Working in a smart home environment: examining the impact on productivity, well-being and future use intention
ISSN: 1066-2243
Article publication date: 27 January 2023
Issue publication date: 19 March 2024
Abstract
Purpose
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has had a big impact on organisations globally, leaving organisations with no choice but to adapt to the new reality of remote work to ensure business continuity. Such an unexpected reality created the conditions for testing new applications of smart home technology whilst working from home. Given the potential implications of such applications to improve the working environment, and a lack of research on that front, this paper pursued two objectives. First, the paper explored the impact of smart home applications by examining the factors that could contribute to perceived productivity and well-being whilst working from home. Second, the study investigated the role of productivity and well-being in motivating the intention of remote workers to use smart home technologies in a home-work environment in the future.
Design/methodology/approach
The study adopted a cross-sectional research design. For data collection, 528 smart home users working from home during the pandemic were recruited. Collected data were analysed using a structural equation modelling approach.
Findings
The results of the research confirmed that perceived productivity is dependent on service relevance, perceived usefulness, innovativeness, hedonic beliefs and control over environmental conditions. Perceived well-being correlates with task-technology fit, service relevance, perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, attitude to smart homes, innovativeness, hedonic beliefs and control over environmental conditions. Intention to work from a smart home-office in the future is dependent on perceived well-being.
Originality/value
The findings of the research contribute to the organisational and smart home literature, by providing missing evidence about the implications of the application of smart home technologies for employees' perceived productivity and well-being. The paper considers the conditions that facilitate better outcomes during remote work and could potentially be used to improve the work environment in offices after the pandemic. Also, the findings inform smart home developers about the features of technology which could improve the developers' application in contexts beyond home settings.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the reviewers and the editorial team for the constructive feedback and the opportunity to improve the manuscript. The earlier version of this research was presented at the conference - Marikyan et al. (2021), “Working in a smart home-office: exploring the impacts on productivity and wellbeing”, in Domínguez-Mayo F.J., Marchiori M. and Filipe J. (Ed.s), The 17th International Conference on Web Information Systems and Technologies 2021, Science and Technology Publications, Setubal, Portugal, pp. 275–282.
Funding: This project was partly funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC): PACE: Privacy-Aware Cloud Ecosystems (Project Reference: EP/R033293/1), and the work reported here was part-sponsored by Research England’s Connecting Capability Fund award CCF18-7157 – Promoting the Internet of Things via Collaboration between HEIs and Industry (Pitch-In).
Citation
Marikyan, D., Papagiannidis, S., F. Rana, O. and Ranjan, R. (2024), "Working in a smart home environment: examining the impact on productivity, well-being and future use intention", Internet Research, Vol. 34 No. 2, pp. 447-473. https://doi.org/10.1108/INTR-12-2021-0931
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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