Mobile Virtual Work A New Paradigm phần 1 pot

Mobile Virtual Work
J.H. Erik Andriessen ´ Matti Vartiainen
(Editors)
Mobile Virtual
Wor k
A New Paradigm?
With 60 Figures and 26 Tables
12
Professor J.H. Erik Andriessen
Delft University of Technology
Department of Work and Organisational Psychology
Jaffalaan 5
2628 Delft
The Netherlands

Professor Matti Vartiainen
Helsinki University of Technology
Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership
P.O. Box 5500
02015 TKK Espoo
Finland

ISBN-10 3-540-28364-1 Springer Berlin Heidelberg New York
ISBN-13 978-3-540-28364-5 Springer Berlin Heidelberg New York
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Preface
Dear Reader
This is a book about mobile virtual work. It aims at clarifying the basic
concepts and showing present practices and future challenges. The roots of
the book are in the collaboration of few European practitioners and re-
searchers, who met each other under the umbrella of the Swedish SALTSA
programme (see next page) in January 2002 in Stockholm. The group was
first called ‘ICT, Mobility and Work Organisation’ but redefined itself
quickly as ‘Mobile Virtual Cooperative Work’ group. The change of the
name reflects the development of reasoning in the group. We could not
find much material on mobile work, certainly not systematic studies, al-
though a growing interest in mobile technologies and services could be
found. Practices of telework and virtual organizations were better known,
but we were convinced that the combination with mobile work was some-
thing different and new. Our main target became to understand what it was
all about.
The next step was an expert meeting in October 2004 at Rånäs Castle

again in Sweden. A wider group of experts was invited to present their
views on mobile virtual work and ideas about book chapters from different
perspectives of working life. Some of the expertise could be found through
the network of the AMI@Work family created by the New Working Envi-
ronments unit of the European Commission’s Information Society Direc-
torate-General. Also close collaboration was developed with the related
MOSAIC program.
Today, much more is known about mobile work systems as can be seen
in the following chapters. There are now many other researchers and prac-
titioners in this field. Mobile business models are being developed, bring-
ing along human, organizational and societal challenges.
With this book we realise our intention to present a ‘state of the art’ col-
lection of knowledge on this subject. We very much hope that you will
find the discussion about present day reality and future challenges of mo-
bile virtual work as exciting as we do. It is possibly a new paradigm.
Erik Andriessen Matti Vartiainen
Delft, The Netherlands Helsinki, Finland
VI Preface
SALTSA
A Joint Programme for Working Life Research in Europe
SALTSA is a programme for research on European working life run in
close co-operation by the National Institute for Working Life in Sweden
and the Swedish Confederation of Trade Unions (LO), the Swedish Con-
federation of Professional Employess (TCO) and the Swedish Confedera-
tion of Professional Associations (SACO).
The aim of SALTSA is to generate applicable research results of high
academic standard and practical relevance. Research is carried out in areas
like labour market and employment, labour law, work organisation and
health and safety.
HTU />Contents

Preface V
Part 1 Concepts and Prevalence 1
1 Emerging Mobile Virtual Work 3
Erik Andriessen and Matti Vartiainen 3
1.1 Fundamental changes and driving forces 3
1.2 What is Mobile Virtual Work? 6
1.3 Objectives and general design of a research program 8
1.4 The contributions to this book 9
References 12
2 Mobile Virtual Work – Concepts, Outcomes and Challenges 13
Matti Vartiainen 13
2.1 Emergence of new concepts 13
2.2 What is mobile? 14
2.2.1 Mobile spaces and places as working contexts 15
2.2.2 Mobile subject 17
2.2.3 Mobile tools 17
2.2.4 Mobile object of work 18
2.2.5 Mobility in organisations and business models 19
2.3 What is virtual? 20
2.4 What is Telework? 21
2.5 Forms of physical and virtual mobility 22
2.5.1 Emergence of eWork 22
2.5.2 Types of physically mobile employees 24
2.6 Mobile work systems in distributed organisations 26
2.6.1 Complexity of tasks 28
2.6.2 Complexity of context 28
2.6.3 Internal processes of individual and collective subjects 37
2.7 Outcomes and challenges 38
Acknowledgements 42
References 42

