The Impact of New Ways of Working on Organizations and Employees: A Systematic Review of Literature

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Thank you for the opportunity to read your paper on the impact of new ways of working on organizations and employees. The systematic literature review aims to examine NWW from both a theoretical and empirical perspective, in which the authors include outcomes of the NWW construct by including a mutual gains versus conflicting outcomes perspective. Overall, the article is interesting and original, yet, I do have some concerns, which I will elaborate on below.

General: Pay attention to the writing style and flow of the article. For example: “Therefore, the main objectives of this article are the following: the article is divided into four sections…”. The objectives of the study are something different compared to the structure of the paper.

Abstract:

• For the reader it is unclear where the ‘mutual gains’ vs ‘conflicting outcomes’ debate stems from and how you integrate this in the NWW concept. More explanation here is needed to understand how this debate fits your systematic literature review.
• In addition, you can provide some details about the systematic literature review that was conducted, e.g., the number of studies that were included and the general approach that you have used to determine the inclusion of studies.

Introduction:

• ‘real outcomes on organizations and employees’ – what you do mean with ‘real outcomes’?
• The contribution of the article can be strengthened. On page 2, the authors mention that ‘Regarding NWW-related academic research, there is only one literature review focusing on NWW’s psychological outcomes’. However, they do not clearly state what the problem or lack of information is regarding the topic under investigation. Why do the authors want to know whether there is more support for the mutual gains perspective or the conflicting outcomes perspective? Furthermore, information regarding both perspectives (including references) are necessary to understand what the authors mean with these perspectives. In addition, the fact that there is only one literature review in current academic literature does not say anything about the amount of empirical work that has been conducted in this area. It might be worthwhile to include information on extant empirical work here as well, to show that there are inconclusive results. In this way, the authors can show what the contribution of their research is, next to the already existing work of Kotera and Correa Vione (2020).
• In addition, the practical relevance of the study can be strengthened. One of the current contributions is related to highlighting definitional and theoretical issues that should be clarified. However, they do not include information on this part of the study in the introduction section of their research as they only focus on outcomes of NWW. Therefore, I suggest that the authors also include information on the construct of NWW and its theoretical perspectives.

Theory

• In the mutual gains-conflicting outcomes theoretical approach paragraph, the outcomes argue that ‘like other HR practices, NWW may generate positive outcomes like increased motivation…’, however, empirical evidence about these positive and negative consequences is lacking.
• The theoretical part of the study includes information about the mutual gains versus conflicting outcomes perspective in HRM literature, but the authors do not really apply this perspective to NWWs and its relationship with outcomes. A more in-depth explanation of how these perspectives can be related to NWW and employee outcomes is necessary to understand how this theoretical perspective fits their study.
• In addition, a clear definition of what the authors defines as employee well-being and employee and organizational performance is missing. Including a definition might help to categorize the findings later on in the results section.

Method

• The search terms that the authors used are all focused on the concept of new ways of working, while the literature uses various definitions of this construct as the authors also acknowledge. Why did the authors not include search terms such as flexible work arrangements, time and place independent work, flexible work? In other words, how do the authors make sure that did not miss any articles that might be relevant for this study?
• The inclusion criteria regarding the examination of NWW practices as a bundle, is not clear to me. The authors do not explain why NWW should consist of a bundle of HR practices in the introduction or theory part of their study, so why do they only include bundles of NWW practices? In addition, what is the definition of a bundle of NWW practices?
• Relatedly, it is not clear to me why the authors excluded practices that belong to the NWW construct but only focus on one part that is not considered sufficient for inclusion. The authors mention that they specifically focus on the emergence of NWW as a concept, but the definition of the concept is not clear.
• Argumentation for why the authors did not include studies that focused on self-employed workers only is lacking.
• Regarding the exclusion criteria; how many articles did not meet one (or more) of the criteria mentioned and where therefore removed? This tells the readers something about the studies that were not included but do investigate NWW.
• I am wondering whether the studies included in the review also had to include particular employee outcomes or not. For example, is it possible that studies that investigated NWW but did not focus on employee well-being or performance outcomes, were included? And why? Should this also be an inclusion criteria?

Results & discussion

• The authors did a good job in creating an overview of the different definitions that extant literature on NWW included. However, in the introduction section, the authors describe that they will highlight theoretical issues that should be clarified while analyzing NWW effects on employee and organizational outcomes, while they only spend just one paragraph about this issue in the results section. In order to provide recommendations for future research, I suggest that the authors explain in more detail the type of theoretical frameworks that have been used and the main similarities and differences between these perspectives.
• The authors state that the findings regarding the relationship between NWW and employee well-being are not straightforward. It might be helpful here to further distinguish the different types of employee well-being, in for example employee health, happiness and relationship well-being dimensions (see Van de Voorde et al., 2012), to see whether NWW has differential relationships with employee well-being dimensions. This could also help the authors in the discussion section.

