The Right To Disconnect: Concept, Benefits, And Limitations

a. Explain the concept of the right to disconnect.
b. What are the benefits and limitations of disconnecting from email?

What is the right to disconnect?

Explain the concept of the right to disconnect.

The right to disconnect is defined as the types of human right regarding the ability of the employees of an organisation to get disconnected from their working environment during the non-working hours. The introduction of the different digital platforms was having a direct negative influence on a worker by engaging them into work during the non-office hours also which is the main reason behind the incorporation of this important. The concept popularised after being credited in the French Labour Law, the main agenda behind passing this law was to enable a perfect balance between the professional life and social life of an individual. This concept is helpful to know about the different aspects of multi-tasking and the contingency in an organization (Secunda 2018). The concept is also helpful in acknowledging the actual roles and responsibilities of any professional worker of an organisation.

1b. What are the benefits and limitations of disconnecting from email?

There are several benefits and limitations of getting disconnected from the official emails. The right to concept can be considered as a flexible technique by which the employees can schedule their work according to their requirement and at the same time maintain a good social life. The prime advantage of this concept is that it will be helping to enhance the low level customer engagement (Letwin et al. 2016). The prime limitation of this concept is that the employees they cannot also get to know about the different types of advancements of the business organisation which can have an impact on their roles and responsibilities. The other drawback of this concept is that it not suitable for all business organisations as every organisation have a unique way of handling their tasks. 

2a. What example did you use and why?

The example of right to disconnect is considered in the famous automobile corporation such as the Volkswagen. The prime reason behind choosing this corporation is that huge number of employees with cultural differences works here and it have branches all around that work so taking it as an example will help us to know about the concept in a more detailed way (Douglas 2017).

2b. Explain the details of the case including the company, the reason for disconnecting from email, progress and current status.

The right to concept is a major issue in company like Volkswagen which is the main reason why the German assembly banned the use of communicative devices after the working hours (Savage and Staunton 2018). They banned the use of such devices from the go off service at end of the working day until the beginning of the next working day. The main reason behind the employees engaging themselves after the working hours is promotions or appraisals in the organisation or to deal with any kind of reservations within the corporation. Situations changed after the law got implemented as it resulted in more balanced social life of their employees.

2c. Will the organisation in the example you use be able to sustain the new policies?  Explain your reasoning.

Benefits and limitations of disconnecting from email

The selected global organisation had a positive impact after the incorporation of the new law. The way the law is implemented into the system is very much systematic and in a professional way, so it was very easy for their employees to follow the law (Korenhof et al. 2015). Those global corporations have a very unique way of handling such issues which makes it easier for all its stakeholders to follow the new protocols. The enhanced efficiency and productivity of the employees is the sign that the new policy is very much well sustained by the companies.

I believe that the concept of right to disconnect, have a great impact on the life of any professional who is working on any type of business organisation. This unit of the document will be focussing on the impact of this concept on the personal and professional life. The rising efficiency in different organisation is the main reasons behind the rise of this concept.

The most important significance of this concept is that it will be very much useful to the readers of this document to know more about the concept and its characteristic features. This concept is given importance by all the leading global organisations all around the world which shows the importance of this topic (Jarosch 2015). I believe that all the major companies face different types of challenges when they try to incorporate any new change in a system, but the rising amount of concern regarding this topic is one of the main reasons why this concept is widely accepted. The concept is justified based on the professional IT perspective also. The concept is not a new one as this concept arrived in the eighteenth century (Thomson et al. 2017). Even the government of France passed a law known as the El Khomri Law as their new labour law which stated the importance of balancing the life of a worker between the professional life and personal life. I think that the different types of issues related to the labour law such as the financial crisis and crisis related to the growth of the professional. I believe the unstructured appraisal schemes and the different reservation techniques is one of the main reasons behind this labour crisis (Rowan 2017). I always knew that this particular crisis was about to come someday as I follow plenty of individuals who works very passionately and professions after the working hours also for the purpose of getting acknowledged by the company sometimes this method succeeds as they get they get their desired recognitions and sometimes it fails as it negatively impacts the life of that concerned individual (Sender, Arnold and Staffelbach 2017). When the concept fails among the employees, they sometimes suffer from severe depressions and other mental and physical problems and these might also be a long term negative impact on both the life of an individual and from the organisation perspective also. So, it is very essential that every worker of an organisation should be having a good personal or social life in order to work more effectively and passionately for an organisation (Charness et al. 2017). I believed that initially the incorporation of the new concept will be difficult for the employees to follow but subsequently this concept is widely spreading and getting acclaimed. I did not notice that many people are getting suffered by working in the non-working hours but after the concept is raised in the all the available platforms such as the news article and tabloids (Turner and Lingard 2016). Different perspectives are also obtained from the latest journals and social media platforms which are signified the importance of the right to disconnect. The right to disconnect have no alternatives since most of the workers of the organisation always tends to seek growth in terms of their growth and development in their organisation. According to me, the right to disconnect is one of the only way by which the social life of a professional can be effectively maintained (Foa, R.S. and Mounk 2016). The issue is similar to all the other type of issues in a business organisation which is an impacting factor both all the internal and external holders of the organisation. Like those issues this issue is also dealt with prime authority and concept.  

