Telework in Japan: Perceptions and Implementation - CiteSeerX

Telework in Japan: Perceptions and Implementation

Kunihiko Higa and Janaka Wijayanayake Department of Industrial Engineering and Management Graduate School of Decision Science and Technology Tokyo Institute of Technology 2-12-1 O-okayama, Meguro-ku, Tokyo 152, Japan {khiga, janaka}@me.titech.ac.jp

Abstract It is believed that telework has numerous benefits for individuals, organizations, and the whole society. Despite the expected benefits, adoption and diffusion of telework have been considerably slow. In Japan, the adoption rate of telework is said to be lower compared with other industrialize countries. The aim of this research is to examine the telework implementation status and the perceptions of workers and management toward telework and thereby identify the problems causing for the slow adoption of telework in Japan. This paper presents a survey study based on 1,134 workers and 463 organizations in Japan. The adoption patterns of three telework types (satellite office, telecommuting, and mobile work) in different areas and by the size of organizations are discussed, and perceptions of workers and management are presented. Reasons for different patterns of adoption and future proliferation of telework in Japan are also discussed.

1. Introduction Japan has faced various problems, such as over crowded cities and uncontrollable environmental problems due to concentration of industries and business activities in big cities. In particular, the problems such as high land price, heavy traffic jams, and long commuting

time in Tokyo and its vicinity are serious and appear to be a never ending problem. However, many of these problems can be solved by implementing telework. In Japan, the rapid development in information technology and the growth in digital networks provide required infrastructure for effective implementation of telework projects. However, the adoption of telework in Japan has not been as widely implemented as one has expected despite the relatively advanced information infrastructure. In fact, it is said that adoption rate in Japan is considerably low compared to other industrialized countries [5]. The overall aim of this research is to examine the current status of telework implementation and perceptions of workers and management about the telework in Japan, and thereby identify the problems caused for the slow adoption of telework. Telework has the ability of redrawing the geographical and organizational boundaries of the traditional organizations. Thereby it provides autonomy, control, flexibility, and convenience for workers and results in higher productivity and cost reduction for organizations. As global competition grows and more and more countries entering to the international market, Japanese firms need to find ways to increase organizational flexibility to adjust to the turbulent global market environment. Telework can be a viable option for Japanese organizations as a strategic tool to compete in the global market.

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The remaining of this paper is organized as follows. In the section two, we define scope of telework in our research. The review of existing telework research in other countries and previous survey findings are discussed in section three. The description of the research methodology including survey design and data collection is explained in section four. Analysis of survey and limitations are discussed in section five. In the final section, conclusion of the research and future directions are presented.

2. Definition of Telework There is no standard definition in the literature on the use of the word telework. Because of this reason, there is a significant inconsistency from telework related statistics to academic research in defining the characteristics and scope of telework. Martino and Wirth explained the need for a common definition of telework and pointed out that there are at least 50 definitions for telework in the literature[8]. Other terminology such as “Flexible work arrangement”, “distance working”, “virtual workplace”, and “distributed work arrangement” are used to describe this concept. Gupta et al. defined telework as "work carried out in a location where, remote from central office or production facilities, the worker has no personal contacts with coworkers, but is able to communicate with them using the communication technologies"[3]. Work performed during normal work hours at a site other than normal work-site was considered as telework by Rupple and Harrinton[16]. According to Bui et al., the term telework is used to refer to the general concept of remote work which can be implemented in an organization in a variety of different ways[1]. Two dimensional taxonomy for telework based on the level of coordination required and the location of the worker has been proposed by Fritz et al.[2]. In our research we use the non-traditional aspect of work development where organizations choose geographical location based on the proximity to worker’s home, in the case of satellite offices. For this study, telecommuting means strictly working at home. In the case of mobile-working, the selection of the work site is decided by the worker. These three types of telework are defined: Satellite office: An office located close proximity to group of workers' residence and workers perform the same jobs similar to their colleagues do at the primary office. Main objective of establishing satellite office is to reduce the commuting time of workers.

