Background Despite a growing literature on how digitalisation affects service quality, justice, and accountability in the public sector, research on the effects on the work and work environment of public employees is scarce.Objective To present and discuss existing evidence and identify knowledge gaps related to how digitalization affects the work and work environment of public sector employees.Methods This scoping review is based on peer reviewed academic journal articles in English found in PubMed, PsycINFO, Business Source Premier (EBSCO) and Scopus.Results The review included 52 studies, of which most focused on office or care workers. An increase in studies since 2020 indicates growing interest in the topic. Challenges among screen-level bureaucrats included work-life balance problems, technostress and fear of job loss. Among street-level bureaucrats, reported challenges included curtailed discretion, lack of user involvement and ethical stress. Identified knowledge gaps include the small number of studies with a work environment focus in general and on sectors beyond office and health settings in particular, few studies set outside of Europe and absence of studies on recent phenomena such as AI or algorithmic management.Conclusions In view of the presented scarcity of research, we suggest that relevant questions are included in national and local surveys to enable more research, that more studies are conducted in occupational sectors, countries and regions lacking this type of research, and that comparative research is stimulated to uncover differences between the effects of digitalisation on occupational health in private and public sector work settings.

Despite the extensive introduction of digital technologies in working life and the demand for the public sector, including schools, to digitalise, there is limited research on the relationship between digitalisation and the work environment. The aim of this article is therefore to explore how implementation processes of digital administrative and communication systems and teaching tools interact with work-related demands and resources experienced in schools. The Normalisation Process Theory (NPT) and Job Demand-Resources model (JDR) were used to analyse experiences of digitalisation and the work environment of employees, managers, strategists and health and safety officers in schools in Sweden. The study, based on semi-structured interviews with 25 participants, shows that the lack of resources and a too-high workload were reported as problematic and challenging in the introduction of digital technology. Collegial cooperation and decision-making opportunities, on the other hand, seemed to enhance the digitalisation process and to some extent even bridge over the weaknesses of strained time resources and high workload.

PurposeThe study aims to critically explore, from an organisational perspective, the intersections between where work takes place, invisible disabilities, gender and the prevailing norms around work within a public organisation.Design/methodology/approachTen participants between 34 and 60 years old, including employees with disabilities, managers with and without disabilities and human resource (HR) officers, shared their experiences of working from home in Sweden. The study used semi-structured interviews, photo-elicitation interviews, a written diary and policy analysis. A thematic analysis was performed.FindingsThe study shows that working from home was perceived as an important workplace accommodation and an individual strategy about conforming to the norm and living up to the concept of the ideal worker. The organisation did not actively work on disability-related issues. There was also a lack of competence and structure.Practical implicationsIt is important to challenge the ideal worker norm and create organisational competence about the intersection of gender, disability and workplace location to create a sense of inclusion among employees.Originality/valueThe study highlights the complexity faced by women employees with invisible disabilities when deciding where to perform work (home or co-located office) and explores HR officers' and managers' experiences regarding working with the inclusion of employees with invisible disabilities.

PurposeThis study aims to investigate regulation strategies used by employees in hybrid work (HW) environments in Swedish municipalities during 2020-2022. Utilizing person-environment fit theory, especially task-environment (T-E) fit, this study examines how employees adapt their work practices, focusing on the aspects of self-regulation and social coordination necessitated by the hybrid model.Design/methodology/approachUsing photo-elicitation interviews, we interviewed 46 municipal white-collar workers and managers at two points in time, for a total of 82 interviews.FindingsOur findings highlight the prospective nature and the resourcing practice at the heart of achieving T-E fit. Findings include a range of regulatory behaviours, from moment-to-moment self-regulatory actions to those bordering on work redesign and an evolution from more short-term and self-focused actions to include more collective solutions over time.Originality/valueThis research contributes to the evolving understanding of T-E fit as a core mechanism for successful HW, emphasizing the importance of adaptability and proactive self-regulation in flexible work environments.

Telework has had a dramatic increase worldwide, especially in the Nordic countries. When work is conducted in the domestic area, the boundaries between work and private life easily become blurred. In this paper, we investigate the daily habits of Swedish municipal office workers as they worked from home during the pandemic with the aim to understand the role of habits in upholding boundaries between work and non-work. Our results indicate that habits from the workplace were sometimes disrupted, and other times transferred to the domestic area. We also saw examples of the establishment of new habits that helped to facilitate role transitions between work and non-work roles, so-called ‘transitional habits’. Our main contribution is to show how the establishment of daily transitional habits can alleviate role shifts and thus help to keep work and non-work roles boundaries separate and distinct.

