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“ALWAYS ON” — DEALING WITH A CONSTANT AVAILABILITY
seems likely trying to encounter these psycho-hazards by becoming more
resilient: yoga classes, mindfulness trainings, self-management courses — these
approaches try to enlarge the capability to work by raising self-efficacy but
worsen the situation by just pushing the boundary a little further." In the end
the outcome might be depression or the occupational burn-out syndrome as
documented in strongly increasing sickness absences due to mental disorders.
Lowering sickness absence is an important goal for business administration
especially in organisations with well paid experts difficult to replace. But the di¬
agram also shows how mobile communication is influencing the organisation of
work in general. Workflows and structures change dramatically by ubiquitous
computing, while organisations find it difficult even to find rules, because
there are many contradictions like global work processes, client’s expectations
of quick response and flexibility, or downsizing of office assistants. Legal
regulations often are not implemented in organisations or do not match the
targets'*. Nevertheless, for organisations in both competition concerns as
issues of workplace health promotion it is advisable to conduct clarification
processes about availability times and smart device use.*® As the branches
of organisations like service, production, or distribution have to deal with
different requirements and conditions, it is difficult to find one solution for all.
The option for individualists to ‘bring-your-own-device’ (BYOD) and log-in into
the enterprise network worsens the situation. This is why enterprises mostly
do not find an agreement on availability or put it very vacuous or ambiguous.
A well-meant example of a German enterprise‘s executives guideline on
ubiquitous computing and availability illustrates this: “Wir stellen hiermit
klar, dass bei freiwilliger Nutzung in der Freizeit und am Wochenende keine
Erwartung fiir die umgehende Beantwortung und Bearbeitung von E-Mails
besteht. Wir fordern unsere Beschaftigten auf, sich selbst klare E-Mail-Zeiten
zur Bearbeitung zu setzen. Hierbei bauen wir auf die Selbstverantwortung eines
jeden Beschäftigten. Jeder Nutzer sollte sich bewusst fragen, ob ein E-Mail¬
Versand in der Freizeit notwendig ist. Ausnahmen bilden Krisensituationen
und Situationen, in denen ein unmittelbares Handeln erforderlich ist.””' Since
the user doesn’t know ifthe enterprise isina critical situation or instant action
Walpuski, Always on.
E.g. the German Bildschirmarbeitsverordnung (BildscharbV) from 1996, alegal ordinance for
occupational safety for workstations.
Walpuski, Smart Devices in Organisationen.
Ibid.: “We hereby make it clear that there is no expectation no expectation for the immediate
answer and processing of e-mails in case of voluntary use during leisure time and weekends.
We encourage our employees to set themselves clear hours for processing e-mails. We relyon
the personal responsibility of each employee. Any user should be aware of whether an e-mail
e 131"