For many employees, dependency on technology increased after the pandemic

• 92% consider themselves dependent on technology for daily tasks

A study, just published by misco, to determine the impact that technology has on individuals’ workplace has found that 42% of employees find the technology implemented at their workplace to increase their stress and burnout levels while another 41% believe it makes it harder to achieve a work-life balance.

The Technology at the workplace report is based on a study conducted between last September and October among 291 individuals employed in Malta who make use of an array of different technologies for their work.

The main objective of this study was to identify the overall perception of employees towards the use of different forms of technology for their job and aimed to determine employees’ level of ease experienced when making use of different technology, understand the perceived impact technology has on their work and work-life balance, and determine organisations’ mode of practice when implementing new technologies.

“For most respondents, their dependency on technology seems to have increased after the pandemic. In fact, while 92% of respondents consider themselves dependent on technology for daily tasks, 66% said that their dependency on technology increased during and following the pandemic particularly for those in a managerial role,” notes Joanne Bondin, director at misco.

Bondin also noted how the fact that most have access to different work-related tasks from their phone, leaves them continuously alert on what goes on at work.

The survey in fact found that 88% of respondents have access to different work-related tasks, including emails and calendar, from their phone and that of these, 55% find that having such access makes them continuously alert to what goes on at work. Moreover, 48% check their phone for work-related tasks multiple times a day outside their working hours. Males (55%) seem more likely than females (39%) to check their phones for work several times a day.

Although many agree that technology has helped them be more productive and flexible, many also believe it has increased their overall time spent working.

In fact, asked to determine if the technology implemented by their workplace has had an impact on their stress levels, whereas 12% stated that technology helped them reduce their stress levels and burnout and 46% felt that the technology did not impact them, 42% believe that it has led to more stress and burnout.

41% also believed that the technology used at their workplace makes it harder to achieve a work-life balance but while 90% agreed that technology at their workplace makes them more productive, 64% also agreed that technology has increased the amount of time spent working.

This confirms similar research conducted recently by misco that had found that while in some cases, remote working has a positive impact on one’s work-life balance, many end up worrying about work when not working and some also carry out work-related tasks in their free time.

“At this point, I would say that there is a need for a new framework of self-organisation skills to ensure we are the ones managing technology and not technology managing us,” added Bondin.

The survey asked respondents to determine to what extent they consider themselves to be tech savvy and on a scale of one to four, (where one meant not at all and four meant very much so), 54% of respondents rated themselves a score of three. Whereas 36% of males consider themselves to be very tech savvy, only 18% of females rated themselves the same score of four.

“If males are more likely to consider themselves to be tech savvy, it means they are more confident in their technological skills. Therefore, will technology become another glass ceiling for women?” asked Bondin.

The survey tackled many other aspects of technology at the workplace including HRrelated aspects, how having modern technology attracts staff and impacts their productivity and how technology is impacting the productivity of remote working.

“The main objective of this study was to identify the overall perception of employees towards the use of different forms of technology for their job and aimed to determine employees’ level of ease experienced when making use of different technology, understand the perceived impact technology has on their work and work-life balance, and determine organizations’ mode of practice when implementing new technologies.”