RESEARCH SPOTLIGHT- Using Zoom Backgrounds to Personalize the Workplace

USING ZOOM BACKGROUNDS TO PERSONALIZE THE WORKPLACE

Gregory Laurence, Ph.D., was quoted in the Wall Street Journal article “What Working From Home Taught Us About Our Office Setups” by Krithika Varagur (June 6, 2021) and interviewed via video as a companion piece to the story.

Communicating aspects of our identity is one of the key functions of personalization in the workplace— whether represented by workspace decoration or uniform modification like “Flair” in Office Space— when one doesn’t have a dedicated workspace. When engaging on Zoom, conscious choices about what to have in the background (whether a physical background or a virtual one) can serve the same function.

“Specifically, where bookshelf backgrounds are concerned, knowing that viewers are likely to read the titles of the books behind us, we may choose to have books there that are related to hobbies/ interests outside of work or that are related to work topics,” said Gregory Laurence, Ph.D., professor of management. “Similarly, non-book items that appear on those shelves can communicate something to viewers.”

Personalization at work has a couple of functions beyond expressing identity. It allows us to manage our work-nonwork boundaries. Some people like that to be fairly permeable (so, they personalize a lot) and some like it to be very defined (less personalization). However, when working at home, these boundaries can become blurred.

“Even those who like a more permeable boundary are unlikely to want a 100% open boundary between home and work and the result of this, I think, will be a shift toward less personal backgrounds over time,” predicts Laurence.

“Organizations are also likely to want to try to build organizational culture and socialization even with a workforce that is remote, so something like mandated organizationally-themed virtual backgrounds would not surprise me. For example, SOM created a whole suite of themed virtual backgrounds available for faculty to use for classes and meetings, and these seem to be fairly popular.

“I predict organizations will make more efforts toward ‘institutionalization’ rather than personalization by providing employees with ‘work from home toolkits’ that feature branded objects like mugs, mouse pads and notebooks to place around their home workspaces in addition to themed Zoom backgrounds… Some of my students who shifted to remote work or new jobs during the pandemic mentioned they were given ‘care packages’ of such items when they went into work to pick up their computers.”

Gregory Laurence, Ph.D., professor of management