In this article, work in Swedish pharmacies is examined.With the Nordic concept of co-workership as a frame, the aim is to examine how employees in pharmacies view and handle their work situations and the reasons behind them. Data were mainly collected with 20 qualitative semi-structured interviews in five different pharmacies. The data were organized and analyzed by using the content analysis process. In the studied pharmacies, it can be summarized as work was carengried out in a self-propelled way. Employees take an overall responsibility for the workplace, have ambition to help others and to be a part of a good team, while most of the work is carried out individually and independently.

Background: Community pharmacies in Sweden merge a state-funded professional community service with a retail business. While previous research has recognized its challenges, less attention has been paid to the potential conflict of interest it could result in regarding the work of pharmacists. This study aims to increase understanding of how pharmacists in Sweden combine their healthcare ambitions and obligations with those concerning being employees in a retail business. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 28 pharmacists employed by pharmacy chains in Sweden. The data were thematically analysed. Results: In the analysis, three themes were formulated: Different interests, The conflict between professional work & business work, and Strategies to manage the conflicts. The analysis of the data reveals that pharmacists in Sweden experience a conflict of interest. They grapple with balancing being healthcare professionals with a focus on patient care and being valued retail employees that also focus on financial results. This conflict manifests in various situations, such as time management, communication focus, preferred behaviours, and different tasks. The different strategies applied by individual pharmacists to manage the work are results of job crafting. Pharmacists employ strategies such as compromise, mandate stretching, avoidance, and acceptance to manage the conflict. However, these strategies lead to compromises in their work. Conclusion: This study aimed to understand how pharmacists combine their healthcare ambitions and obligations with those of being employees in a retail business. The study demonstrated that Swedish community pharmacists need to perform a juggling act to be both professional healthcare workers and viewed as valuable retail employees. In situations when the conflict of interest occurs, the pharmacists use different strategies when determining how to prioritize between the professional work and the business work. The conflict of interest in the pharmacists’ work need to be taken into consideration when discussing pharmacists practices, the profession, or role it’s in the healthcare system. © The Author(s) 2024.

Inclusive workplaces for people with disability – a rapid literature review

In Sweden, the Discrimination Act (SFS 2008:567), aims to counteract discrimination and promote equal rights and opportunities for all despite factors such as disability, sex, ethnicity, and religion. In practice, this means that work organizations need to work for diversity and inclusion. This work is often manifested through recruitment process and to ensure, for example, that gender and disability do not constitute an obstacle for employment. However, the fact that an organization achieves diversity does not automatically mean that the employees have a sense of inclusion.

Shore et al (2011, p. 1265) define inclusion as “the degree to which an employee perceives that he or she is an esteemed member of the work group through experiencing treatment that satisfies his or her needs for belongingness and uniqueness”. Inclusion in working life leads to many positive aspects such as good working relationships, job satisfaction, intention to stay, improved work performance, sense of organizational belonging and commitment, well-being, increased creativity and career opportunities (Shore et al 2011). Exclusion, on the other hand, risks leading to negative effects on psychological and physical health (Alexanderson, 2004), regardless of whether the exclusion occurs due to obvious prejudices or subtle forms of discrimination (Shore et al 2018). 

The purpose of our presentation is to present a systematic overview of the research on disability and inclusion in working life and identify knowledge gaps relevant for the Swedish context. The study is conducted as a systematic literature study with literature search in international and Nordic databases. The project used predetermined inclusion and exclusion criteria and all reviewed articles in this project represent research of good standard. 

Furthermore, we will present a short overview of a 3-year research project starting in January 2023, that to some extent builds on the review and aims to examine disability and remote work. 

References

Alexanderson K. (2004) Den könssegregerade arbetsmarknaden - samband med sjukdom: positiva effekter av könsintegration, negativa av könssegregering? / Kristina Alexandersson. Den könsuppdelade arbetsmarknaden: betänkande av Utredningen den könsuppdelade arbetsmarknaden, 2004.

Discrimination Act 2008:567

Shore, LM., Randel, AE., Chung, BG., Dean, MA., Ehrhart, KH. & Singh, G. (2011) Inclusion and diversity in work groups: a review and model for future research. Journal of management, 37(4), 1262-1289.

Shore, LM., Cleveland, JN. & Sanches, D. (2018) Inclusive workplaces: A review and model. Human resource management review, 28, pp. 176-189.