Telecommuting: Workers working at home during regular work hours, instead of commuting to the primary office, but with real time communication linkage to the primary office with the use of computers and communications technologies. Main objective of this type of work arrangement is to eliminate commuting. Mobile Worker: A worker who works at a customer’s site or some other location chosen by him/her. Further, he/she works outside of the office three days or more per week. Being constantly on the move, mobile workers receive work orders and deliver work using computers and telecommunications technologies.

3. Previous Work The concept of telework, or remote work has known to researchers and practitioners for a long time. However, only in the recent past years they have started seriously studying the various forms of telework all over the world[1]. Though, there is a sign of growth in the telework research during the past, progress has been very slow and most of the studies have examined limited areas of telework, namely telecommuting. These previous research attempts to investigate teleworkers and their job related issues such as job selection, site selection, evaluation of workers, training, worker selection, productivity, and isolation, etc. Furthermore, most of these are empirical studies based on pilot projects formed by small group of pioneers and other informal and formal work at home arrangements[1]. Recently, attempts have been maid to identify need of the communication technologies and their capabilities for the successful implementation of telework projects in different areas which have different facilities and customer’s needs.[3]. This narrow paradigm of research has been identified as one of the main reasons for slow diffusion of telework programs[5,18]. In addition literature notably lacks full scale survey result of telework programs. In the United States, the number of teleworkers increased two and a half times in four years from 2.2 million in 1988 to 5.5 million in 1991, and the latter figure represents 4.4% of the total US work force[9]. The trend is likely to continue through 1995 at an annual rate of 8% [15]. Link Resources, a marketing research firm, estimates that the number of teleworkers has risen from 5.5 million in 1991 to 8.8 million in 1994, and it projects that there will be 12 million teleworkers by the end of 1998. According to Hudson Institute, this will reach 90 million by the year 2030. A survey on the longterm implications of information technology in the United Kingdom projected that between 10-15% of the skilled

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workforce would be engaged in telecommuting by 1995, increasing to 15-20% by the year 2010[12]. The report submitted to the European Council on “Europe and the Global Information Society” identified teleworking as one of the top 10 priority applications in IT area for EU and projected 10 million teleworking jobs by the year 2000[14]. The Satellite Office Association of Japan estimated number of teleworkers in Japan as 0.4 million in 1995 and expected to increase up to 1.6 million by the year 2000, which is about 8% of the total white- collar work force population in Japan[17].

4. Research Design To accomplish the objectives of the research, we used the survey data which were provided to this study by the Satellite Office Association of Japan. The survey data were gathered using a questionnaire through out Japan covering six areas out of nine areas in Japan. The design of the questionnaire took many matters into consideration. Two types of questionnaires were prepared separately for organizations and workers to gather free opinion about telework from both parties. The questionnaires explored the perception gap between management and workers toward the introduction of telework. In addition, the survey investigated types of telework the organizations have implemented, number of teleworkers, technology used, and so on.

For the selection of the sample, most populated six areas (Hokkaido, Tohoku, Kanto, Tokai, Kansai, and Kyushu) were selected. From these six areas, the main city of each area (Hokkaido area : Sapporo, Tohoku area : Sendai, Kanto area : Tokyo, Tokai area : Nagoya, Kansai area : Osaka and Kyushu area : Fukuoka) was selected for data collection. Lists of organizations prepared by each city office were used for the sample selection, and samples were selected randomly using those lists. Table 1 shows the sample size of each area. Organizations were divided into four groups (small, medium, large, and very large) according to the number of employees. Table 2 shows grouping criteria and number of organizations selected for the survey for each category. All together 13,576 questionnaires were distributed among 4,232 organizations covering all sectors, such as manufacturing, IS, construction, finance, banking, utilities, insurance, public service, and government organizations. Employees were contacted through their personnel departments, and 1,134 usable responses were received from employees with a response rate of 8.4%. On the other hand, 463 organizations replied for their questionnaires with a response rate of 11%. Sample represented the Japanese working population well with comprising all job categories from managers to clerical workers and engineers to technical workers. Table 3 shows the number of responses received from each category from both employees and organizations.

