E‐voice in the digitalised workplace. Insights from an alternative organisation

Abstract

AbstractDigitalisation permeates all aspects of organizational life, especially the ways we communicate with each other. Drawing on a case study of an alternative organisation—the German collective Premium, which is almost entirely digitally organised—we seek to explore contextual factors that facilitate or hinder the expression of electronic voice (e‐voice). Based on 20 semi‐structured interviews with different members of the collective, we identified various contextual facilitators and barriers to e‐voice expression: Collective belief in the value of diverse voices, cautious online and complementary face‐to‐face communication facilitate e‐voice, while less formalised structures, power and knowledge asymmetries, and information overload hinder it. These findings demonstrate that despite an alternative organisation's firm intention and self‐reflective efforts to create an inclusive and participatory digital space, tensions arise. Further, our study contributes to employee voice theorising by outlining contextual factors that are specifically relevant to e‐voice practices.