New article in cooperation with the Czech trade unions

A new article prepared in cooperation with the Czech Trade Union of State Authorities and Organisations has just been published in the union’s monthly bulletin. The article introduces the TIMED project and highlights selected findings from our research on how digital technologies shape working conditions and employees’ experience of time. Czech trade union representatives and members played a crucial role in the research, contributing through expert interviews and semi-structured interviews. You can read the full article in Czech in the linked issue of the bulletin (page 6); an English translation is available below.

 

How technology steals our time

Lucie Němcová (Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University),

Tereza Klegr (Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences),

Vanda Černohorská (Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences)

Digital technology has become an integral part of both our professional and personal lives. It is often presented as tools that save time and boost efficiency. However, a new international study of the TIMED (Time Experience in Europe’s Digital Age) project, carried out in collaboration with scientific teams from Czechia, Spain, the United Kingdom, Poland, Switzerland and Germany, shows the other side of this development. Digital tools can also steal people’s time and increase their mental strain in multiple ways.

The study How digital technology can steal your time, in which Vanda Černohorská and Tereza Klegr from the Institute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of Sciences were also involved, is based on 300 interviews with people of different professions, ages, genders and educational backgrounds across six European countries. The cooperation partner of the TIMED project is, among others, the Czech-Moravian Confederation of Trade Unions. Members of the Czech Trade Union of State Authorities and Organisations also took part in the research, sharing their experience with digital technology through semi-structured interviews. In addition, the research team carried out a series of expert interviews with specialists from the Czech-Moravian Confederation of Trade Unions on social, gender and labour implications of digitalisation. It was this initial phase that defined the key topics on which the project focused later in the following stages of data collection, including not only other interviews but also questionnaire-based surveys.

Many interviewees noted that while digital tools make some work tasks easier, they give rise to new obligations, administrative workload, and their use often causes information overload. This can be illustrated with the example of the situation in public administration, where incomplete digitalisation has not led to the expected reduction of workload. On the contrary, a lot of employees highlight that decision processes take ironically longer because of the use of digital technology. Digital technology therefore not only fails to save time, but it even increases the pressure on employees and makes decision processes more complicated. On the other hand, when digital tools increase efficiency at work, the respondents across fields pointed out that the saved time is immediately taken up by other tasks and activities. This in turn causes overload, fatigue and stress, but it also leads to a loss of natural breaks between activities.

Another essential finding related to working conditions is that boundaries between the professional and personal lives become blurred. A number of respondents reported that as the accessibility of digital devices rises, they feel obliged to be available and, for example, to reply to work e-mails outside working hours or at the weekends. This is not just a question of personal choice but often of a structural pressure from employers who expect their employees to be available all the time. At the same time, many employees feel an internal pressure to be active and respond in order not to be left behind or get excluded from the team. That results in extended working hours and interference with personal life. Some respondents, however, see a potential for improving the situation through a social dialogue and collective bargaining.

Added to this is the subjective feeling of wasting time when working with digital tools, be it by endlessly searching for information or losing track of time when using social media. The research participants‘ experience clearly shows that digital technology fills in free moments and allows us to be constantly active, but in the end it increases the feeling that people do not control their time. That can bring about feelings of guilt, shame or regret. Last but not least, the conducted interviews also highlighted the increasing use of digital monitoring, which exposes employees to constant surveillance and pressure on performance. There is no doubt that the importance of this aspect will grow over time. The related negative effects on mental health include frustration, stress, and fatigue.

The role of unions in this department is essential: they enforce the right to disconnect, they raise the topic of digital overload in collective bargaining, and they protect employees from overmonitoring. Digital technology will continue to be a part of our professional lives, but it is up to social dialogue and cooperation with unions that its use does not increase pressure and extend working time, but it really leads to better working conditions.