Table 1. Number of organizations selected from each area Hokkaido 321

Tohoku 284

Kanto 1,939

Tokai 560

Kansai 807

Kyushu 321

Table 2. Categorization of organizations Category Small Medium Large Very Large

No. of employees 1 - 29 30 - 99 100 - 999 1000 and over

No. of organizations 742 716 1,234 1,540

Table 3. Number of responses Category Small Medium Large Very Large Not Available

No. of Responses (Employees) 47 133 330 622 02

No. of Responses (Organizations) 56 96 165 142 04

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Total 4,232

5. Results 75% of worker-respondents were male, and 72% of them were married while only 25.4% female respondents were married. Majority of the respondents were in their middle age, 61.9% of them were below 40 years old and only 15.7% were over 50 years old. There was a clear difference in commuting time of workers depending on the areas they work. Over 50% of respondents from Tokyo area spent more than 60-minute-one-way for commuting while only about 30% from Osaka and Nagoya and less than 20% from other cities spent that much time for commuting. The majority of workers from Osaka and Nagoya spent between 30 to 60 minutes for

commuting. But, in contrast, only less than 10% of workers from Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya commute less than 30 minutes. Figure 1 shows the percentages of workers and their commuting time. Number of teleworkers who live around Tokyo is comparatively higher than that of other areas (see Figure 2). Specially, number of satellite office workers around Tokyo is very high with 11.9% of workers working at satellite offices. Clerical workers were the highest number of workers among respondents, 41.7% belong to this job category, and the remaining balance distributed equally among other job categories. The highest number of participated organizations were from the construction sector (148 organizations responded).

60% 50% 40% 30%

Tokyo

20%

Osaka & Nagoya

10%

Others cities

0% Less than 30

Between 30 More than and 60 60 Minutes

Figure 1. Commuting time by area

12% 10% 8% Telecommuting

6%

Satellite Office

4%

Mobile Worker

2% 0% Tokyo

Around Tokyo

Osaka & Nagoya

Others

Figure 2. Number of teleworkers by area

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Twenty six people out of 1,134 do telecommuting representing 2.3% of the respondents and thirty five people work at satellite offices representing 3.1% of the respondents. The number of people who does mobile work is relatively low with 1.5%, only 18 respondents doing mobile work. Among 26 telecommuters, 10 people have company initiated formal telecommuting arrangements while 28 out of 35 satellite workers work at company established satellite offices. Among those who telework, 23.1% of them were full-time telecommuters,

and 76.9% of them telecommute at least twice a month while 91.4% of satellite office workers do telework at least once a week. Figure 3 shows the details of the frequency of teleworking. The telephone is the most commonly used media to contact and report to head offices with 78.1%, and facsimile is the second most commonly used media with 37.8% followed by Electronic-mail with 31.3%.

100% 80% Telecommuting

60%

Satellite Office Mobile Workers

40% 20% 0% 3 or more days per week

1-2 days per week

Less than 1 day per week

Figure 3. Frequency of teleworking

10% 8% 6%

Telecommuting Satellite Office

4%

Mobile Woker

2% 0% 1 -29

30 - 99

100 - 1000

>1000

Figure 4. Size of the organizations and number of teleworkers

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The proportion of each telework type by the size of organizations are shown in Figure 4. It can be seen from the Figure that there is a relationship between the number of teleworkers and the size of organizations. Workers working at small business organizations tend to adopt telecommuting than satellite office while workers working at large organizations adopting satellite office more than telecommuting. 8.5% of the respondents who work for small organizations do telecommuting and 2.4% of respondents belong to very large organization do telecommuting. On the other hand, satellite offices are adopted by large organizations more than small organizations. This can be seen as only 2.1% of workers belong to small organizations work at satellite office while 4.5% of workers belong to very large organization work at satellite office. There is no discrimination when it comes to the adoption of mobile working. This telework arrangement is equally adopted among small organizations as well as large organizations. The adoption of telecommuting and satellite office arrangements among organizations which have workers between 30 to 99 and 100 to 1000 are different from small organizations and very large organizations. In a sense, their adoption pattern of the above telework arrangements are in the opposite way compared to small and very large organizations. This can not be explained with the available data, and another detailed survey of these organizations are needed to find out the reasons which cause for this adoption pattern. Most of the satellite office arrangements in Japan have been showcases for the state of the art technology as well as test beds for new technologies and services[10]. Since