I hope that my comments are helpful. Best of luck with your research!

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The article "The impact of new ways of working on organizations and employees: A systematic review of literature" proposes to offer an overview of the existing studies on NWW. This is an interesting contribution to the a "non-stable" field, where existing studies refer to NWW in many different ways. The article is well written and structured, the method used to identify and select the relevant pieces of literature is clearly explained. I would like to see this article published, regarding its potential contribution to NWW studies but there are still weaknesses that the authors will certainly--I hope so--be able to overcome.

First, some key references are missing, and need to be integrated in the review since they are topical or "founding" the field (Kelliher and Richardson (2012) is one of the first scientific book dedicated to NWW and shows the diversity you mention; Taskin (2012) is known as offering the more complete, nuanced (and quoted?) definition of NWW. Other references have just been published and give a fresh look at NWW's diversity and commonalities, so your review should refer to this work.

-Kelliher & Richardson (2012) New ways of organizing work. https://www.routledge.com/New-Ways-of-Organizing-Work-Developments-Perspectives-and-Experiences/Kelliher-Richardson/p/book/9781138203174

-Aroles, de vaujany, Dale (2021) Experiencing the new world of work. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/experiencing-the-new-world-of-work/DACE58B5B8A21C1A601FD4C883097AAB

-Mitev, Aroles... (2021) New ways of working: organizing in the digital age. https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9783030616861

-Taskin (2012) Despatialisation: enjeux organisationnels et manageriaux https://books.google.be/books/about/D%C3%A9spatialisation.html?id=DsyILwEACAAJ&redir_esc=y

-Taskin et al (2019) The dark side of office design https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ntwe.12150

Second, the paper lacks of conceptual consistency. It is of huge importance, in this kind of work, you address the conceptualization of NWW--and I would suggest to make this as one of the contribution of the article. As many authors, you write "these definitions demonstrate their diversity, commonalities, and differences" (p.5). You then quote Ruostela et al. (2015) definition (referring to a philosophy), then the Dutch-team definitions (that in fact confonds with flexwork and telework) where NWW is a question of spatial and temporal flexibility. Finally, you metion works that associate NWW to autonomy and management styles. And, you do not clearly present how you decide to define NWW--or, in conclusion, how NWW could be defined in future research. In this theoretical discussion, you need to position NWW re other close concepts like flexwork and telework, e.g. (and since the definitions you gave allow the confusion). To my opinion, the difference comes from the wider scope of NWW (beyond spatio-temporal flexibility that telework and flexible work design encaompass). This is a major limit to the work presented here.

Third, you should spend time to discuss to what extent your review differs from Ajzen et al. (2015)'s review since you quote it. They propose the same kind of work as you and collected 100+ references referring explicitely to NWW. It is of importance to exploit better this key reference and to position your review re this one (which is older in a constantly evolving field).

details:

-in the introduction section, the first sentence of the second § needs references; the second sentence can be deleted; the focus on well-being seems not in the scope (delete, top of p.2), a clear definition (the one you base on) should be presented here.

-section 2: practice precedes theory (well, as most (all?) of management research)?

-results: since key references are missing, maybe the relevance of a dominant Ducth hub is less obvious? Compare your approach to Ajzen et al (2015) one.

-definitions: see above and choose carefully the most relevant definition of NWW to avoid confusion with telework/flexwork; on p.6, position your approach re Ajzen et al. 2015.

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

My previous concerns on the manuscript have carefully been addressed by the author(s). I only have a couple of text editing corrections.

Abstract:

Line 7: “Current definitions of NWW as manifold and based on 8 rather vague theoretical foundations.” (should be and(?))

Line 12: “Findings demonstrate that NWW definitions are diverse and somewhat imprecise, lacking of theoretical foundations ans leading to fragmented research designs and findings.” (ans should be and(?))

Introduction

Line 35: NWW is seen as a viable answer to incompatibilities between people’s professional 34 and personal lives stemming from major societal issues, and have been boosted by current 35 COVID-19 pandemic issues (Mitev/Aroles, 2021). . (one dot should be removed(?))

Line 53: “Mitev, Aroles (2021)”. Reference not complete?

Line 102: “In this regard, the research done by Taskin and al” (and should be et(?))

Line 134: “and the associated discussion aboutthe mutual gains” (space between about and the)

Line 404: insert a dot at the end of the sentence.

Line 507: “van de Voorde 2012” should be “van de Voorde et al., 2012”

Line 518: “Beurden et al., 2020” should be “Van Beurden et al., 2020”

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Thanks for having improved tha paper so fast. Minor spell chacking is necessary, esepcially in the sections added (line 25, KelliHer; line 91 Ajzen ET AL....)

good job and interesting contrubution that echoes topical work and concerns about NWW.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.docx