VIII Contents
3 Mapping the Mobile eWorkforce in Europe 45
Karsten Gareis, Stefan Lilischkis and Alexander Mentrup 45
3.1 eWork and physical mobility 45
3.2 Drivers 47
3.2.1 Drivers of worker mobility 47
3.2.2 Physical and virtual mobility 49
3.2.3 ICTs as drivers of mobile work 49
3.3 Conceptualising mobile eWork 51
3.4 Mobile work and mobile eWork today 54
3.4.1 Mobile work 54
3.4.2 Mobile eWork 57
3.4.3 Tele-collaboration: "virtually mobile eWork" 63
3.5 Conclusions and outlook 63
Statistical annex 65
References 67
4 New Forms of Work in Labour Law 71
Minna Helle 71
4.1 New forms of work as legal challenges 71
4.2 Mobile and virtual work in labour legislation 73
4.3 The European framework agreement on telework 75
4.3.1 Purpose and background 75
4.3.2 The definition of a teleworker 76
4.4 Employment relationship and entrepreneurship 78
4.5 Employment conditions in mobile and virtual work 80
4.5.1 The outline of employment conditions 80
4.5.2 The principle of equal treatment 81
4.5.3 Working time 82
4.5.4 Equipment – costs and liability issues 83
4.5.5 Health and safety 84

4.5.6 Data protection 85
4.5.7 Privacy issues 85
4.6 Contractual issues 86
4.6.1 Individual contracts in mobile and virtual work 86
4.6.2 Particularities of mobile and virtual work 86
4.6.3 The need for specific contracts in different situations 87
4.6.4 The content of a specific contract 90
4.7 Conclusions 91
References 93
Contents IX
Part 2 Mobility in Work 95
5 Virtually Connected, Practically Mobile 97
Mark Perry and Jackie Brodie 97
5.1 Chapter outline 97
5.2 Designing mobile technology to ‘fit’ the work 98
5.3 On being mobile 99
5.3.1 Addressing Mobile Virtual Work 99
5.3.2 ‘Mobility’ in the research literature 101
5.3.3 Articulating mobile work: ‘mobilisation work’ 102
5.4 Examining mobility 104
5.4.1 Data collection methods 104
5.4.2 Primary data collection 105
5.4.3 Technology probes and user evaluation 106
5.5 Analysis 106
5.5.1 Cognitive activity and planning behaviour 107
5.5.2 Social interaction and home/work relationships 110
5.5.3 Mechanisms of interaction in mobilising work 112
5.6 Technology probes: design and functionality 112
5.6.1 Design of the probes 112
5.6.2 VMail 113

5.6.3 Dynamic-List 114
5.6.4 Connect-Talk 116
5.7. Probe evaluation and implications for design 118
5.7.1 Supporting awareness 118
5.7.2 Supporting effective communication 119
5.7.3 Transforming work relationships 120
5.7.4 Building and maintaining social and domestic bonds 121
5.7.5 Privacy and ‘user control’ 121
5.7.6 Technological implications 122
5.8 Discussion and conclusion 124
References 126
6 Collaboration in Mobile Virtual Work: a Human Factors View 129
John R Wilson 129
6.1 Starting position 129
6.2 Future work, mobility and virtuality 130
6.3 Collaboration 133
6.4. Examining mobility 135
6.4.1 Social and organisational support 135
6.4.2 Technical systems support 138
X Contents
6.5 Methodological considerations in studying collaborative work141
6.6 Cases of collaborative working 142
6.6.1 Collaborative virtual environments 142
6.6.2 Studies of planners and schedulers 144
6.6.3 Railway maintenance 145
6.6.4 Multiple decoupled interaction in virtual environments 146
6.7. Concluding discussion 147
Acknowledgements 149
References 149
7 Model-based Design of Mobile Work Systems 153

