le travail à l'écran de visualisation work with display units

ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE AND COMPUTERIZATION: INFLUENCING CHANGEInger Sôderberg, Division of Social and Organizational Psychology, National Institute ofOccupational Health, S-171 84 Solna, SwedenIn a longitudinal case study with an action oriented design, we studied a municipal organizationin Stockholm for two and a half years following an organizational change and the introduction ofcomputerization. Our analysis included how the changes were executed and how they affectedthe working environments and situations of the employees. The study's goal was to collect datafor the development of methods of instituting change that involved personnel and utilized thenetwork of resources that often exist at a workplace.The employees and their superiors were asked to respond to questions in interviews and surveyson various occasions. The key persons involved in the changes were also interviewed.The reason for the organizational change was to increase efficiency in the organization andimprove service to users. An initial investigation was made by outside consultants. Theinvestigation resulted in a recommendation to change from a functional organization to amultifunctional one, divided into geographical districts uniting several professional positions.The transition meant an enormous adjustment for almost everyone to changed work tasks, newcoworkers and superiors, and new premises. At the same time, the first computer system wasintroduced. The new job situation was both better and worse. For example, many found theirwork more interesting when different professional categories were united at the district level; atthe same time, the work load, deadlines, and stress had increased considerably. Later, thenumber of jobs decreased as a result of political decisions, and an imbalance developed betweenwork requirements and the possibility of fulfilling these requirements under a steadily increasingworkload.The first computer system, which came to be used only for word-processing, was still usedinefficiently a year later. It had come about as an "aside" during the investigate phase and wasmet with some resistance. Later, another computer system was introduced for record-keepingand filing. This time, employees were involved in specifying requirements, and the system wasmuch more accepted than the previous one right from the start.We could identify three sources of stress during the different transitional phases: (1) uncertaintyduring the investigte phase, when employees didn't know what would be happening to thempersonally; (2) adaption when they tried to submit themselves to and find their niche in the neworganization; and, (3) pressure because of increased workloads and deadlines on the job afterthe organizational change.We found that influence and change were prerequisites for each other. Changed work taskswere experienced positively and educationally, for example, on the condition that the personinvolved could influence the changes; the opposite was found to be true when change occurredwithout the feeling that on could influence the contents of the change.KEYWORDS: Organizational change, computerization, influenceORGANIZATIONAL ASSESSMENT OF TERMINAL USE AND ITS HUMANCONSEQUENCES. A METHOD DEVELOPED TO FACILITATE PRIMARY ANDSECONDARY PREVENTION BY THE LOCAL HEALTH SERVICES.Gunnela Westlander. PhD, ProfessorDirector of Division of Social and Organizational Psychology,National Institute of Occupational Health. 17184 Solna, SwedenObjectives of the studyThe aim of this research was to offer local health services moresystematic knowledge about work conditions related to VDU use, andthereby provide starting point of practical preventive measures.The methodA method of assessment was developed in stages through collaborationbetween the research staff and a number of local health units.Thepurpose was to obtain an overall view of office departments at anorganizational level.The researchers worked out an organizationalassessment method based on a questionnaire study, followed by the ^construction of reliable measures of job content, job-related socialinteraction, VDU use and health at work. The health services staffwere responsible for data collection in the office departments. Theresearchers offered data analysis models to satisfy 1. the need ofthe local health service team to obtain knowledge about all the aspects,ergonomie, psychosocial, skill-related, of the work of everyexmployee in order to promote further preventive measures, 2.theneed of the participants in the questionnaire study to know aboutthe results, 3.the need of a deeper understanding of the reasons behindthe organization of the VDU work.After testing some models ofpresentation the researchers and the local health services staffdiscussed which of the empirical analyses were most practicallyuseful and effective.ResultsThe results were of two kinds.Data analyses on an organizationallevel facilitated comparisons of various office departments withrespect to their different organizational solutions of VDU use; thisled to a better awareness of the special demands arising from thetotal activity of the department in question and also of the scopeof freedom available to change difficult or bad conditions .As theevaluation model covered a field in which many factors were involved,the team members of the local health services learned to worktogether across their own professions. This way of solving problemsat work places provided each employee with a better chance of optimizingwork conditions whithin a shorter period of time.DiscussionThe project can be discussed as an example of a strategy from theoryto practice. It shows an effort to implement applied research basedon several previous empirical works within a particular technologicalfield (office automation) that is under process of change;there is, therefore, a continuous need for prevention and healthdevelopmentsupport from expert sources.Keywords:organizationalassessment; VDU-use; models of preventionTEV 1989 — DEUXIÈME CONFÉRENCE SCIENTIFIQUE INTERNATIONALE • MONTRÉAL • SECOND INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CONFERENCE — WDU 1989192TEV 1989 — DEUXIÈME CONFÉRENCE SCIENTIFIQUE INTERNATIONALE • MONTREAL • SECOND IN'ITiRNATIONAI. SCIENTIFIC CONFERENCE — WWDU 1989193