this is the case in Japan, the implementation of satellite office is very costly as it needs lot of resources and hightech equipment and that can not be cost justified for small and medium-size organizations. Furthermore, the objective of implementing satellite office is to reduce commuting time of workers and office cost. Therefore, the number of workers who live in the vicinity of the satellite office should be large enough for the cost justification. On the other hand, telecommuting arrangement can be implemented with very little initial investment and does not require costly high-tech equipment and much resources, hence it is affordable for small organizations. Though, telecommuting is a viable option for both large and small organizations, due to long standing features of Japanese corporate culture, which prefers group involvement both at work place and after work, satellite office is preferred by large organizations over telecommuting. Despite the cultural barrier, because of the low implementation cost, small organizations prefer telecommuting over satellite office. The main tasks done by mobile workers are significantly different from that of telecommuters and satellite office workers (see Figure 5). Main tasks done by telecommuters and satellite office workers are word processing and report writing with 45.6% and 40.4% respectively. Sales-marketing and investigation are the main tasks done by mobile workers with 28.3% and 24% respectively. Because of the types of tasks that mobile workers do and as they are well suited for mobile working, both large and small organizations adopt this telework arrangement equally without any discrimination.

50% 45% 40% 35% 30% 25%

Satellite office & Telecommuting Mobile worker

20% 15% 10%

Accounting

Sales & Marketing

Editing & proof reading

Data entery

Investigation

Repot writing

0%

Word processing

5%

Figure 5. Tasks done by teleworkers

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80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 20 - 29

30 - 39

40 - 49

Over 50

Age(Years)

Figure 6. Age and percentage of workers intend to do telework in the future

The reasons given by both management and workers for the adoption of telework are some what similar. 44.2% of teleworkers identified improvement of productivity as the most significant effect of teleworking and the second most significant effect identified was relief from fatigue and stress of commuting with 32.2%. Three most significant reasons given by management for the implementation of telework are reduction of cost (38.1%), improvement on productivity (33.3%), and relief from pressure of work (33.3%). On the other hand, there is a considerable perception gap toward telework between management and workers of organizations which do not have a telework program. According to the survey, 81.2% of workers are not teleworking because there is no telework program in their organizations. The reasons given by management for not implementing telework program are: there is no suitable job for telework (63.3%), and teleworkers are difficult to manage (42.7%). Workers have a significant interest in telework while only very small percentage of managers have the same interest. This perception gap can be seen from the statistics that 63.2% of workers are interested in teleworking when the program becomes available to them but, only about 8% of the management planning to introduce a telework program in the future. It is worth noting that the desire to do telework among workers change with the age (see Figure 6). Workers in their twenties and thirties are quite interested in doing telework with 71.9% and 75.5% respectively. On the other hand, only 36.7% of workers over 50, who are in administrative positions, are interested in teleworking.

Discussion Organizations are facing competitors from all over the world, customers are demanding quicker response, and talented labor resource is becoming even more scarce. Telework is a viable option to face all these problems

while remain competitive. In this process, satellite office will be the most attractive telework arrangement in Japan due to various reasons explained below. Mokhtarian and Sato identified factors that influence the adoption of telework in Japan, and the most significant among them is the organizational culture[10]. Japanese organizational culture gives its first priority to face-to-face interaction and group work. This important face-to-face interaction is taken place not only on the job but at the after-hours drinking sessions as well. Furthermore, written job descriptions are rare in Japan, and workers are expected to do what ever the job assigned to them by their supervisor. Generally there is no formal method for performance appraisals and rewarding. Personal relationships play an important role in the advancement of the workers in an organization and promotions are based on experience and personal relationship with the superiors. Telecommuting will put all these practices into danger and telecommuter may feel sense of isolation and danger of not considered for future promotions. In addition to these, living facilities are generally smaller in Japan, and it is very difficult to set aside space for a home office. In traditional Japanese marriages, the home is under the control of wife and having a working husband at home during the day time will make her feel that her territory has been invaded. Under these circumstances satellite office arrangements are very likely to attract management and workers when compared with telecommuting arrangements. It appears from the survey that management's major concern of implementing telework is to reduce office cost. To achieve this, enough workers at one facility should telework at a high frequency, and only then it is possible to eliminate or reduce office space occupied before teleworking. If few workers do teleworking or even

