Psychological Impacts of the New Ways of Working (NWW): A Systematic Review

Digitalization of knowledge work is essential for today’s organizations, responding todiversified employee needs. Many organizations are already implementing some form of flexibility tohelp workers perform work and non-work duties, while maintaining high productivity. While thesechanges in workplaces, “New Ways of Working (NWW)”, have been discussed in the literature,a systematic appraisal of evidence of NWW has not been conducted. Relating to poor work-relatedmental health worldwide, this systematic review analyzed the psychological impacts of NWW, andthe quality and quantity of NWW research. Following the preferred reporting items for systematicreviews and meta-analysis (PRISMA) guidelines, NWW studies targeting psychological outcomeswere evaluated. Initial literature search on ProQuest, PsycINFO, Science Direct, and Google Scholarretrieved 308 titles, from which seven articles fulfilled all inclusion criteria. Our appraisal revealedthat NWW research evaluated diverse psychological outcomes. While NWW can help workers’engagement, work-related flow, and connectivity among staff, NWW can also increase blurredwork-home boundary, fatigue, and mental demands. The quality of NWW research was overallmedium, needing more rigorous studies. Our findings can inform decision-makers in the workplaceto effectively implement NWW, and researchers to improve the quality and the usefulness of futureNWW studies.N/