Ludger Schmidt and Holger Luczak 153
7.1 Introduction 153
7.2 Trends of mobile work in Europe 154
7.3 Mobile work in the context of industrial engineering 156
7.4 Design space model for mobile work systems 159
7.5 Case study on augmented reality work 163
7.6 Application of the model based design process 165
7.6.1 Requirements analysis of the objective 166
7.6.2 Identification of interconnections and conception 168
7.6.3 Integration and prototyping of design solutions 170
7.6.4 Evaluation and verification 171
7.7 Conclusion 173
References 174
8 Usability in IT Systems for Mobile Work 177
Niklas Johansson, Torbjörn Lind and Bengt Sandblad 177
8.1 Usability in mobile IT systems 177
8.2 Usability aspects and criteria 179
8.2.1 General usability in IT-support systems 179
8.2.2 Mobility specific usability criteria 181
8.2.3 Design for mobile systems 185
8.3 Assessment of usability in mobile systems 186
8.3.1 Method 186
8.3.2 Results 188
8.3.3 Case study – the ambulance system CAK-net 191
8.4 Design for usability in mobile systems for home care 193
8.4.1 Background 193
8.4.2 Seminars for requirement gathering 194
8.4.3 Specification of future work 195
8.4.4 Design of mobile work support systems 197
8.4.3 Case conclusions 199

Contents XI
8.5 Conclusions 200
Acknowledgements 201
References 201
9 Participative Design for Home Care Nursing 203
Marion Wiethoff, Thierry Meulenbroek, Hans Stafleu and Rogier
van Boxtel 203
9.1 Home health care as mobile work 203
9.2 ICT, mobile workers and the chronically ill 204
9.3 User involvement in design 205
9.3.1 Design approaches 206
9.4 Application of the ESE design approach 211
9.4.1 Stage B: Analysis present situation and problems 211
9.4.2 Stage C: Defining the input for textual scenarios 213
9.4.3 Stage D: Developing textual scenarios 214
9.4.4 Stage E: Defining the input for pictorial scenarios 221
9.4.5 Stage F: Developing pictorial scenarios 222
9.5 Discussion and conclusions 226
References 228
10 Well-being and Stress in Mobile and Virtual Work 231
Peter Richter, Jelka Meyer and Fanny Sommer 231
10.1 Challenge of well-being in mobile virtual work 231
10.2 A framework to mental workload and mental strain 232
10.2.1 Summary 236
10.3 Task-related and organisational factors of mental workload 237
10.3.1 Individual work in virtual settings 237
10.3.2 Aspects of collaboration in mobile virtual work 240
10.3.3 The role of resources 247
10.4 Conclusions 248
References 249

11 Building Scenarios for a Globally Distributed Corporation 253
Veli-Pekka Niitamo 253
11.1 Challenge of global working 253
11.2 Drivers, motivation and context of change 254
11.3 Globally distributed mobile work environment 255
11.4 Drivers and benefits of flexible working solutions 261
11.5 Scenario challenges 262
11.6 Conclusion 264
References 265
XII Contents
12 Case Descriptions of Mobile Virtual Work in Practice 267
Robert M Verburg, Stefania Testa, Ursula Hyrkkänen and Niklas
Johansson 267
12.1 Setting the scene 267
12.2 MVW in practice: customs control in the Netherlands 268
12.2.1 Mobile setting 268
12.2.2 Implementation 269
12.2.3 Benefits and drawbacks 270
12.2.4 Conclusion and lessons learned 271
12.3 MVW in practice: providing facility services in Italy 272
12.3.1 Mobile setting 272
12.3.2 Implementation 273
12.3.3 Benefits and drawbacks for the organisation 274
12.3.4 Benefits and drawbacks for employees 274
12.3.5 Conclusions and lessons learned 275
12.4 MVW in practice: mobile servicemen in Finland 276
12.4.1 Mobile settings 276
12.4.2 Mobile reporting with the Palm computer 278
12.4.3 Implementation 279
12.4.4 Benefits and drawbacks 279

12.4.5 Conclusions 281
12.5 MVW in practice: IT-support for home care in Sweden 282
12.5.1 Intended use 283
12.5.2 The system implemented in another environment 283
12.5.3 Performance and outcomes 284
12.5.4 Unanticipated use of the system 285
12.5.5 Conclusions and lessons learned 286
12.6 Overall conclusion 287
Acknowledgement 288
References 288
Part 3 Organisational Strategies 289
13 Knowledge Sharing in Mobile Work 291
Mariano Corso, Antonella Martini, Luisa Pellegrini 291
13.1 The KMS challenge in mobile context 291
13.2 Research framework and methodology 295
13.3 Field research results 298
13.3.1 Mapping the MW phenomenon: the survey results 298
13.3.2 Cause and effect links: three explicative case studies 302
13.4 Conclusions and implications 315
References 317
Contents XIII
14 Factors Influencing the Diffusion of New Mobile Services 319
Sven Lindmark, Mats Magnusson and Filippo Renga 319
14.1 Mobile work and mobile services 319
14.2 Development and diffusion of innovations 320
14.2.1 Strategic issues related to resources and capabilities 321
14.2.2 Technological issues 323
14.2.3 Economic issues 324
14.2.4 Marketing issues 324
14.2.5 Summary 325

