The academy, like any other workplace, is characterized by social, difference-creating processes that, seemly inevitably, results in unequal working conditions among employees. Subtile, informal structures of power, as opposed to the formal once, are both complex and difficult to detect, but research show that patterns of inequality based primarily on gender, ethnicity, religion and language create difficult obstacles to inclusion and equal treatment in academia. So, how about University West? How inclusive are we as an organization? What do the employees themselves have to say, if asked? The overall aim of our research project was, in accordance with the above-mentioned questions, to seek knowledge about employees’ thoughts on, and experiences of, inclusion in everyday working life at University West, with a particular focus on ethnicity.

Both qualitative and quantitative research methods were used for collecting and processing of data. In order to gain an overview of employees’ perceptions of inclusion at University West, a questionnaire, primarily linked to the seven grounds of discrimination, was distributed to all employees. In total 101 responses were received. In parallel with the survey, thirteen in-depth interviews were conducted with employees at the university’s various work units. A comprehensive interview guide with relatively open questions about work and career opportunities was used. The majority of the interviewees are teachers and researchers, and most of them have a migrant background.

The survey shows that experiences of differential treatment are mainly related to gender, age, academic position and social class. Respondents with a migrant background feel that they receive less respect from colleagues than those with a Swedish background, and the same applies to those who consider it difficult to communicate in Swedish. Disparaging comments in everyday work life are mainly linked to factors such as not being able to speak Swedish, nationality, age and ethnicity. The prevalence of derogatory speech about both women and men shows relatively high figures.

During the interviews, it emerged that most of the informants enjoy their work, but that some problematic patterns and behaviours make it difficult to feel welcomed and completely “at home” within the organization. “Us - and - them” categorizations, not least based on ethnic background, but also based on gender, age and religion, are highlighted. A lack of curiosity about experiences and competencies of “others”, alongside with a mono-lingual norm where a perceived demand for “correct” Swedish reinforces the presence of a non-inclusive mono-culture and a feeling of constantly being positioned as “the Other” in everyday working life. Language, not unexpectedly, emerges as a key factor in the demarcation between “us” and “them”, as do restrictive behaviour codes and other local norms. There are several perceived obstacles to work and career opportunities, but the one that most often is mentioned is a lack of personal connections and informal networks within which inquiries and recruitment are perceived to take place on a personal basis rather than on documented experience, merits and skills. Allying oneself with the “right” people, making friends with persons who has power and influence, is seen as a fundamental prerequisite for moving upwards within the organization. The interviewees also pointed to a culture of silence in which it is perceived as difficult, or futile, to raise problems relating to discrimination, racist jargon or sexual harassments. A lack of transparency when it comes to internal funding and recruitment, and a clear discrepancy between organisation’s articulated values and what it really looks like in reality, are further examples of problems raised.

In summary, the empirical data shows us that employees have various experiences of exclusionary behaviors, mechanisms and patterns in everyday working life at Högskolan Väst, and that a greater sensitivity among colleagues and management to unequal working conditions and issues concerning inclusion, is requested. Our hope is that this study will contribute to a more open discussion about these types of sensitive issues, issues that more often need to be addressed as a common problem for the entire organization, rather than a problem for just a few.

Purpose: This study identifies gendered disparities among women students participating in work-integrated learning and explores the effects of the disparities on their perceptions on perceived opportunities, competencies, sense of belonging, and professional identity. Design/methodology/approach: A series of semi-structured focus groups were run with 59 participants at six higher education institutions in four countries (Australia, Canada, Sweden, United Kingdom). All focus groups were designed with the same questions and formatting. Findings: Thematic analysis of the transcripts revealed two overarching themes, namely perceptions of self and interactions with others in work placements. Theme categories included awareness of self-presentation, sense of autonomy, perceived Allies, emotional labour, barriers to opportunity, sense of belonging, intersections of identity, and validation value. Originality/value: This study fills an important gap in the international literature about gendered experiences in WIL and highlights inequalities that women experience while on work placements.  

