With an increase in alternative forms of work, people are no longer limited to traditional office spaces. The aim for a healthier integration of private and work comes with the advantages of experimenting with new technologies. As a result, coworking spaces are spreading through the urban centers. But our way of dealing with work is still marked by our corporate-focused past. This project aims to explore how can co-working spaces occupy a more meaningful role by connecting people with their interests. My interest is to unveil the social rules of the space and turn interactions between coworkers more pleasant and easy. The result is a reflection about the future of collaborative workplaces. The success of the experiments reflect the openness of most co-workers and hosts. On a higher level the project gave me a better understanding of how AI could help to improve the social aspect of our workplaces.

Organizational research about the autonomy paradox –the discrepancy between workers' increased level of autonomy in carrying out their work and their increased self-imposed constraints– is limited in two ways. First, our understanding of the role of technology in perpetuating the paradox of autonomy is limited to the influence of relatively simple features of technology (e.g., email devices' portability and ubiquity) in amplifying the expectations of near-constant availability. However, human-computer interaction research and practice increasingly show that design features of advanced technology, too, can play an important role in cultivating the culture of constant connectivity. Second, organizational research on the autonomy paradox has primarily focused on organizational shared expectations and has not examined social forces and cultural images that might contribute to the autonomy paradox in the individualized context of independent work. Thus, our understanding of socio-cultural processes that might contribute to the tension between autonomy and discipline in the context of platform work is incomplete. In this dissertation, I explore these issues through a review study and two empirical studies that draw on 50 semi-structured interviews with Instagram content creators, four years of participant observation, and a walkthrough analysis of the platform’s features. The first study integrates the literature on sociomateriality, identity control, and autonomy paradox to explore the interconnected cultural, social, and material mechanisms that contribute to the autonomy paradox. I discuss how we can extend our understanding of autonomy in technology use by attending more explicitly to material features of digital technology and how mechanisms identified in organizational contexts can guide our understanding of platform workers’ autonomy. In so doing, this study maps out pathways for examining autonomy and discipline outside traditional organizational contexts. The second paper examines how through a recurring process that I label identity baiting, evaluative metrics provided by digital platforms function as habit-forming identity affirming opportunities for desired identities which motivate work effort and sustain underpaid future oriented labor. By attending to workers’ desired identities rooted in cultural ideals of independent work, this study sheds light on entanglement of cultural ideals and technological features in shaping the tensions of autonomy and self-imposed constraints in platform work. Finally, the third study explores how people navigate the tensions arising from the collocation of externally prescribed authenticity in the discourse of personal branding with the internal desire to be and feel authentic in contemporary work. I find that tensions arise from the consistency required to maintain a personal brand and the inconsistency of the authentic self over time. Further, practices induced by the rhetorical invocations of authenticity sometimes contradicted workers’ internal needs for a strategic balance between authentic and image management. This study shows that tensions of autonomy remain even if the external prescription demands individuality and authenticity rather conformity and collective assimilation. / Thesis / Candidate in Philosophy / How and why might workers (choose to) constrain their own autonomy in the context of platform work? Animated by this overarching research question, this thesis explores the tensions between autonomy and self-imposed constraints through three essays. The first essay integrates multiple streams of organizational research to portray the constellation of three structural forces (social norms, cultural discourses, and material features of technology) that interact with workers’ identity to shape the autonomy paradox. The second essay demonstrates how evaluative metrics provided by digital platforms function as habit-forming identity baits that control workers’ behavior and sustain underpaid labor. Finally, the third essay demonstrates how prescribed authenticity (e.g., the ethos of ‘just be yourself’) prevalent in the discourse of personal branding ironically constrain workers’ autonomy by turning the once protective fender of personal brand into a system of radical self-revelation. The second and third essays draw on an inductive qualitative inquiry of Instagram content creators.