14.3 Vehicle telematics in West Sweden 326
14.4 Methods used 328
14.5 Empirical observations 329
14.5.1 Overview 329
14.5.2 Case illustration: Vehco and the Co-Driver 330
14.5.3 Encountered benefits, problems and firm responses 331
14.6 Discussion 337
Acknowledgements 341
References 341
15 Mobile Workplaces and Innovative Business Practice 343
Hans Schaffers, Liz Carver, Torsten Brodt, Terrence Fernando and
Robert Slagter 343
15.1 The challenge of mobile workplaces 343
15.2 Mobility and collaborative working 344
15.3 Current perspectives in mobile collaborative work 347
15.4 Mobile work and new business practice 352
15.4.1 Automotive industry 352
15.4.2 Aerospace industry 353
15.4.3 Building and construction industry 355
15.4.4 Prospects for new ways of mobile working 357
15.5 Introducing mobile collaborative work 357
15.6 Towards a roadmap and innovation agenda 361
15.6.1 Future scenarios 361
15.6.2 An initial roadmap for mobile collaborative workplaces 362
15.7 Final remarks 366
References 367
XIV Contents
16 Mobile Virtual Work: What Have We Learned? 369
Matti Vartiainen and Erik Andriessen 369
16.1 Introduction 369

16.2 MVW is among us 370
16.2.1 Mobile Virtual Work is strengthening 370
16.2.2 A typology of MVW 372
16.3 Specific conclusions and implications 375
16.4 Scenarios for the future 383
16.4.1 A European vision 384
16.5 Conclusion 385
Index 387
List of Contributors 389
Part 1
Concepts and Prevalence
1 Emerging Mobile Virtual Work
Erik AndriessenP
1
P
and Matti VartiainenP
2
P
P
1
P
Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management, Delft University of
Technology, The Netherlands
P
2
P
Laboratory of Work Psychology and Leadership, Helsinki University of
Technology, Finland
1.1 Fundamental changes and driving forces
Something new is happening in the nature of organisations and the role of

employees, a change that may be indicated by the concept of ‘Mobile and
Virtual Work (MVW)’. This type of work is already a reality in different
business areas with mobile customer services, such as sales, logistics,
maintenance, and professional services like consulting or health care.
These developments do not only take place in the commercial world, but
also in public and non-profit sectors.
A number of driving forces let us expect that this type of work is rapidly
gaining momentum in working life worldwide. Some of the driving forces
are related to reducing costs and increasing economical outcomes. Others
grow out of the needs and preferences of employees. The driving forces
form an interwoven set of relationships. They can be clustered into a) so-
cietal forces including technology and b) organisational and individual
choices.
A driving force is the competition in the markets and new business prac-
tices, e.g. a globalised business is not possible with a local organisation.
Ongoing globalisation of markets and businesses leads to higher mobility
requirements and widely distributed international cooperation. Customers
of a product and talents needed to create a product or a service are globally
dispersed. Products and services are getting more and more complex and
are, to an increasing extent, being based on knowledge from different do-
mains and disciplines. This means that they require growing efforts to
bring together and combine multiple expertises and competences in order
to create specific customer solutions. Customer orientation as a strategic
business perspective requires higher efforts in exploring customer needs,
4 Erik Andriessen and Matti Vartiainen
in shaping and streamlining products and services according to these
needs, and in providing comprehensive after sales services for maintaining
their effectiveness.
Technology is a driving force or at least an important enabler. Techno-
logical changes, particularly the developments in mobile and wireless in-