This study examined the similarities and differences in sense of belonging, mental health, and well-being of higher education students from three countries. A cross-sectional design using a quantitative online survey was used to collect demographics, and perceptions of sense of belonging, mental health, and well-being. Participants were recruited from three universities in Canada, Germany, and Sweden. All students from the three countries reported only moderate emotional stability; neutral satisfaction with life; moderately strong levels of sense of belonging; and only moderate control of self and events, happiness, mental balance, self-esteem, social involvement, and sociability. Students in Sweden compared to Canada and Germany reported significantly stronger sense of belonging. Additionally, students in Sweden compared to students in Canada reported significantly stronger emotional stability and higher self-esteem. Higher levels of sense of belonging were strongly related to positive mental health and well-being. No significant differences as a function of sex, age, year-of-study, and program of study were found within and across countries. The findings shed light on the mental health status and well-being of students in two European countries where little research on student mental health has been conducted. Additionally, comparisons are made between student mental health in Canada and these European countries. The results validate the importance of a sense of belonging as it relates to the mental health and well-being of all higher education students. Findings can inform the design of promotion and prevention programs aimed at improving and maintaining mental health and well-being outcomes. 

The workplace and work life has changed due to advances in digital technology, which has increased distributed work. Many organizations no longer work in a physical office, but in a hybrid workplace where organizational members work both remotely, using digital technology, and in the physical office. This literature review explores and examines the existing research on leadership in hybrid workplaces. While there is a large body of research on e-leadership and numerous studies on the pandemic, there is a paucity of research on the leadership of hybrid workplaces, which is crucial in the present workplace. Hence, this paper is a systematic review of the literature that addresses leadership in the hybrid workplace across disciplines.

A total of 48 papers from six databases were analyzed and interpreted. This review reveals the different but complementary disciplinary focus contributing to developing the knowledge of leadership in the hybrid workplace. It also presents a comprehensive overview of changes to the workplace and the critical challenges leaders face with the abrupt switch to the new structure of the workplace. This work has significant learning points for leadership practice in the contemporary workplace. It offers a conceptualization of hybrid leadership, along with propositions for future research.

Time is central to many debates about hybrid work - the impact on speed and productivity, commute times, and synchronisation of work. However, we argue that time is often over-simplified in extant hybrid work literature and tends to ignore many temporal concepts that capture the inherently complex, multifaceted, subtle, and socially embedded nature of time.

To address this issue, we conducted studies of five hybrid work teams across two large organisations. The paper contributes to current research on hybrid work by (i) illustrating the various temporal concepts that may be considered in the design of hybrid work environments, as well as the impact of considering or not considering them; (ii) illustrating how these temporal concepts in a physical space can be augmented in the digital space, rather than assuming the digital space should simply represent the physical; and (iii) providing a framework for the consideration of time–aware hybrid work. We hope to spark scientific interest in studying the temporal nuances of hybrid work but also the temporal aspects of design in other areas.

Social media platforms have in the last decade been widely used in the workplace. Although many organizations use multiple social media platforms for different purposes, recent research has focussed on the use of single social media platforms and its implications for work practices. The present study focuses on multiple social media use in the workplace. This perspective embraces social media platforms used for both internal and external purposes, as well as social media content produced on third-party platforms. Moreover, few studies focus on how the use of multiple social media in the workplace affects existing work practices. Therefore, this study aims to examine how new work practices develop over time and how the workplace is transformed due to the ongoing use of multiple social media. The present study contributes to the Information Systems (IS) literature by emphasizing that the explicit features of “algorithmic phenomena” of social media platforms, like ever-changing algorithms and transparency, create the need for new work practices as well as new organizational structures.

The increasing implementation of digital technologies in organizations such as social media platforms is fundamentally transforming the nature of services encounters [1, 2], not least in the hospitality industry. This causes new ways of working for hotel employees, causing disruption in service routines and work tasks. There are few qualitative studies that are focusing on the hospitality industry and technostress. The present study focus on technostress among employees in an international hotel chain. Data have been collected in eight European countries over a period of seven years. The Person-Technology fit model is used in order to identify and analyze stressors and strains deriving from social media use. The results indicate that techno stressors such as work overload, work-life conflict, and changing algorithms creates negative stressors. The study makes a theoretical contribution to technostress research in the Information Systems research as well as the hospitality research field by uncovering negative stressors and strains created over time.

Multiple organizational social media (MOSM) foster new ways of communication, interaction and new encounters for organizations that can cause stress. Earlier research on social media and technostress have focused on negative stressors, hence there is a lack of studies focusing on both positive and negative stressors deriving from social media. In this study, both negative and positive stressors and strains deriving from using MOSM are studied in an international hotel chain with employees in eight European countries over a period of seven years. The results indicate that techno stressors such as work overload, work-life conflict, and changing algorithms creates negative stressors. However, positive stressors such as the ability to create new ways of providing service was also found. The study makes a theoretical contribution to technostress research in the Information Systems research field by uncovering both positive and negative stressors and strains created over time as well as suggests a development of the Person-Technology fit model.

