Smart Working

Business leaders who manage to set the initial conditions and create engaging, meaningful work, through organisational design and ways of working that make the best use of the knowledge and creative potential of their workforces are increasingly said to be engaging in smart working. In Smart Working: Creating the Next Wave Anne Marie McEwan explains how smart working has hitherto been associated with flexible and mobile working - 'anytime, anywhere' ways of working enabled by communication technologies. Dr.McEwan, though, offers another broader view defined by flexibility and autonomy, not just in where and when, but also how people work. She argues that systems, working environments and governance principles are more likely to lead to effective performance if they maximise self-determination and choice. In short, smart working is an outcome of designing organisational systems that are good for business and good for people. McEwan warns that the tendency in management literature to talk of 21st century management and new paradigms is a "delusion with novelty" that risks overlooking the fundamental insights of theoretical thinkers from decades ago, from years of academic research, and lessons learned from process innovation methods that took root in the 1980s. She also points to how social computing and collaborative communication technologies are creating immense possibilities for stimulating and harnessing collective intelligence, within and beyond organisational boundaries. This rigorously researched but intensely practical book reviews current workplace trends (in people, technology, place and space); reviews what we already know about effective management and high performance work methods; and shows how insights from what we already know can be interpreted and used to advantage in contemporary turbulent, fast-changing and connected workscapes. It will help those with responsibilities for the strategic direction of their organizations, as well as learning & development and HR professionals, to understand how to interpret these insights for their own business contexts.