Disrupting Work and Careers - Report Example

Disrupting Work and Careers Name Institution Date Research Essay Plan Provisional thesis statement: media assemblage which involves the use of computers and the internet that changes the roles of workers and the nature of the work disrupts work and career. What’s the assemblage? Assemblage is a gathering of similar technology, making up a collection. According to the assemblage theory, if a part were detached from the whole it would cease to be what it is because being this particular component is one of its constituted properties. The media assemblage is articulations of: 1. An aspect of a genre's form of communication between the workers and the employers. 2. Physical objects such as TV sets, film cameras, personal computers, and publishing Companies 3. Relationship between the workers and their employers in relation to how they interact with the hardware and material objects such as computers, mobile devices, phones and spatial element of the workstation. Example 1 Description: “Work at home” through media assemblage that involves using the computer and the internet to work from home is specially favored by women. Proposition: What are the merits and demerits for working at home? Sub-conclusion: Merits lie in that it’s time-saving, so that women can do other home chores, and demerits lie in that it makes women exhausted, leading to low efficiency. References: Gregg, M. (2013). Work's intimacy. New York: John Wiley & Sons. References: Yates, J., & Orlikowski, W. J. (1992). Genres of organizational communication: A structurational approach to studying communication and media. Academy of management review, 17(2), 299-326. Example 2 Description: Workplace communication technology such as use of emails and social media creates a social contact burden for many people. Proposition: In what way does workplace communication technology influence people’s private life? Sub-conclusion: Social network sites, chat programs, and email have intruded in people’s private life as it ends up dealing with work related issues during their private time. References: Gregg, M. (2013). Work's intimacy. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Example 3 Description: Communication technology plays an active role in organizations. Proposition: How communication technology affect the operations of an organization. Sub-conclusion: Electronic communication is incomplete, for it fails to examine reciprocal and recursive relationships, which can lead to a different organizational behavior (Yates & Orlikowski, 1992). Reference: Yates, J., & Orlikowski, W. J. (1992). Genres of organizational communication: A structurational approach to studying communication and media. Academy of management review, 17(2), 299-326. Reference: Ragins, B. R., Kram, K. E., & Ragins, K. E. K. B. R. (2007). The landscape of mentoring in the 21st century. The handbook of mentoring at work: Theory, research and practice, 659- 692. Disrupting Work and Careers Introduction In the past, the office was known to be the only working environment for professionals. This was before media assemblage which completely disrupted the work and careers. Media assemblage mainly involves gathering of similar technology making up a collection. The introduction of technological devices such as the laptop and the used of the internet have seen a reduction in the number of professionals working from their office. Through the media assemblage, it is possible to work from anywhere which has eliminated the need of reporting to the office (St John, 2012). Most people are increasingly working from home. The career development of most people has also changed as people can study from any part of the world through the online means. The disruption in the work and career has some benefits to women who stay at home to look after their children. Media assemblage is thus an important aspect due to the trend that is taking. It is set to influence the careers as well as the nature of work among most people. The media assemblage is articulation of: An aspect of a genre's form of communication between the workers and the employers. Physical objects such as TV sets, film cameras, personal computers, and publishing Companies. Relationship between the workers and their employers in relation to how they interact with the hardware and material objects such as computers, mobile devices, phones and spatial element of the workstation. Sharing and carrying out activities through an online platform. Discussion The first example is ‘work at home’ through media assemblage which is specially favoured by women. Working from home mainly involves using the media assemblage which involves the laptop and the internet (Crowe & Middleton, 2012). This enables the individuals to work at the comfort of their homes using the computer. The internet facilitates communication with the employers and hence enabling the individuals work while keeping in constant communication with their employers. This trend is common among most of the women due to the benefits that it has. One of the major benefits is that the women can work at the comfort of their houses. Most of the women are usually tasked with the responsibility of taking care of their children at home. Media assemblage therefore enables the women to take care of their children while working at home (ACAS, 2007). This plays an important role in terms of enhancing the work-life balance among the women who have children. The women who are pregnant can also work from home at their own comfort through the use of the computer. Working from home is cheaper as compared to working at the office. This is because it reduces a lot of costs for the company as well as the employee. The performance of the employees is improved when they are working in an environment that they are comfortable with. Some of the office environment may be intimidating or too noisy and hence affecting the concentration of the workers. Working from home has therefore benefited the women a lot. Working from home is beneficial to the women in terms of coping with the lack of flexibility in performance, attendance and reward measures that is in place at the formal work environment (Gregg, 2013). Although working from home has its benefits, it also has some disadvantages. One of the major disadvantages is that the employees end up working more for little pay. In most cases, the employees given huge workloads and they end up working till late in the night. This is an indication that working from home ends up consuming the time that the women or individuals should be using for their personal life issues. This has resulted to a concept that is known as presence bleed. The re ate no formal policies with regards to the use of media assemblage and this has negative impacts on the workers. The workers have to work way beyond their paid hours in order to complete the tasks that has been allocated to them. The employees therefore end up being exploited without their knowledge. This is because the disadvantages are overshadowed by the advantages that they enjoy. The efforts of the employees may not be recognized by the company when the employees work from home (Gregg, 2013). This includes the long working hours and huge workloads that they are subjected to. It is therefore evident that the merits of working from homes is time saving. This enables the women to carry out other chores at home while working. However, its demerits are on exhaustion of women leading to reduced productivity and inefficiencies. This is as a result of the huge workloads as well as long working hours. The second example is that communication technology creates a social contact burden for many people. This is as a result of the influence that it has on the private life of the people. The communication technology mainly involves the use of emails, Facebook, Twitter and other social media networks (Pahlavan, 2011). In the modern world the communication technology is widely used and it is considered professional to use the communication technology. In a work environment, an employee may find it difficult not to use the communication technology as other employees could be using it. The companies are also increasingly using the communication technology in their organization. The use of communication technology such as email has created a burden to most people as they have to check their emails from time to time. Failing to do so may be considered unprofessional