Multiple organizational social media (MOSM) foster new ways of communication, interaction and new encounters for organizations that can cause stress. There is a lack of studies focusing on both positive and negative stressors deriving from social media. In this study, both negative and positive stressors and strains deriving from using MOSM are studied in an international hotel chain with employees in eight European countries over a period of seven years. The results indicate that techno stressors such as work overload, work-life conflict, and changing algorithms create negative stressors. However, positive stressors such as the ability to create new ways of providing service were also found. The study makes a theoretical contribution to technostress research in the Information Systems research field by uncovering both positive and negative stressors and strains created over time as well as suggesting a development of the Person-Technology fit model.

There are vital challenges for organization undergoing digital transformation, especially those that rely more and more on the ever-evolving platform economy. The hotel industry faces key problems as they need to have the power to control and augment the value chain supported by an ongoing access to accurate data (such as online customer behavior). We discuss on a conceptual level how such disruptive economic changes appear in the analogue and physical practice, at place in hotel organisations. We explore the practice of analogue disruption as it emerges as struggles and discontinuities that may not bring the expected flow of value to the business. This paper aims to examine how analogue disruptions takes place due to the ongoing digitalization in the hotel sector through the platform economy. We here apply a qualitative analysis with interpretative methodologies, that will open for further knowledge and insights on the analogue disruption of digital transformation. © 2023 IEEE Computer Society. All rights reserved.

Purpose – This study aims to develop the understanding of learning processes related to the new ways of interacting in the enforced digital workplace over time.

Design/methodology/approach – A multiple, longitudinal case study of knowledge-based workers in three firms located in Sweden has been conducted from March 2020 to March 2023. In total, 89 interviews with 32 employees in three knowledge-based firms have been collected.

Findings – The study shows how the intricate interaction between rules and norms for interaction and work must be renegotiated as well as un- and relearned when the physical work environment no longer frames the work context. Furthermore, technology can be viewed as both an enable and a barrier, that is, technology has enhanced collaboration between organizational members yet also created social difficulties, for example, related to communication and interaction. The study emphasizes that individuals learned through trial and error. That is, they tried behaviors such as translating social interactions" to a digital arena, appraised the outcomes and modified the practices if the outcomes were poor.

Research limitations/implications – The present study does have several limitations. First, it is based on interviews with respondents within three organizations in Sweden. To broaden and deepen the understanding of both organizational and learning, future studies can contribute by studying other contexts as well as using a mixed method approach in other countries.

Practical implications – Results from the study can provide a practical understanding of how the rapid change from working at the office to working from home using digital technologies can be understood and managed.

Originality/value – Contributions include combining interaction order and un- and relearning among organizational employees. This insight is important given that the rapid digital transformation of our society has changed how work is performed and how the future workplace will be both structured and organized.

Hardly any organization remains unaffected by the digitalization of society and the whole global economy is shaken by disruptive digital innovations (DDI). This calls for strategic responses from incumbent firms to remain relevant in a changing environment. This study explores the phenomenon of digital transformation and the development of digital business strategy in the context of incumbent firms, in this case, the hotel industry. We address the following research questions: 1) How are hotel organizations disrupted by digital innovations? and 2) How do they respond strategically to these disruptions? The research approach consists of multiple longitudinal case studies of two international hotel chains, offering a rich dataset. “Strategy-as-practice” is used as a theoretical lens. The results show three overall organizational responses due to DDI including: 1) relating to a new digital business environment; 2) translating strategy to practices 3) renegotiating value. Contributions include extending the existing literature on digital strategies and responses to digital disruptions in incumbent firms as well as providing implications to practice.

I denna artikel presenteras en internationell studie från Doing Business vid Worlbank.org, om hur effektiva insolvensförfaranden är i de olika länderna. Det som granskats är hur den insolvensrättsliga lagstiftningens utformad, tiden för genomförande, kostnaderna för förfarandena och det ekonomiska resultatet. Studien visar bland annat att USA, Finland och Japan är mest framgångsrika med att lösa insolvensförfaranden i världen. I denna artikel presenteras studiens resultat. Artikeln avslutas med egna reflektioner.

