Workfulness: governing the disobedient brain

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe Scandinavian telecommunication company Telenor recently introduced the notion of Workfulness by adapting digital detox to the workplace. Workfulness is a management program aimed at technology-intensive companies that rely strongly on digital media. The program encompasses strategies of disconnection for employees, including mobile and email-free work hours and technology-free meetings, in order to enhance focus and efficiency. This article investigates Workfulness as one prominent example of managerial approaches that are based on neuroscientific assumptions about human decision-making. Drawing on textual materials and interviews, the analysis shows that Workfulness manages digital distractions in the workplace by establishing a form of stimulus-control rather than appealing to rational self-control. Workfulness alludes to the necessity of making choices, but it considers unconscious behavior, which is explained with reference to preconscious workings of the brain. The human brain becomes a battleground between rational and impulsive decisions, and it is the disobedient brain that needs to be governed in order to become an efficient employee. We situate the Workfulness program as part of and at the same time extending the biopolitical economy by incorporating advances in neurosciences into modes of governance.