E‐voice in the digitalised workplace
Subtitle
Insights from an alternative organisation
Publication date
2022-06-25
Document type
Research article
Organisational unit
Series or journal
Human Resource Management Journal
Periodical volume
34
Periodical issue
2
First page
369
Last page
385
Peer-reviewed
✅
Part of the university bibliography
✅
Keyword
alternative organisation
collective
digitalisation
e-voice
electronic voice
employee voice
Abstract
Digitalisation permeates all aspects of organizational life, especially the ways we communicate with each other. Drawing on a case study of an alternative organisation—the German collective Premium, which is almost entirely digitally organised—we seek to explore contextual factors that facilitate or hinder the expression of electronic voice (e-voice). Based on 20 semi-structured interviews with different members of the collective, we identified various contextual facilitators and barriers to e-voice expression: Collective belief in the value of diverse voices, cautious online and complementary face-to-face communication facilitate e-voice, while less formalised structures, power and knowledge asymmetries, and information overload hinder it. These findings demonstrate that despite an alternative organisation's firm intention and self-reflective efforts to create an inclusive and participatory digital space, tensions arise. Further, our study contributes to employee voice theorising by outlining contextual factors that are specifically relevant to e-voice practices.
Version
Published version
Access right on openHSU
Metadata only access
Open Access Funding
Wiley (DEAL)