For graduates to be able to compete in the global world, study programmes must include knowledge, competences and skills that ensures that students with a higher education degree are ready for both a complex working life and continuous competence development. This demands competencies beyond traditional theoretical knowledge, such as preparing for uncertainty and unknown outcomes. Therefore, it is essential to engage students in learning to learn, i.e., lifelong learning so that the tools and methods for learning in higher education can also be developed through future work.

At University West (UW) in Sweden, this means that programmes are developed in collaboration with societal partners to provide a relevant and attractive educational offer. The University West uses the concept of work-integrated learning (WIL) to embrace a sustained/systematic collaboration with strategic partners outside academia. We consider that knowledge is created in the encounter between academia and our strategic partners, through the integration of knowledge, skills and competences acquired both within academia and work life.

To achieve a strategic and qualitative development of work-integrated learning (WIL), the Board of University West in 2018 decided to WIL-certify all educational programs including a sustainability perspective and enhance this process by engaging in strategic partnerships with stakeholders from civic society to international companies. The process is a development of existing and future programmes and their pedagogical approach. The WIL certification process has developed into a renewal of the pedagogical approach through a development process based on a lively exchange of experiences from study programme representatives from political science to nursing; and discussions with our strategic partners that benefits both students, staff as well as the strategic partners through competence development and lifelong learning.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the lessons learned so far and present a conceptual quality framework for WIL in higher education with a clear connection to sustainable development. Based on the experiences from the development of the institutional WIL project and a Swedish Innovation agency (VINNOVA) research project we aim for a better understanding and insights into how theoretical and practical knowledge can enhance learning both within academia and within strategic partners. Data collection activities include workshops and focus groups with selected participants from the target groups at the university (managers/prefects and teachers) as well as at the collaborative partner organization (managers and supervisors/mentors). Initial findings suggest that the meeting between academia, working life and the surrounding society can ensure that insights, solutions and mutual development are created to meet the challenges society faces. The paper will discuss the methodology of creating work-integrated learning environments that include well-functioning communication and a community of practice (Wenger, 1998) connecting learners, teachers, and other staff with local, regional and national stakeholders.

The tremendous impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the global aviation industry has led to many cases of airline financial distress and bankruptcy. The Asia–Pacific region (APAC) contains more than half of the world’s population, and its airlines had the highest profit margin of any region. In this study, we investigate whether corporate sustainability practice can reduce the financial distress risk of air carriers, and, if so, what would the effect be in APAC? We first examine the relationship between environmental, social, and governance disclosure and the likelihood of financial distress of airlines as measured by the Altman Z″-score. Second, we analyze the moderating role of being an APAC airline in this relationship. The findings support the claim that implementing environmental actions may increase financial distress risk, and by improving social and governance activities, airlines can mitigate the risk of financial distress. The negative influence of the environmental pillar and the positive influence of the social pillar can be smaller for APAC airlines. Our study provides empirical evidence of the influence of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) on the likelihood of financial distress in the airline industry. Moreover, we analyze the moderating role of being an APAC airline in the relationship between sustainability and financial distress. This study has significant implications for executives, managers, and policymakers in the aviation industry on ESG strategy decisions and the general issue of sustainability.

Today’s working life faces a major ongoing transformation characterised by increased complexity and specialisation of work and conditions for lifelong learning. This requires competencies beyond traditional theoretical knowledge, including the ability to prepare for uncertainty and unknown outcomes. Therefore, involving students in work-integrated learning (WIL) and learning how to learn for lifelong learning is essential. At University West in Sweden, educational programs are WIL-based and developed in collaboration with strategic partners to provide a relevant and attractive range of programs and courses. In this study, we argue that it is a shared responsibility for academia and business organisations to collaboratively develop innovative approaches to working and learning to secure a future workforce ready for a complex working life and continuous competence development. The purpose of the study is to identify and provide knowledge underpinning the understanding and application of WIL in higher education and working life. The goal is to develop a framework that supports key stakeholders in understanding, designing and applying WIL. Findings from this study suggest that the collaboration between teachers, partners, and students can be strengthened by a quality framework supporting the planning, implementation, reflection and improvement of WIL-based education and competence initiatives. The main contribution of the paper is a nuanced description of WIL conceptualizations along with a multi-perspective approach, bringing multiple perspectives into the development and application of WIL. It also highlights how a framework based on these foundations can support quality development and enhance the application of WIL in higher education and working life.

