Examining the Implications of Smart Homes for Work

In light of debates about the future of work after the pandemic (Venkatesh, 2020, Barnes, 2020), it is important to examine the effect of smart home utilisation in remote work practices and impacts on individuals’ productivity and wellbeing. However, the literature on smart homes and organisational behaviour provides limited insights. Specifically, given that researchers so far have only focused on the utilisation of smart home technologies for household tasks (Marikyan et al., 2020, Mulcahy et al., 2019, Shin et al., 2018, Balta-Ozkan et al., 2014a), the impact of smart homes on work productivity has not been explored. Secondly, although prior literature examined the impacts of remote work, the potential implications that emergency situations (e.g. pandemic) may have for individuals’ productivity have not been researched (Venkatesh, 2020, Chatterjee et al., 2021, Papagiannidis et al., 2020).

The aim of this study is to fill the gaps in the existing literature and understand the implications of smart home technologies in the home-office environment while working remotely during the pandemic. Specifically, this study aims to examine the application of smart home technologies in remote work practices by exploring work and work environment characteristics, smart technology and individual factors in relation to organisational productivity and personal wellbeing. To address the objective, this study will adopt a cross-sectional research design. 500 responses have been collected from smart home users that work remotely, with the help of an independent research company. Validated scales will be used to measure the beliefs and perceptions about work, technology, technology use, personal factors and outcomes. The relationships between the factors will be analysed using a structural equation modelling approach.