or it can be concluded that the individual ignored the emails. This is common in a work environment as most companies use emails to contact their employees. This has created a huge burden among the employees. The use of the social media has also created a burden among people. Social media is seen as tool for communication as well socializing. As a result of this most people are to visiting their social media page from time to time in order to chat with their friends or workmates. Meeting new people and obtaining new ideas is increasingly becoming an important aspect of the social media (Gregg, 2013). As a result of this a lot of time is spend on social media. Employees working in an office may end up spending a lot of time chatting on social media during the working hours (Manochehri, Al-Esmail & Ashrafi, 2012). This has negative impacts on their productivity as well as their efficiency. It is also an indication that the work-life balance is affected by the communications technology. Most of the people spend a lot of their private time on social media. This therefore creates a lot of burden considering that resources are also used. Communication technology has also resulted to addiction among some of the people. Addiction to social media is on the increase and this has seen some of the people spending a lot of time on social media. Some stay till late in the night while chatting. Addiction is also an indication that the social media is becoming a burden to most people. Online presence monitoring is also a concepts that has been introduced by some of the organization to in order to know whether the employees are online or not (Treem & Leonardi, 2012). The process of monitoring is the employees also seem to be burdensome to the employees and hence affecting them. Communication technology has therefore brought about a new revolution in the lives of the people. In some instances, the private information about people is usually posted on the social network sites and hence impacting negatively on their privacy. Social network sites, chat programs, and email have intruded people’s private life. The intrusion of the privacy of the people contributes to the burdens that the people are facing. The third example is communication technology plays an active role in organizations. The human communication is considered central to the organizational actions. Different genres have also emerged over time which has influenced the communication process (Yates & Orlikowski, 1992). The business letters as well as the memos were widely used in the past. However, communication technology is has led to the changes in the modes of communication. Communication technology mainly involves the use of electronic communication. Emails and social networks are currently being used in the organizations for the purposes of communication. A business letter can easily be sent to the employees through the use of emails. Most of the organizations require the employees to have email addresses which they should check from time to time. The social media pages are also used by the organizations for the purposes of communicating. Some of the organizations have formed group chats on social media so as to enable the employees to communicate and carry out discussions with regards to different aspects within the organization. Communication technology plays an important role in the organization in terms of ensuring that the activities are coordinated (Ragins, Kram & Ragins, 2007). The coordination of activities is therefore important in terms of ensuring that the operations of the activities are carried out in accordance to the goals and objectives of the organization. Most of the organizations are also putting in place infrastructure that supports the aspects of communication technology. The communication technology therefore plays an active role in terms of enabling the organization to meet its goals and objectives. In the past communication mainly involved direct contact between the individuals in an organization. The communication technology has however changed this and communication is mainly electronically. This has affected the mentorship process within most of the organizations (Ragins, Kram & Ragins, 2007). Direct contact in the past contributes promoted mentorship. However, this has become difficult as the direct communication has been overtaken by the use of communication technology. This is an indication that the communication technology although promoting efficiency in the organization, has negative impacts on the mentorship process. Mentorship process has positive impacts on the organization in terms of passing knowledge and expertise from the experienced employees to those who have less experience. The failures of the communication technology to enhance the mentoring process affect the process of knowledge acquisition with the organization (Von Schomberg, 2011). This has the potential of affecting the ability of the company to utilize the experience and expertise of the employees who are retiring from the organization. The use of communication technology also makes it difficult for the organization to fill the knowledge gap and hence impacting negatively on the organization. Communication technology fails to meet the other aspects that are important to the organization. Although it is effective its does not bring the people together leading to effects o the mentorship process. It is therefore evident that the electronic communication is incomplete, for it fails to examine reciprocal and recursive relationships, which can lead to a different organizational behavior. Conclusion In conclusion, it is evident that media assemblage has contributed to the disruption of the work as well as careers. Media assemblage has seen the increase in the number of women working from home. This is convenient to them considering their diverse needs. It is however evident that working from home leads to exploitation as employees has to work for long hours and spent most of the private time working. It is evident that communication technology is increasingly becoming common among most people as well as organizations. Communication technology has created a burden to the people as it has led to addiction. It is evident that people spend a lot of time on social media which has led to the addiction. Communication technology is also affecting the privacy of the individuals and hence creating a burden to them. It is evident that the communication technology is widely used by organizations for the purposes of communication. The communication technology has replaced the traditional methods of communication. It is evident that the communication technology has impacted negatively on the direct communication. This has affected the mentoring process as mainly involves shaping of talents. It is thus evident that communication technology has some disadvantages to the organization. References Gregg, M. (2013). Work's intimacy. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Crowe, R., & Middleton, C. (2012). Women, smart phones and the workplace: Pragmatic realities and performative identities. Feminist Media Studies, 12(4), 560-569. ACAS (2007). Flexible working and work-life balance. Retrieved on 11th October 2015, from, . Pahlavan, K. (2011). Principles of wireless networks: A unified approach. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.. Manochehri, N., Al-Esmail, R., & Ashrafi, R. (2012). Examining the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on enterprise practices: A preliminary perspective from Qatar. The Electronic Journal of Information Systems in Developing Countries, 51. Treem, J. W., & Leonardi, P. M. (2012). Social media use in organizations: Exploring the affordances of visibility, editability, persistence, and association. Communication yearbook, 36, 143-189. St John, G. (2012). Global tribe: Technology, spirituality and psytrance. Equinox. Yates, J., & Orlikowski, W. J. (1992). Genres of organizational communication: A structurational approach to studying communication and media. Academy of management review, 17(2), 299-326. Ragins, B. R., Kram, K. E., & Ragins, K. E. K. B. R. (2007). The landscape of mentoring in the 21st century. The handbook of mentoring at work: Theory, research and practice, 659- 692. Von Schomberg, R. (2011). Towards responsible research and innovation in the information and communication technologies and security technologies fields. Available at SSRN 2436399. Read More

