The Futures of Hybrid Work - Participatory Futuring in Practice

Abstract

Throughout the last years, but especially with the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, our workplaces and way of ’going to work’ has changed a lot. One might even claim that the nature of work is ’in limbo’, a transitional phase between the traditional on-site workplace and hybrid and remote work conditions. This overview of my doctoral research starts with a number of future oriented questions regarding collaboration and human interactions, embodied presence and socio-materiality in hybrid and remote work environments. The hypothesis is that a participatory futuring approach can engage stakeholders from different industries in a collective development of alternative futures and thereby inform the re-thinking process around remote and hybrid work conditions within and across industries. Hence, several empirical studies are proposed in order to (1) understand hybrid work settings and its challenges (2) create knowledge around possible futures of hybrid work and (3) investigate the strategic value of participatory futuring methods in industrial settings.