formation and communication technologies (ICT), create possibilities to
work in any place and time. This driver is closely related to the business
driver, because of economical benefits it potentially implies. The European
Information Technology Observatory (2004) forecasts that although many
mobile applications and services are still in their infancy, the demand of
technology and services will grow, because of the following reasons: the
number of mobile employees is to increase in Europe sharply in the com-
ing years, the number and features of hand-held equipments increase as
well, wireless LAN spreads, Bluetooth replaces cables, 3G is implemented,
and operators develop their assortment, when broadband networks are
widely implemented. Mobile technology opens a new perspective to prod-
ucts, services, work and organisation by increasing possibilities to select
more freely the place of working, and by allowing higher mobility than
“wired” technologies. Salesmen, auditors, consultants, patrolling police,
truck drivers, ambulance staff, on-site customer service and repair and
maintenance groups are some of the most common examples of physically
mobile workers using mobile technologies and services. Many other pro-
fessions have a strong mobile element as their job content.
A driving force may even be a new strategic thought or a theoretical
construct, e.g. an idea of developing a virtual community to increase mu-
tual learning and creativity may start the design of new technology to sup-
port it, and later create new business opportunities. When Marshall McLu-
han forecasted the “global village” in the 1960s, he was, in fact, speaking
of the dispersed, virtual workplace.
The role and significance of people and their needs and habits cannot be
underestimated. Needs and benefits of citizens – customers in the case of
companies – are in the end a decisive factor in the implementation of both
mobile technologies and forms of organisations.
These drivers constitute some of the major forces in this arena. In the
following chapters more specific factors are discussed (see e.g. the chap-

ters of Gareis and of Schaffers in this volume) The market side together
with the technological changes stimulate the demand side, i.e. what needs
to be done and how. Demographic and social changes influence the supply
side, i.e. the kind of workers that are available. The impacts of the major
changing forces on the world of work are mediated by inter-organisational
structures and strategies; and the interaction between all these forces takes
place in a larger political-economic-societal context.
1 Emerging Mobile Virtual Work 5
Altogether, the implications of these rather general and lasting trends for
work requirements sum up to increased shares of MVW in business and
work processes. The direct consequence of this all is to be found in the
growth of distributed work processes, network organisations, physical mo-
bility of workers and intensive interaction through various ICT tools. The
development of mobile virtual work can, therefore, be highly attractive,
both for companies who in this way can become more flexible, effective
and innovative, and for those employees who prefer dynamic work envi-
ronments or a more flexible integration of work and private life.
At the same time, we see indications of more fundamental and some-
times negative developments. The possibilities for professional develop-
ment and learning of employees who do not meet colleagues face-to-face
may be limited. Working in a dispersed and mobile manner requires new
skills and competences both from employees and leaders. The social cohe-
sion (social capital) in organisations may face large gaps when workers are
not only geographically distributed, but also have less fixed contractual re-
lations with companies. The management of work may become quite diffi-
cult when intellectual and social capital is threatened by new organisa-
tional arrangements. On the other hand, new technologies make the
monitoring and control of employees often much easier, even from afar.
This requires a new deal between employers and employees. And well-
being may suffer from work under high time pressure without social sup-

port. If one works at varying places new social and emotional requirements
are needed. The balance of work and family life may be shaken, because
work is brought to home. There are also some signs of the increasing digi-
tal divide not only between continents and countries but also inside coun-
tries. For example, statistics show that big companies have better resources
than small- and medium-sized companies to invest on new technologies.
One of the main reasons not to implement wireless and mobile technolo-
gies and to increase working outside the main office is the issue of secu-
rity. The weaknesses in the security of transferring information and confi-
dential knowledge in the Internet are real challenges, which slow down the
development of e-business models.
Summarising, it appears that the trends toward mobile and virtual work
processes are central in a wider process. A process, in which organisations
become less integrated, both geographically and in terms of employment,
and a process, in which people may become more independent but possi-
bly also isolated both socially and contractually. It is a trend toward less
bureaucracy and more interaction in terms of communities. But the new
possibilities can bring risks, and short-term effectiveness may conflict with
long-term sustainability. Before organisations become too optimistic about
the alleged virtues of mobile and virtual work processes they may consider
6 Erik Andriessen and Matti Vartiainen
whether this development is really essential for their business or not. What
is needed is the design and implementation of high-performance work
processes. By high-performance we mean processes that are effective and
sustainable at the same time: They are effective in that production and in-
novation are according to intentions, with controlled effort; and they are
sustainable in that they regenerate rather than consume individual and so-
cial resources needed and used in work.
In our view, this implies an integrated socio-technical approach. Infor-
mation and communication technology is the instrument and medium