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majority of workers do part-time teleworking (once in a week or month) will not be significant enough to reduce office space and cost. For Japanese organizations, satellite offices are relatively easy to introduce compared with other two telework arrangements as full time telework in a satellite office can be arranged without significantly affecting the social and cultural practices in Japan.

these types of analysis as the second stage, conducting an additional survey among organizations which already have some form of telework arrangements. Furthermore, to examine the exact status of telework arrangements in Japan, we have to find out how long each organization has been practicing telework, whether they are expanding it after adoption, and so on.

In recent past organizational culture and management practices in Japanese organizations have started to change. Lifetime employment is no longer guaranteed and promotions are based on performance rather than years worked and personal relationships. Management style is changing from micro-management to management by objectives. Although these practices are still new to most organizations, more and more organizations are adopting them. Two-worker household is in increase and women are appointed for responsible jobs and actively participate in businesses and industries. Elderly care is a special concern in Japan, due to rise in the aging population and it is also traditionally expected that elder parents will be cared by their children. This will force workers to find alternative way to attend their family duties while keeping the employment. All these will boost the diffusion of telecommuting in Japan. But that will not happen in the near future as the changes in both organizations and household take place very slowly.

6. Conclusion and Future Directions

Equipment and resources needed for mobile working vary from job to job. It can be just a mobile phone or a lap-top computer connected to net work through ISDN line. Working place can be customer site, cafeteria or some other location chosen by the mobile worker. Recently several large organizations in Japan have started (or about to start) mobile work programs in a large scale (500 or more workers). Some early adopters of mobile work, such as the Price Waterhouse in Japan, have been reporting significant positive effects of mobile working (office cost reduction, improved productivity, better customer satisfaction, etc.). Therefore, it is expected that the adoption of mobile work will continue to increase in certain job categories, such as sales and marketing, consulting, and customer engineering. Some of the limitations of this research have to be pointed out. Though, our sample size of the workers population is quite large, the sample size of teleworkers is representing only the small percentage of teleworking community in Japan. For example, the association of Small Office and Home Office estimates that there are more than one million contract-based teleworkers, who are not included in our survey. Due to our small sample size, we could not do some micro level analysis, such as types of jobs adopted by teleworkers, types of businesses and industries, etc. However, we are planning to perform

The survey result indicates that there are some differences in adoption pattern by telework types in Japan. The adoption pattern of satellite office differs from that of telecommuting by the size of the adopting organizations. Large organizations prefer to implement satellite offices while small organizations prefer telecommuting. The reasons suggested for this difference are the cost factor, social barriers, and organizational culture. In the case of mobile work, there is no notable difference in the adoption pattern among various types of organizations. But, it is shown that this type of telework arrangement is more popular among certain job category, namely sales and marketing. The reasons given by both management and workers for doing telework have similarities. However, this study also revealed that there is a significant perception gap between management and workers of non-teleworking organizations toward the adoption of telework. The majority of workers are interested in telework while management is reluctant to adopt it. Considering all these data, the adoption of telework in Japan will continue to increase specially in satellite office and mobile work arrangements. This paper presented an overall picture of telework arrangements in Japan. This study will help readers to understand the present status of telework implementation and management and workers perceptions toward telework in Japan. From this study, we found that though there are some social and cultural barriers, workers are ready to do telework. It implies that Japanese workers (particularly younger generations) prefer better quality of life than ever before. It is now up to policy makers and administrators of organizations to accelerate the adoption process of telework and thereby help improving the quality of life of workers and, at the same time, keeping the competitiveness and effectiveness of business.

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