abstract: The 21st century will be the site of numerous changes in education systems in response to a rapidly evolving technological environment where existing skill sets and career structures may cease to exist or, at the very least, change dramatically. Likewise, the nature of work will also change to become more automated and more technologically intensive across all sectors, from food service to scientific research. Simply having technical expertise or the ability to process and retain facts will in no way guarantee success in higher education or a satisfying career. Instead, the future will value those educated in a way that encourages collaboration with technology, critical thinking, creativity, clear communication skills, and strong lifelong learning strategies. These changes pose a challenge for higher education’s promise of employability and success post-graduation. Addressing how to prepare students for a technologically uncertain future is challenging. One possible model for education to prepare students for the future of work can be found within the Maker Movement. However, it is not fully understood what parts of this movement are most meaningful to implement in education more broadly, and higher education in particular. Through the qualitative analysis of nearly 160 interviews of adult makers, young makers and young makers’ parents, this dissertation unpacks how makers are learning, what they are learning, and how these qualities are applicable to education goals and the future of work in the 21st century. This research demonstrates that makers are learning valuable skills to prepare them for the future of work in the 21st century. Makers are learning communication skills, technical skills in fabrication and design, and developing lifelong learning strategies that will help prepare them for life in an increasingly technologically integrated future. This work discusses what aspects of the Maker Movement are most important for integration into higher education. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Human and Social Dimensions of Science and Technology 2017

This thesis aims to investigate the major consequences Information and Technology have caused to Work since the relationship among these factors remains poorly understood. Artificial Intelligence (AI), enabled by Machine Learning (ML) and Big Data have entered dynamically the workplaces. The digital transformation of modern organizations is of strategic importance and inevitably shapes the future of work as we know it impacting on various dimensions, such as deskilling, emergence of new skills, new forms of organizing and strategizing, such as crowdsourcing. The research involves the use of qualitative methods: the data collection includes interviews data, as well as document analysis. The data analysis explores the research question.

This thesis investigates how digitalisation impacts school as a place to work and learn byexploring how a few teachers experience digital tools and platforms in their daily work andteaching, both when reflecting upon current state and thinking about the future. A widerperspective of digitalisation in society and education is added by interviewing a learningstrategist as well as including other material covering the current debate. The analysis is guidedby six futural orientations (anticipation, expectation, speculation, potentiality, hope anddestiny) shown in the activities, leaning on a theoretical framework of anthropology of future,work and technology, human agency and intersubjectivity, humanity in a digital age as well asteacher’s role and identities. Hence uncovering examples of how lifeworlds are created andevolve in a school setting, human agency and shifting identities as a teacher manifesting itselfwhen managing conflicting priorities or faulty processes, and how to make sense of beinghuman in a digital age with an awareness of digital wellbeing.

In my diploma work I am dealing with topic of work in one of the world's largest global retailer on the internet - Amazon. In 2015 Amazon opened a new fullfilment centre in Dobrovíz near Prague. Through the statement of one of ex-employee I discovered what it means to work for one of the richest man in the world (2019) - Jeff Bezos. These working conditions I've decided to demonstrate on platform AmazonExperience which consists from e-shop that contains artworks - that apeears as products. They are mostly inspired by company's slogans, stereotypes of work, experiences of Amazon's system and strict or unwritten rules.

Immersive technologies, including augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR), are envisioned to become ubiquitous in future work environments. The implementation of both technologies is associated with versatile benefits, such as decreased costs, reduced physical risks, increased employee self-satisfaction, and lower resource consumption. Despite these potential benefits, the organizational diffusion of immersive technologies faces myriad challenges. For instance, usability problems along with privacy concerns have introduced technology acceptance issues. Addressing these challenges, this cumulative dissertation explores the design, application, and implications of AR and VR systems in the workplace by employing a mixed-methods approach. The contribution of this research is threefold. First, this dissertation provides descriptive insights into user preferences for immersive technologies to inform user-centered design considerations. Second, this dissertation presents design principles to guide the development of four information technology artifacts. Two of these artifacts enable VR-based collaboration in the fields of design thinking and process modeling, while the remaining two artifacts leverage AR to facilitate the crowdsourcing of human intelligence tasks and to support students in distance learning settings. Third, this dissertation develops an e³-value model for the AR and VR business ecosystem to illustrate how technology providers can transform such artifacts into economic value. Taken together, these insights improve understanding the sociotechnical interplay between humans, tasks, and immersive technologies, as well as its economic implications.

