermore, the role of occasional forms of telework is considered by exploring different intensities of smartphone use in the contexts of working life and private life.
2.2. Potential Gains and Drawbacks in Extended Telework as Regards Time Pressure and Control
A large body of research, mainly based on earlier phases of telework adoption, has investigated the role and outcomes of telework with regard to aspects such as job satisfaction [
8], work–life balance and conflict [
33,
37,
38,
39,
40], and individual well-being and happiness [
41,
42]. Though rarely focusing directly on time pressure and personal control over time use, time-related issues and outcomes are considered fundamental drivers of telework adoption and development. Time and time use are usually denoted by compound concepts such as work satisfaction and efficiency, work–life balance and quality of life [
42,
43], and social sustainability [
44]. It is found, for example, that people telework for reasons linked to work time efficiency (e.g., to work undisturbed and avoid interruptions) [
12], to avoid costly commuting and save travel time [
45,
46], and to cope with and more easily coordinate daily work and non-work commitments (e.g., work time vs. family time and leisure) [
46,
47,
48,
49]. Family-related motives are emphasized by the fact that individuals with children are overrepresented among teleworkers [
1].
Concerning the actual outcomes of telework, an extensive literature presents contradictory evidence and conclusions [
5]. Several studies find telework to be “successful” insofar as it correlates with desired, positive effects in the lives of teleworkers, particularly as regards perceived job satisfaction and effectiveness, but also as a facilitator of the effective arrangement of work/nonwork commitments and work–life balance [
33,
38,
39,
50,
51]. On the other hand, research has also repeatedly found that some people working from home encounter new problems [
5] and unintended consequences that counterbalance or even outweigh the expected gains (e.g., ineffective work due to household distractions, private life intrusions, workaholism, and professional and personal isolation) [
43,
52,
53].
The few studies more explicitly looking at time pressure have presented divergent findings. For example, Peters and van der Lippe [
54] found that while telework can be a strategy for reducing time pressure among some individuals, it can also be associated with drawbacks that may actually enhance feelings of being time-pressed. This is partly dependent on the nature of the specific teleworking practice and whether it is regarded as an ad hoc crisis response or a long-term (premeditated) commitment [
55]. Similarly, Mazmainian et al. [
56] reported contradictory findings in their study on the relationship between telework and time control. They found reported gains from telework in terms of enhanced peace of mind and time use control in the short run. It the long run telework intensified collective expectations of availability and reduced ability to disconnect, which for some was associated with reduced feelings of being in control.
Furthermore, some previous literature has been focusing on time use implications from work-related use of mobile devices. Mobile ICTs have often been associated with negative implications, for example, in terms of accelerated and intensified work activity that intrudes into private life, resulting in greater time pressure in daily life [
57]. Whereas some studies support such expectations [
56,
58,
59] other studies find them to be exaggerated and that total work load, private life intrusions and subjective time pressure are not drastically changed due to technology [
60,
61]. In contrast it has been found that mobile phones encourage family contact and maintenance while working rather than extending work into private life [
60,
62].
A summarized conclusion from our review of existent literature is that research into the overall implications of telework for the individual’s everyday life has so far been inconclusive and replete with disagreement, with telework being seen as both good and bad [
5]. As discussed by, for example, Boell et al. [
5], a better understanding of this “telework paradox” should attend to and expose the inherent differences between types of telework, not only in relation to the preconditions of various groups of employees, but also as regards the actual and divergent teleworking practices and technologies involved. For example, previous studies have found important differences in terms of gender and family situation, finding that telework usually enhances the work–life balance of families with children, that women more often than men experience negative effects in the family sphere [
63,
64], and that men more often than women experience positive effects in relation to work and work performance. Previous research has indicated that teleworking practices that entail work outside ordinary working hours are more strongly connected to negative implications, especially in relation to the family sphere [
34,
35]. As regards technology, studies of the use of pre-smart mobile phones found expectations of enhanced time pressure and private life intrusion to be exaggerated [
60,
62]. Yet, there is still a lack of comparable research examining smartphones.
Another important conclusion, referring to the current tendencies for telework expansion as discussed above, is that this complexity of possible “outcomes” is likely to increase even more. New groups of teleworkers call for new research perspectives that take into account qualification level, types of work tasks, and the nature of jobs. As telework expands to encompass less qualified types of workers, for example, it has been suggested that telework will become less voluntary on the part of the individual teleworker, but instead be initiated and forced by employer interests [
3,
4,
35,
54]. Furthermore, emerging and increasingly widespread forms of occasional and “smart” telework may have divergent implications. For some workers smart telework will mean more flexibility and autonomy, while for others it will be part of a process of greater work-related ties, expectations, and control, reducing individual autonomy to decide when and where to work [
5]. Taken together, such tendencies could rebalance and have unequal and unfair consequences for the everyday lives of different teleworkers.
In the present study, issues concerning time and telework are explored in terms of individuals’ perceived time pressure and control of time use in everyday life. Overall time pressure and personal control over time use are arguably crucial indicators of social sustainability, individual life satisfaction, and well-being [
42,
54,
65,
66,
67]. In our ongoing exploration of telework, we recognize two crucial aspects: First, there is a need to adopt a nuanced approach that affirms differences between groups and in relation to the actual teleworking practices and technologies involved. In this paper, we take into account a set of crucial divergences as regards job qualifications, teleworking practices in relation to working hours, and smartphone usage for work and in private life.
Second, we recognize a need to problematize the notion of telework outcomes as such, and how they should be understood in relation to daily time use and decisions about it. This applies not least to our focus on the relationships between telework, time pressure and time use control. These relationships can be viewed from two perspectives as regards selectivity, motives, and causality. One suggests that “time-pressed people do telework,” meaning that telework is a response and can regarded as an individual coping strategy. Telework does not in itself induce time pressure, but rather is a work arrangement selected by time pressured people. For example, employees with small children telework to maintain or even enhance time use control over daily commitments and obligations in both working life and family life. Another perspective is that “telework causes people to be time-pressed,” a suggestion clearly found in current theories of ICT-induced work acceleration, work intensification, and family life intrusion and conflict (see, e.g., Wajcman [
57]). The focus is then on the drawbacks of telework, that is, the indirect and mostly unintended implications of telework, including the individual’s lack of control over daily time use.