through which MVW is enabled, but not determined. In contrast, we con-
sider the forms and requirements of the task and of the social interaction of
the workers collaborating in MVW as shaping the actual work process and
determine the performance and quality of the business they are designed
for. Consequently, computer technology has to meet work-oriented social
requirements in order to be a support rather than a hindrance for work,
while, at the same time, the functionality of the networked ICT systems
impose specific action requirements on the collaborating workers.
1.2 What is Mobile Virtual Work?
Is there a difference between MVW and the traditional concept of tele-
work? The chapters of Gareis and Helle will show that there is quite some
overlap. But the term telework is often associated to home-based telework
and is strongly related to an individual’s preference to do the work on an-
other place than the traditional office. The concepts of mobile and virtual
are, however, to be associated with the work content and with a change in
organisational processes, which makes mobile and virtual work necessary.
The definition of Mobile Virtual Work and related terms is taken up in
several of the following chapters (see particularly the chapter by Vartiai-
nen). As will become clear, one has to distinguish between mobile work-
ers, mobile work and mobile technology. Mobile workers are employees
that work at and move between different work places. The concept of mo-
bile work has two meanings, i.e. in a stricter sense the documents and tasks
that move, either physically or digitally, but in a wider sense it is also used
to refer to the work of mobile worker. The concept of mobile technology is
also used in two different ways. It may refer both to portable ICT tools
(e.g. laptops) and to all the tools and infrastructures (e.g. the Internet) that
support mobile workers and work.
1 Emerging Mobile Virtual Work 7
The term mobile is often associated with individuals, although of course
a team can be mobile to a certain degree in the sense that all or some of its

members are sometimes physically mobile during their work.
Virtual is a concept that is used in various frameworks, such as virtual
working space and virtual group or organisation. Virtual space is an Inter-
net-based or intranet-based electronic working environment, in which
documents, messages and images and even representations of people, i.e.
avatars, are stored, exchanged, retrieved and worked. Virtual spaces are
used for communication and collaboration.
The ‘virtual group’ concept signifies that a number of persons are to a
certain extent dispersed in space, sometimes in time, and that a substantial
part of their communication is through the media. The concept of virtual
organisation may be understood in the same way. In fact, being virtual is a
matter of degree. A virtual group or a virtual organisation is not so much a
pure form as a continuum for describing a range of relationships along the
dimensions of space, time, culture and organisational boundary. Relative
to the traditional organisation, relationships in the virtual organisation are
more geographically distributed, more asynchronous, more multicultural,
and more likely to extent outside the firm. There is, however, also litera-
ture that considers a virtual organisation as a network of legally independ-
ent companies that acts as one organisation vis a vis a client. Thus, virtual
organisations can be classified into levels of networks, companies, pro-
jects, teams and dyads.
Apart from space, time and ICT use, other dimensions are sometimes
also parts of an author’s concept of virtuality, such as the diversity of
members, e.g. different cultural background and language, and the loose-
ness of contractual binding of the members (see also the chapter by Vartia-
inen). Mobility is a feature closely related to the use of different spaces
and tools for communication and collaboration. However, for many au-
thors in this book these aspects are not considered and discussed in their
analysis.
The focus on mobile virtual work implies that we are generally inter-

ested in settings were physically distributed and mobile people interact
through digital infrastructures and mobile tools to perform their tasks in an
organisational context that has a mobility oriented structure and culture.
Strictly speaking this definition may also apply to the traditional physician
that calls his assistant by telephone, while being at a patient’s home. The
phenomenon of mobile virtual work becomes, however, only interesting
and challenging when dealing with new forms of mobility and when deal-
ing with new forms of technological support, in the framework of flexible
work arrangements, and network organisations.
8 Erik Andriessen and Matti Vartiainen
1.3 Objectives and general design of a research program
This book is the result of two forums: a SALTSAT
1
T workgroup on Mobile
Collaborative Virtual Work (MCVW), which started its work in January
2002, and a workshop of experts held in autumn 2004.
The overall aim of the SALTSA work group has been to analyse condi-
tions for and to help create competitive and sustainable MCVW processes
in various business areas that have growing economic weight, such as
health care, professional services, sales, and maintenance. To this end, ex-
isting practices of mobile computer-mediated work have been analysed
and evaluated with respect to effectiveness and sustainability and new
business opportunities based on MVW processes have been explored. The
objective of this work is to contribute to the understanding and the im-
provement of MVW processes. The concept of mobile virtual work and its
context may have been defined as in the above sections, but this does not
mean that we know all about it. On the contrary, it still appears to be an
elusive phenomenon. Apart from the question “What is it?” many other
questions have to be answered, such as: “Why is it?”, “What are the con-
sequences?”, “How to organise and manage it?” and ”How to design

