Enacting new temporal boundaries: the role of mobile phones

Abstract

This paper examines how the use of mobile phones influences the temporal boundaries that people enact in order to regulate and coordinate their work and non-work activities. We investigate both the structural and interpretive aspects of socio-temporal order, so as to gain a fuller appreciation of the changes induced by the use of mobile phones. With specific reference to professionals working in traditional, physically based and hierarchically structured organizations, we found that mobile phone users are becoming more vulnerable to organizational claims and that as a result ‘the office’ is always present as professionals, because of the use of mobile phones, become available ‘anytime’. This is enabled by the characteristics of the technology itself but also by users’ own behaviour. In the paper, we discuss the properties of the emerging socio-temporal order and show how mobile phones may render the management of the social spheres in which professionals participate more challenging.

Keywords:

• mobile phones
• temporal order
• structural and interpretive properties
• temporal boundaries
• information systems and time

Acknowledgements

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the ETHICOMP (2004) Conference on the Challenges for the Citizen of the Information Society; we are grateful to the conference participants, as well as the participants to the Centre for Information Management (CIM) Seminar Series at the University of Bath for their constructive feedback. We would also like to thank the study participants, the two anonymous reviewers for their extensive comments and the special issue editors; in particular Iris Junglas provided very helpful suggestions throughout the review process.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Elpida Prasopoulou

About the authors

Elpida Prasopoulou is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Management Science and Technology at the Athens University of Economics and Business (AUEB), Greece. Her current research focuses on the use of information technology as a vehicle for the modernization of public sector as well as the temporal dimensions of information and communication technologies.

Athanasia Pouloudi

Athanasia (Nancy) Pouloudi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Management Science and Technology at the Athens University of Economics and Business, Greece. Prior to that she served as lecturer in information systems at Brunel University, U.K. She holds a first degree in Informatics (Athens University of Economics and Business), and an MSc and Ph.D. degree in Information Systems (London School of Economics). Her research focuses on the organizational and social implications of information systems implementation, specializing in interorganizational systems and stakeholder issues.

Niki Panteli

Niki Panteli is a Senior Lecturer in Information Systems at the University of Bath School of Management, U.K. and she has a Ph.D. from Warwick Business School. Broadly defined, her research lies in the field of information and communication technologies and emergent organizational arrangements. She is presently engaged on research on virtuality, notably virtual teams and virtual collaborations.