Working from home is beneficial to the women in terms of coping with the lack of flexibility in performance, attendance and reward measures that is in place at the formal work environment (Gregg, 2013). Although working from home has its benefits, it also has some disadvantages. One of the major disadvantages is that the employees end up working more for little pay. In most cases, the employees given huge workloads and they end up working till late in the night. This is an indication that working from home ends up consuming the time that the women or individuals should be using for their personal life issues.

This has resulted to a concept that is known as presence bleed. The re ate no formal policies with regards to the use of media assemblage and this has negative impacts on the workers. The workers have to work way beyond their paid hours in order to complete the tasks that has been allocated to them. The employees therefore end up being exploited without their knowledge. This is because the disadvantages are overshadowed by the advantages that they enjoy. The efforts of the employees may not be recognized by the company when the employees work from home (Gregg, 2013).

This includes the long working hours and huge workloads that they are subjected to. It is therefore evident that the merits of working from homes is time saving. This enables the women to carry out other chores at home while working. However, its demerits are on exhaustion of women leading to reduced productivity and inefficiencies. This is as a result of the huge workloads as well as long working hours. The second example is that communication technology creates a social contact burden for many people.

This is as a result of the influence that it has on the private life of the people. The communication technology mainly involves the use of emails, Facebook, Twitter and other social media networks (Pahlavan, 2011). In the modern world the communication technology is widely used and it is considered professional to use the communication technology. In a work environment, an employee may find it difficult not to use the communication technology as other employees could be using it. The companies are also increasingly using the communication technology in their organization.

The use of communication technology such as email has created a burden to most people as they have to check their emails from time to time. Failing to do so may be considered unprofessional or it can be concluded that the individual ignored the emails. This is common in a work environment as most companies use emails to contact their employees. This has created a huge burden among the employees. The use of the social media has also created a burden among people. Social media is seen as tool for communication as well socializing.

As a result of this most people are to visiting their social media page from time to time in order to chat with their friends or workmates. Meeting new people and obtaining new ideas is increasingly becoming an important aspect of the social media (Gregg, 2013). As a result of this a lot of time is spend on social media. Employees working in an office may end up spending a lot of time chatting on social media during the working hours (Manochehri, Al-Esmail & Ashrafi, 2012). This has negative impacts on their productivity as well as their efficiency.

It is also an indication that the work-life balance is affected by the communications technology. Most of the people spend a lot of their private time on social media. This therefore creates a lot of burden considering that resources are also used. Communication technology has also resulted to addiction among some of the people. Addiction to social media is on the increase and this has seen some of the people spending a lot of time on social media. Some stay till late in the night while chatting.

Addiction is also an indication that the social media is becoming a burden to most people. Online presence monitoring is also a concepts that has been introduced by some of the organization to in order to know whether the employees are online or not (Treem & Leonardi, 2012).

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