Pathways to meaningful work in the digital workspace: A qualitative exploration

Abstract

Orientation: The way people view and experience their work and workplaces is fundamental to the extent to which employees find meaning in work. Research that examines individuals’ views about the more turbulent and disruptive technology-enhanced work world seems to be scant.

Research purpose: The present study sheds light on the extent to which individuals’ personal philosophy and Africanisation views on the work world inform pathways to meaningful work in the digital-era workspace.

Research approach/design and method: The study applied a qualitative, grounded-theory research approach to inductively gain deeper insight into participants’ views of the digital era work world from their responses on an open-ended research questionnaire. A randomly chosen sample of (N = 486) undergraduate students participated in the study.

Main findings: The findings illuminated four psychosocial pathways and their resources toward meaningful work in the digital-era workspace: Self-agency, other-agency, self-communion and other-communion.

Practical/managerial implications: Employers and practitioners should explore strategies for enhancing work meaningfulness in today’s more turbulent technology-driven work world.

Contribution/value-add: The study contributed an integrative model of psychosocial pathways and resources toward meaningful work in the digital workspace. The model informs practices for fostering meaningful work in technology-enhanced workspaces.