Women of Color and Work–Life Balance in an Urban Environment: What Is Reality?

Background:Work–life balance is a significant issue for women of color in an urban environment whether one is engaged in academia, traditional work, remote/dispersed work, or entrepreneurial work. As women of color attempt to address the tangible and intangible aspects of the “life” portion associated with the work–life balance discussion, elements such as race, ethnicity, religion, spirituality, and caregiver demands toward primary and extended family are often ignored.Objective:This article expands the work–life balance discussion to include urban women of color.Methods:Uses the lens of a womanist epistemology that incorporates critical race feminist theory while capturing viewpoints of four urban women of color who are social workers in the academy.Findings:reflect a nuanced voice challenging the work-life balance discussion to work life management.

Organizational Identification: Perspectives of Dispersed Social Workers

Human service organizations are often challenged to become more efficient while maintaining the quality of their services. As a result, more organizations have restructured, adopting the practice of dispersed work, which allows employees more freedom and flexibility to meet organizational goals outside of the traditional workplace. While dispersed work allows social workers to engage in work activities beyond the traditional office environment, it may also impact their sense of belonging to the organization. Eleven dispersed social workers were interviewed to understand how interaction via new communication technology impacts organizational identification. Overall themes gleaned from this study suggest that although dispersed social workers perceive themselves as having more autonomy and flexibility, they also can feel socially isolated and disconnected from their peers and supervisors, which may negatively impact organizational identification. Despite the enhanced efficiency that technology can bring, human service organizations must strive to understand the unintended consequences of a dispersed workforce.

Negotiating Knowledge Gaps in Dispersed Knowledge Work

Reviews from the two streams of research - knowledge based view of the firm and dispersed work – offers evidence for knowledge gaps that exist among dispersed members. Dispersed members therefore cannot take for granted that they have a common context, making dispersed collaboration problematic. A major challenge for such teams is thus to co-create a commonly shared context. This paper examines the process of how dispersed teams negotiate knowledge gaps to create a common context. The study uses a multiple case design on dispersed teams at a knowledge-based marketing organization in the US. The findings from this field study highlight three strategies to negotiate knowledge gaps: (1) active engagement strategies, (2) negotiating relationally, and (3) redundant knowledge structures. Taken together, these findings have the potential to help managers in knowledge based organizations to discern appropriate social and technological interventions that may be needed for conducting dispersed knowledge work.

Negotiating Knowledge Gaps in Dispersed Knowledge Work

Reviews from the two streams of research - knowledge based view of the firm and dispersed work – offers evidence for knowledge gaps that exist among dispersed members. Dispersed members therefore cannot take for granted that they have a common context, making dispersed collaboration problematic. A major challenge for such teams is thus to co-create a commonly shared context. This paper examines the process of how dispersed teams negotiate knowledge gaps to create a common context. The study uses a multiple case design on dispersed teams at a knowledge-based marketing organization in the US. The findings from this field study highlight three strategies to negotiate knowledge gaps: (1) active engagement strategies, (2) negotiating relationally, and (3) redundant knowledge structures. Taken together, these findings have the potential to help managers in knowledge based organizations to discern appropriate social and technological interventions that may be needed for conducting dispersed knowledge work.

Distanced Leadership and Multimedia

At the dawn of the 21st century, more and more organizations in various industries have adopted geographically dispersed work groups and are utilizing advanced technologies to communicate with them (Benson-Armer & Hsieh, 1997; Hymowitz, 1999; Townsend, DeMarie & Hendrickson, 1998; Van Aken, Hop & Post, 1998). This geographical dispersion varies in form. For example, some organizations have adopted “telecommuting,” in which members may work at home, on the road and/or at the office (Hymowitz, 1999). Other organizations have created teams that are globally dispersed. A leader located in Palo Alto, California, for example, may be responsible for coordinating employees in Belgium, China and Mexico.

High-Performance Virtual Teams

In the past several decades, we have seen tremendous advancements in the development of communication technology. Since the invention of the Internet in 1969, there has been rapid development of Internet-based communication tools and technologies. This technology has revolutionized business practices by offering another important and effective channel for communication (Foo & Lim, 1997) and has allowed people to work on projects irrespective of their physical location. One resulting business practice that has been adopted in recent years is virtual teamwork. Virtual teams are groups of individuals who work together in different locations (i.e., are geographically dispersed), work at interdependent tasks, share responsibilities for outcomes, and rely on technology for much of their communication (Cohen & Gibson, 2003). The use of virtual teams has become widespread in organizations, and its use is expected to grow (Martins, Gilson, & Maynard, 2004; Powell, Piccoli, & Ives, 2004).

Potentials of Cooperation

Since Hobbes' Leviathan was published in 1651, the 'problem of order' has been known for some time. Despite this long gestation period for social theory even today we do not have a universally agreed upon answer to this 'problem'. One of the reasons behind this lacuna may be the overly dispersed work being done in the economic and sociological traditions. Whereas one tradition favours 'collective action' as a central answer, the other thinks of the problem itself being dissolved by the acceptance of 'socialized man'. Here, an attempt is made to offer the phenomenon of 'cooperation' as a promising middle ground for both traditions. To underline the importance of cooperation as an elementary social activity, first, cooperation is shown as working in tandem with its rival 'competition'. Secondly, several conceptual analyses of what is included in collective action and cooperation are offered. These analyses, thirdly, are deepened by an overview of the motivational bases potentially advancing cooperation. Overall, an awareness of the self-creating character of cooperation is explored, and put forward as the most feasible way of answering the classical problem of order.