Example of Volkswagen and its implementation of the right to disconnect

Based on the above discussion it can be found that there are plenty of issue related to the incorporation of the right to disconnect in various organisations. This document will be guiding the readers to have an idea about what the concept is and what are the problems associated with this issue and how different organisation and individuals are getting affected due to working after their shirt timings in office (Bernstrøm, Drange and Mamelund 2018). As discussed, I would like to suggest that every organisation who have not yet incorporated the concept of right to disconnect should be immediately incorporating the new concept in order to enhance their existing overall efficiencies. Based on the interpretation of this reflective writing I can say that the importance of right to disconnect should not be ignored at any cause, that portion of the writing highlighted the importance of the concept and discussed all the relevant aspects after their implementation in various organisations. All the previous and the current perspective of this concept are described in this reflective writing will be a source of knowledge for the readers of this documents.

The writing states all the probable advantage and limitations of this concept and its similarities with the other issues of the different business organisations. My understanding of this concept significantly improved after going through different types of journals and peer reviewed articles, however I can say that incorporation of the right to disconnect have other issues as well such as the resistance to a new change in an organisation, this makes me feel that before implementation this concept the governing bodies should be aware of all the possible positive and negative impact on the organisation. This means that this may give rise to other important issues as well so its implementation should be done with the help of a careful approach (Hesselberth 2018). I am really not certain about the issues related after the incorporation of this concept but I am certain that this will definitely help any worker to maintain their balance between the professional and social life and this is considered as the strength of this concept.  The main weakness of this writing is the absence of the issue related to the right to disconnect which might be a human emotion like anxiety or any sort of depressions. All I can say that, in the future I will be suggesting the importance of this concept and with its related issues to every organisation who will be seeking to find a solution regarding this problem.

4. Based on your reading, the case study and your reflection, what is the future of the right to disconnect concept?

From the selected case study I understood the significance of the right to disconnect in a much broader way. The case study helped me to know about the different aspects of the concept. According to me the rising concerns of any organisation related to the safety and security of their employees involves this concept as it is one of the most popular concepts considering the employee satisfaction criteria in any type of organisation (Karppi 2016). The case study helped me understanding the impact of right to discontinue in Germany.

Details of the case on Volkswagen and its progress

 Considering corporations such as Volkswagen as one the leading automobile corporations of the world, accepts and supports this concept in order to keep their workers happy and their strategy are proven successful over the years and following this particular organisation many other global and small scale enterprises started following the same concept and they also acknowledged the importance of this concept (Fogel et al. 2014). So, I believe that this concept has the capability to gets worldwide acceptance. I also believe that this concept should be reached to peoples by different kinds of platforms which are most widely used so that people from all over the world are aware of the concept and make all the necessary steps in order to incorporate the proposed concept.

I believe that the concept of right to disconnect have a very bright prospect as most of the organisation would want their employees to have a very active social life as that will also enhance their performance on the organisation. According to me having a balance between the social life and professional life it is very much necessary as those activities provides as a source of a breather for the employees. I believe that encouraging this concept by more organisations will provide a sense of security for both the employers of an organisation as well as from the perspective of an employee. I believe that the use of the right to disconnect will be helping the employers to maintain a good working environment in a business organisation.

Reference

Bernstrøm, V.H., Drange, I. and Mamelund, S.E., 2018. Employability as an alternative to job security. Personnel Review.

Charness, G., Cobo-Reyes, R., Jiménez, N., Lacomba, J.A. and Lagos, F., 2017. Job security and long-term investment: An experimental analysis. European Economic Review, 95, pp.195-214.

Douglas, M., 2017. Disrupted justice: How technological change is expanding open justice. Precedent (Sydney, NSW), (139), p.10.

Foa, R.S. and Mounk, Y., 2016. The democratic disconnect. Journal of democracy, 27(3), pp.5-17.

Fogel, R.I., Epstein, A.E., Estes, N.M., Lindsay, B.D., DiMarco, J.P., Kremers, M.S., Kapa, S., Brindis, R.G. and Russo, A.M., 2014. The disconnect between the guidelines, the appropriate use criteria, and reimbursement coverage decisions: the ultimate dilemma. Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 63(1), pp.12-14.

Hesselberth, P., 2018. Discourses on disconnectivity and the right to disconnect. New Media & Society, 20(5), pp.1994-2010.

Jarosch, G., 2015. Searching for job security and the consequences of job loss. manuscript, Stanford University.

Karppi, T., 2016. Book Review: Disconnecting with Social Networking Sites.

Korenhof, P., Ausloos, J., Szekely, I., Ambrose, M., Sartor, G. and Leenes, R., 2015. Timing the right to be forgotten: A study into “time” as a factor in deciding about retention or erasure of data. In Reforming European data protection law (pp. 171-201). Springer, Dordrecht.

Letwin, C., Wo, D., Folger, R., Rice, D., Taylor, R., Richard, B. and Taylor, S., 2016. The “right” and the “good” in ethical leadership: Implications for supervisors’ performance and promotability evaluations. Journal of Business Ethics, 137(4), pp.743-755.

Rowan, S., 2017. The new French law of contract. International & Comparative Law Quarterly, 66(4), pp.805-831.

Savage, R. and Staunton, M., 2018. How Employees Are Impacted. In Conquering Digital Overload (pp. 9-24). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.

Secunda, P.M., 2018. The Employee Right to Disconnect.

Sender, A., Arnold, A. and Staffelbach, B., 2017. Job security as a threatened resource: reactions to job insecurity in culturally distinct regions. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 28(17), pp.2403-2429.

Thomson, P., Johnson, M. and Devlin, J.M. eds., 2017. Conquering Digital Overload: Leadership strategies that build engaging work cultures. Springer.

Turner, M. and Lingard, H., 2016. Improving workers’ health in project-based work: job security considerations. International journal of managing projects in business, 9(3), pp.606-623.