The aim of this study was to investigate the experiences of inclusion and exclusion in academia, with a primary focus on ethnicization/racialization within a local University in Sweden. The discussion about structural discrimination in the Swedish labour market has been going on in the public discourse for several decades. The main focus has been on the inequality between women and men in working life (see, for example, SOU 1993:7; SOU, 1998:6; SOU, 2014:81, but discrimination against non-Swedes and/or non-whites has also been noted, albeit to a somewhat lesser degree (see e.g. Mählck, 2013; Osman, 2021; de los Reyes, 2008; SOU 2005:56; SOU 2006:59). The question of how gender interacts with other categorisations, such as ethnicity and/or ‘race’ have been shown even less interest. Nor has discrimination in higher education attracted much attention, and Swedish as well as European academia is relatively little researched from critical perspectives on power, inclusion, and exclusion. However, the fact that academia, like other educational institutions, always includes aspects of power is nothing new (Ahmed, 2012; Bethoui & Leivestad, 2019; Hübinette & Mählck, 2016). To investigate these issues, the following four questions were in focus: 

1) To what extent do employees perceive themselves included or excluded in relation to ethnicity/’race, class, gender/gender identity, religion, age, sexuality and disability.  

2) What experiences and understandings of inclusion and exclusion processes do employees express?

3) In what contexts do employees perceive that inclusion/exclusion occurs? 

4) How is ethnification/racialization perceived to interact with other social categorizations in relation to inclusion/exclusion? 

Although ethnicity/’race’ has been the focus of the study, we also asked how these categorizations were perceived to interact with gender, age, class, religion and to some extent sexuality and disability. The employees we interviewed have also spontaneously highlighted the importance of how gender, age and class are perceived to affect such things as collegial treatment and career conditions.

As research has pointed out, these are complex processes of demarcation and exclusion that rarely allow themselves to be understood with the help of a social category belonging alone (see, for example, de los Reyes, 2007). Although there are experiences of exclusion that are perceived to have a clear basis in the person's ethnic origin or skin color, such orders cannot be said to be stable and unambiguous (cf. Lundström, 2017).Since norms and notions of ethnicity/'race' are mutually constituted by other power relations, and since social positioning is always context-dependent, we saw it as an analytical necessity to apply an intersectional perspective on the processes of ethnicization and racialization that we investigated. (cf. Mählck, 2012 p. 31). The concept of intersectionality can be traced to the work by black feminist researchers concerned with how oppressive power is embedded in societal structures and systems The intersectional theory concerns primarily how the exercise of power, through intersecting domination and oppression, affects individuals who face multiple social inequities, with consequent multiple marginalisations (Collins, 2019). This criticl social theory gave a lens to analyse understand inclusion and exclusion within a local university context. 

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The outbreak of the global pandemic COVID-19 meant an extreme intensification of digitalization in education. Around the world, technology became a prerequisite for continuing education, as schools were to switch to distance education. Drawing on an institutional logics perspective, this paper aims to explore school leaders' experiences and insights from running a virtual school overnight. Data includes a survey of105 school leaders in Swedish high schools. The results show clear challenges for schools as institutions, yet most of the school leaders perceived that the shift to virtual classrooms went well and can lead to lasting value for the school. Still, when facing a new situation, organizational problems are uncovered, and the importance of brick-and-mortar schools becomes visible. Contributions include analyzing an extreme case of digitization in schools and conceptualizing two faces of digitalization, that constitute both a preservative and disruptive force in institutional logic.

Purpose – In this study, the authors explore teachers’ experiences of work during the pandemic using the analytic lens of technostress. More specifically, the authors investigate how the sudden transition to distance education induces technostress among teachers in relation to their teaching practice.

Design/methodology/approach – The data gathering method constitutes a questionnaire that exploreshow teachers’ work situation was affected by shifting to distance education. 286 Swedish teachers answered the open-ended questionnaire.

Findings – The results demonstrate how technostress creators, technostress strains and teachers’ coping strategies are expressed in teaching practice during an extreme case of digitalization.

Originality/value – The authors contribute to the work on technostress by suggesting the theoretical concept of “technorest” to shed light on alternative effects of the digitalization of work practice. Furthermore, the authors give examples of technorest creators which the authors term “techno-shields” and “techno-security”.

The results could be interesting to enhance the understanding of the digitalization of work practices and cultivate a more favorable work situation