it?”.
This book is also a result of a workshop dedicated to try to find up-to-
date answers to these questions. In the workshop, European experts were
brought together in fields that are related to mobile virtual work. In the
workshop, they presented and discussed the developments as to questions
such as the following:
• What scenarios can be formulated concerning expected future mobile
virtual work settings?
• What are the ergonomic aspects that are relevant in designing effective
tools supporting MVW?
• What are the potential effects of MVW on well-being, stress and social
relations of workers? How can mobile work be organized, managed and
supported in order to avoid these and other negative effects for employ-
ees?
T
1
T SALTSA stands for the joint program for working life research in Europe.
SALTSA is a joint undertaking by the three Swedish confederations of employ-
ees - LO, TCO, SACO - and the National Institute for Working Life. The pur-
pose of the program is the collaboration on problem-oriented working life re-
search in Europe.
1 Emerging Mobile Virtual Work 9
• What is the role of mobile technologies and services in supporting
MVW? Which are the main trends in the evolution of mobile technolo-
gies and services?
• What are the implications of MVW for coordination and control?
• How to foster knowledge sharing and organisational learning in an
MVW environment?
• What new business models are emerging in companies using MVW?
What are, in the different models, the perceived benefits and the strate-

gic implications of MVW?
• How to assess the usefulness and implications of the introduction of
MVW and supporting tools and technologies?
• Which are the contractual issues and employment solutions related to
the use of MVW?
1.4 The contributions to this book
This book aims at answering the above-mentioned questions. In all, the
book consists of sixteen chapters, which illustrate the topic from different
perspectives. The chapters are organised into three sections: first, concepts
are defined and the prevalence of mobile virtual work in Europe, including
the relevant European legislation, is shown; secondly, mobility and virtual-
ity in many work settings are described and analysed from different per-
spectives; third, organisational strategies to meet the mobile challenge are
discussed.
After the general introduction showing the challenges of mobile virtual
work, Matti Vartiainen in his chapter ‘Mobile virtual work – concepts, out-
comes and challenges’ studies mobility as a quality of a work system con-
sisting of a subject using tools to process objects of work in a working
context. Manifestations of mobility in these different elements are de-
scribed. Mobile virtual work as distributed collaborative work is also dis-
cussed. Some impacts and outcomes of MVW are identified.
Karsten Gareis, Stefan Lilischkis and Alexander Mentrup explore in
their ‘Mapping the mobile eWorkforce in Europe’ the prevalence and key
characteristics of mobile workers and mobile eWorkers, based on several
large scale surveys in Europe. The findings also show the reality of mobile
eWork in Europe today.
Minna Helle’s ‘New forms of work in labour law’ evaluates mobile and
virtual work as new forms of work organisations from the perspective of
(European) labour law. The article discusses the legal implications and
status of mobile and virtual workers under the legal framework.

10 Erik Andriessen and Matti Vartiainen
Mark Perry and Jackie Brodie in their article ‘Virtually connected, prac-
tically mobile’ tackle the question: what is the work of mobile workers?
They point to the phenomenon of ‘mobilisation work’, which means that
much activities of mobile and virtual workers is actually spend on finding
each other and keeping contact, instead of on the primary work task itself.
They also show how mobile workers mix their mobility with their work,
home and social lives.
John Wilson in his ‘Collaboration in mobile virtual work: a human fac-
tors view’ writes about the necessity to understand the nature of collabora-
tion and teamwork and how to organise it before beginning to implement
future information and communication technologies. Several cases are de-
scribed showing various aspects of mobile virtual collaborative work.
Ludger Schmidt and Holger Luczak in their ‘Model-based design of
mobile work systems’ present, firstly, dimensions of mobile work against
the background of the classical fields of industrial engineering and ergo-
nomics. Then, a model is introduced that aims at shaping and supporting
the design of mobile working systems in a human-centred and task-
oriented way. Its application is demonstrated by exemplary research ques-
tions, which have been developed in a real world case study.
Niklas Johansson, Torbjörn Lind and Bengt Sandblad in their chapter on
‘Usability in IT systems for mobile work’ discuss usability aspects of mo-
bile IT support systems, and also report on parts of their findings from a
large survey performed in Sweden in 2004. In this survey, user’s opinions
concerning usefulness in a broad sense are evaluated. The article continues
with a discussion regarding methods for design of mobile work support
systems.
Marion Wiethoff, Thierry Meulenbroek, Hans Stavleu and Rogier van
Boxtel in their chapter ‘Participative Design for Home Care Nursing’ pre-
sent an approach for participative concept development in the field of