Recent public artificial intelligence (AI) advancements, particularly ChatGPT, are predicted to transform whole industries, work roles and organisational structures, leading to some jobs becoming obsolete while also creating new opportunities. This qualitative research explores the effects of ChatGPT on work roles and organisations in the information technology (IT) industry, more specifically, the effects on skills, competence, and organisational processes such as the automation of routine and non-routine tasks. The aim is to fill the gap in how ChatGPT affects the IT industry and to provide recommendations for policy makers, companies, and workers to address these challenges. Two research questions were formulated: “How does the increasing adoption of ChatGPT in internal work processes of businesses in the IT industry change work roles” and “impact the organisation and what are the potential implications for changes in work roles due to ChatGPT?”. To explore and answer these questions two data collection methods were used such as semi-structured interviews and qualitative questionnaires, with a combined sample size of 14 participants. The data was analysed using thematic as well as content analysis and the theoretical framework. The findings suggest that adopting ChatGPT is indeed transforming work roles and organisations by automating routine and non-routine tasks, leading to efficiency and cost savings. While some roles and skills change, others become entirely obsolete. The impact varies based on organisational factors, the nature of work and adaptability to new technologies, leading to the emergence of new opportunities in AI management and big data. Smaller companies in particular benefit from implementing ChatGPT, allowing focus on other tasks such as for example strategic development. Organisational challenges include training employees and adapting to new technology as well as concerns for job loss.

The remarkable economic success of the Cayman Islands is primarily driven by its large expatriate population. Expatriates make up over one-third of the total population of the Islands and half of the labor force. This has led some Caymanians to demand more opportunities for local individuals. However in April 2014, one of the two local newspapers commented that the problem was that the quality of local graduates was below the standard required by the private sector. This suggests that there is a serious dislocation between the Caymanian education system and the labor market. This also suggests that there may be increasing tension in the future between expatriates and locals with regard to job opportunities, hiring policies, the role of the educational system and the quality of its outputs. This case study examined how local higher education is perceived by the key stakeholders within the Cayman Islands, with a specific focus on its efficacy in preparing students for the labor force. The study also examined what the higher education institutions are doing to help students develop the skills that are required by employers and desired by the labor force; and where there might be opportunities to improve the quality and efficiency of higher education systems and ensure a closer match to the needs of employers in the future. The study examined perceptions primarily through the viewpoint of employers, using human capital development theory, with additional perspectives from social theory and systems thinking. The primary sources of data were semi-structured interviews with employers in major industries in the islands, university faculty in higher education institutions, and recent graduates from these institutions. / Educational Leadership

The present project provides a survey of contemporary work relations in the context of the so-called gig economy (also known as the sharing, collaborative, platform, and on-demand economy). Against the background of recent concerns over automation replacing work at a large scale, the project argues instead that the displacement of work warrants more critical attention. The project examines how the gig economy presents their services as automating technologies while downplaying the ways that workers' employment, not to mention lives, are made increasingly precarious by these alleged improvements. Specifically, the project surveys three gig-economies, the ride-hailing service Uber, the home-sharing service Airbnb, and the online labor marketplace Amazon Mechanical Turk (AMT). Methodologically, the project employs an interdisciplinary approach, integrating insights from political economy, critical theory, discourse analysis, and ethnographic research. A qualitative assessment of the respective work environments shifts a relatively apolitical discourse on the future of work not only toward a more pronounced critique of the gig economy, but also toward a renewed discussion on the kinds of jobs that earn the labels of freelance and entrepreneurship. Professionals and scholars concerned with the future of work stand to benefit from the findings of the research, particularly as it challenges some commonplace assumptions in the discourse of what has been termed postcapitalism. / Ph. D. / The present project provides a survey of contemporary work relations in the context of the so-called gig economy (also known as the sharing, collaborative, platform, and ondemand economy). Against the background of recent concerns over automation replacing work at a large scale, the project argues instead that the displacement of work warrants more critical attention. The project examines how the gig economy presents their services as automating technologies while downplaying the ways that workers’ employment, not to mention lives, are made increasingly precarious by these alleged improvements. Specifically, the project surveys three gig economies, the ride-hailing service Uber, the home-sharing service Airbnb, and the online labor marketplace Amazon Mechanical Turk (AMT). Methodologically, the project employs an interdisciplinary approach, integrating insights from political economy, critical theory, discourse analysis, and ethnographic research. A qualitative assessment of the respective work environments shifts a relatively apolitical discourse on the future of work not only toward a more pronounced critique of the gig economy, but also toward a renewed discussion on the kinds of jobs that earn the labels of freelance and entrepreneurship. Professionals and scholars concerned with the future of work stand to benefit from the findings of the research, particularly as it challenges some commonplace assumptions in the discourse of what has been termed postcapitalism.