Canadian Government Executive - Volume 26 - Issue 02

Governing Digitally By Jeffrey Roy S ince the advent of the Internet, there has been both hope and hype about a more flexible and virtual workplace in which the traditional office (or cubicle) becomes a relic of the industrial age. Today, for the worst of all reasons – namely a global health pandemic, the contours of a transforming workplace may be emerging. As companies, and in some cases entire countries, order workers to stay home, commuting times and carbon emissions plummet. In China, for example, air pollution levels have dropped by as much as 30 per cent in many cities according to monitoring by NASA. The problem, of course, is that economic growth is also plummeting with the prospect of a global recession now on the horizon. In such a setting, companies may be incentivized to shed workers rather than maintain remote working arrangements. According to the Boston Consulting Group’s Henderson Institute, such a contraction would be short-sighted as companies must instead recognize that in times of uncertainty, investing in re- silience is as important as achieving greater efficiencies (Reeves and Varadarajan, January 2020). Moreover, companies that find ways to innovatively deploy workers during a downturn are more likely to retain the best workers when the economy recovers. Coronavirus 26 / Canadian Government Executive // March/April 2020 & The Future of Work