health care. Through this approach the needs for ICT-support for elderly,
chronically ill patients and their mobile practitioners are made visible and
concrete applications are developed. In the chapter, textural and pictorial
scenarios are presented to illustrate the approach.
Peter Richter, Jelka Meyer and Fanny Sommer provide in ‘Well-being
and stress in mobile and virtual work’, first, an overview about terms and
theories of the modern mental work load research. Next, investigations on
mental strain and well-being in the context of mobile virtual work are de-
scribed. Here, the main emphasis is put on the design of tasks, motivation
and collaboration in virtual teams as well as the role of operational uncer-
tainty. Finally resources for mobile virtual work are presented and dis-
cussed.
1 Emerging Mobile Virtual Work 11
Veli-Pekka Niitamo describes in his ‘Building scenarios for a globally
distributed corporation’, how a scenario was built in Nokia for shortening
the product creation process by exploiting better the network of co-located
sites in different time zones and by utilizing optimally the available com-
petencies of different sites. It has had direct implications to the workplace
design, i.e. design of work process and work environment needed for in-
creasing productivity. For the purpose, a global team of mobile work de-
velopers was established.
Robert Verburg and colleagues Stefanie Testa, Ursula Hyrkkänen and
TNiklas Johansson collected and analysed Tfour comparative case studies
from MVW settings in Italy, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden. The
descritions and analysis are presented in the chapter ‘Case descriptions of
mobile Virtual Work in practice. The cases describe conditions for the im-
plementation of mobile technologies to support mobile work in different
contexts.
The chapter by Mariano Corso, Antonella Martini and Luisa Pellegrini,
‘Knowledge sharing in mobile work environments’, builds its evidence

from a survey and three case studies. The chapter explores the relations be-
tween dispersed workers activities, knowledge management tools and
worker satisfaction. This chapter explores the emerging approaches that
companies use to manage knowledge in MVW environments. It provides
evidence that business performance and people satisfaction depend on the
fit between the type of work processes (more or less routine) and type of
knowledge management strategy.
Sven Lindmark, Mats Magnusson and Filippo Renga in their chapter
‘Factors influencing the diffusion of new mobile services’ investigate en-
ablers and disablers of the development and diffusion of services for mo-
bile work. Based on case studies of companies developing services for
mobile work, the writers identify and analyze factors influencing the de-
velopment and diffusion of such services.
Hans Schaffers, Liz Carver, Torsten Brodt, Terrence Fernando and
Robert Slagter explore in ‘Mobile workplaces and innovative business
practice’ perspectives for using mobile technologies in three industrial sec-
tors, i.e. aerospace, automotive and construction. Challenges and success
factors are identified for mobile workplace innovation, and human, organ-
isational and technical issues are discussed in the transformation to innova-
tive mobile and networked workplace settings.
In the concluding chapter ‘Mobile virtual work, what have we learned?',
Matti Vartiainen and Erik Andriessen bring together the findings and dis-
cussions of the previous chapters. Conclusions are integrated, a typology
of MVW settings is developed and a research agenda for the future is pre-
sented.
12 Erik Andriessen and Matti Vartiainen
One of the strong points of this book appears to be that many chapters
include descriptions and analysis of concrete MVW cases. Since system-
atic empirical analysis of existing Mobile Virtual Work settings is very
rarely found in the literature, it is now possible to go beyond assumptions

and speculations. This makes it also possible to discuss the main implica-
tions of the present developments in mobile virtual work in terms of sce-
narios and roadmaps.
References
European Information Technology Observatory (2004)