The Dichotomy of a Changing Workplace: Analysing South Africa’s Newspapers during the Covid-19 Situation

Abstract

This paper analyses the potential influence of the selected, South African online newspapers on the discourse of alternative workplace arrangements during the Covid-19 era. A content analysis of online newspapers’ coverage of the pertinent workplace requisites of performance during the Covid-19 pandemic enlightens the complex dichotomy of a traditional office workplace against work from home and a hybrid work model. The essence of anticipatory corporate leadership is that personnel behavior has to adapt to the changing work situation. This paper hypothesis that the framing of ideas by South African newspapers promotes perceptions and particular interpretations of the prevailing workplace environment during the two years of the Covid-19 period in South Africa. The research uses qualitative content analysis, which is the written texts, and quantitative methods of content analysis of newspapers by conducting a hypothesis test and independent group ANOVA test. That provides perspectives of choices and reasons for or against the distinct workplace situation. The results show that the newspaper reports focused more on the “Work from Home” practice. The newspapers’ perspective on the “Work from Home” culture may heighten the anticipatory strategies of corporate leaders in their pursuit to sustain high work performance. The circulation level of selected online newspapers in South Africa influences the research findings.

The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Organisation of Remote Work in IT Companies

“…In view of this, the authors found that studies in this area are inconsistent [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][51][52][53][54] and decided to determine how the remote work is perceived by IT-sector employees in Poland. Consequently, the following hypothesis was formulated.…”

“…A number of studies on remote work have been published, addressing the legal [29,30], economic [31,32], and social aspects [33,34] of the changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. The year 2020 has undoubtedly intensified the need to transform the traditional "in-office" workplace to "work from home" or "hybrid working" [35]. A review of both past and present theoretical background and empirical research surrounding changes in working mode and perceptions of productivity is crucial for further development in this field.…”

Implications of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Organization of Remote Work in IT Companies: The Managers’ Perspective

“…Great emphasis has also been placed on the review of the existing subject literature. Therefore, in order to gain a comprehensive understanding of the subject literature, it is advisable to become familiar with primary research studies that address teleworking [10,29] and remote working [8, 9,11,30,31] and their use during the COVID-19 pandemic [32][33][34][35][36][37][38], as well as flexible working conditions for remote working [14] and the intersection of private and professional life [15][16][17].…”