BUS 272 Term Final EY Work Conflict Solutions PDF

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BUS 272 Term Final EY Work Conflict Solutions
Lieke Bruhumulis...

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Running head: REVIEW OF ERNST & YOUNG COMMUNICATION PROBLEM

Analysis and Solutions to Ernst & Young Communication Technology Problem

Simon Fraser University Beedie School of Business 01 May 2021

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REVIEW OF ERNST & YOUNG COMMUNICATION PROBLEM Table of Contents Introduction..........................................................................................................................3 Problem Identification and Impact.......................................................................................3 Organizational Behaviour Theories Problem Analysis........................................................4 Boundary Theory..............................................................................................................4 Goal Setting Theory.........................................................................................................6 Loss Cycle Burnout..........................................................................................................7 Recommendations and Implementation...............................................................................8 Increasing Intrinsic Rewards and Task Significance........................................................8 Specific Client Goal Strategy...........................................................................................9 Policies and Training......................................................................................................10 Monitoring Work Hours.................................................................................................11 Conclusion.........................................................................................................................12

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Introduction Ernst & Young is one of the Big Four accounting firms. They provide assurance, tax, auditing, consulting, and advisory services to many companies. They have over 231,000 employees in 150 countries around the world. EY has abandoned the traditional nine to five job time, instead, they implemented a more flexible work schedule that allows their employees to have more control over when and where they work. This results in a more convenient and suitable schedule for the employees. However, the flexibility to their work schedule has caused supplementary stress because employees feel they are constantly connected to work via communication technology. These technologies enable them to be available 24/7 for their clients which increased their stress levels. Our role as external knowledge based consultants in this report is to analyse the boundary theory, the goal setting theory and the loss cycle burnout theory in relation to the problem in EY. We will then use insight from the analysis to implement a job design that caters to preventing employee burnout, while still maintaining their flexible work arrangements.

Problem Identification and Impact

Figure 1: Causal Chain on Impact of Electronic Communication

The problem for Ernst & Young is that they are experiencing high employee burnout rates and stress because employees that work at home constantly feel connected to work during offwork hours. As indicated in [Figure 1], the causal chain suggests electronic communication,

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such as emails, phone calls, and text messages causes information overload. When there is an increase in job demands, such as an overflowing message box, their workload exceeds their processing capacity. This is known as information overload (Langton, Robbins, & Timothy, 2016, p.252). Some employees decide to sacrifice their own personal time during off-work hours to fulfil their communication. However, this causes stress on relationships at home or work-home interference (WHI), as employees find it extremely difficult to detach from work (Derks, Brummelhuis, Bakker, 2014, p. 604). The effects of working during off-work hours is an incomplete recovery for the employees. Employees are not able to fully gather the resources necessary to fulfil the job demands in the next day. Without the necessary recovery, employees feel mentally and physically exhausted. When stress and burnout occurs, it negatively affects the company because employees will be less productive and damage their overall health.

Organizational Behaviour Theories Problem Analysis

Boundary Theory Everyone has different roles to fulfill at work and at home, and each of these roles has several different demands. Individuals can fulfill multiple roles simultaneously, however, sometimes two or more roles have specific demands that contradict each other, which causes role conflict. The boundary theory suggests individuals manage the boundaries between work and family life in relation to the intensity of role demands between the two domains (Furtado, Sobral and Peci, 2016, p. 1336; Boswell & Olson-Buchanan, 2004, p. 594). Furtado (2016) et al. found that when “individuals experience increasing demands in a target domain, they respond by weakening the boundary strength in the cross-domain to allow resource draining to cope with these demands” (p. 1336). When the job domain weakens, or becomes integrated with the family life do-

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main, employees can find it difficult to fulfill their family role. Thus, work-home interference (WHI) can occur because employees must “reallocate resources from the other domain” (Furtado et. al, 2016, p. 1336). In the case of EY employees, the use of communication technology (CT) during off-work hours has psychologically increased the job demands because employees still feel obligated to answer calls and emails they receive after work. Boswell & Olson-Buchanan (2004) suggests “CTs allow for greater work-life integration, thereby allowing the line between domains to blur” (p.593). As a result of the blurring of the domains, employees move resources from their family domain to deal with job demands. The depletion of resources in the family life causes WHI, which may ultimately result in stress and burnout for the employees. Additionally, since EY employees are using flextime work arrangements, Furtado (2016) et al. indicates “from a boundary management perspective, [flextime] might lead to weaker boundaries around non-work roles, which may increase [work interference with family]” (p.1340). To avoid the harmful effects of the blurring of the work and family boundary, EY must make the boundaries well defined to the employees. Boswell & Olson-Buchanan suggest (2004) organizations to “formally (e.g., policies) or informally… limit the use of CT after hours” (p. 605). Furthermore, Sonnetag (2001, as cited in Derks, Brummelhuis, Bakker, 2014) argues “when individuals spent more time on job-related activities during evening hours, the more deteriorated their well-being was at bedtime” (p. 87). Therefore, restrictions on CT in the evening can heavily influence an employee’s well-being and resource recovery.

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Goal Setting Theory Goal setting is fundamentally based on making “specific and difficult goals, with feedback, [and] leads to performance” (Langton, Robbins & Judge, 2016, p. 139). Furthermore, studies indicate that working toward a goal are a source of work motivation (Langton et. al, 2016, p. 139). Overall, Ernst and Young’s consultants are not given a goal on how to address communication technology. Employees experience burnout because they use their personal time to answer all emails and calls on time. Adam Locke’s goal setting theory provides four motivational factors in relation to goals, including goals direct attention (Langton et. al, 2016, p. 139). The employees are currently not directing attention when making responses to electronic communication. Employees is attempting to answer as many emails and phone calls as they can without setting priority on which they answer. If Ernst and Young were to introduce goals, it would encourage the development of strategies and action planning (Langton et. al, 2016, p. 140). Once the goal is set, the individual will consider the ways and means to develop a strategy and follow an action plan specifically to accomplish the goal. In addition, goals increase persistence and regulate effort, resulting in the employee's becoming more persistent to achieve the goal and work more efficiently (Langton et. al, 2016, p. 139 & 140). Moreover, “[g]oals may simply motivate one to use one's existing ability, may automatically ‘pull’ stored task-relevant knowledge into awareness, and/or may motivate people to search for new knowledge” (Locke & Latham, 2006, p. 265). Goals determine what must be done and what is desirable. Ernst and Young should implement the goal setting theory to increase motivation within the organization and resolve the organizational issue (Langton et. al, p. 142). For goal setting to be successful, EY management should provide feedback and support

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to improve employee work-life balance (Langton et. al, 2016, p. 139). To reduce stress and burnout, the goal-setting theory suggests making goals with specific objectives that helps employees prioritize tasks regarding communication technology.

Loss Cycle Burnout The loss cycle burnout model suggests that an increase in job demands for employees causes external pressure. External pressure uses more job resources from the employee. If job resources are not fully replenished the employee will feel stressed and burnout. However, intrinsic motivation can break the cycle of burnout because intrinsically motivated employees can replenish their job resources to meet the increase in job demands (Brummelhuis, Ter Hoeven, Bakker, & Peper, 2011, p. 271). Brummelhuis (2011) et al. argues that if employees do not recover from burnout, they appear to gather more job demands “indicated by increasing work hours, work overload and work-home barriers” and a decrease in “[j]ob resources” as time progresses (p. 280). EY employees are faces high external pressures because of job demands that increases the work-home barrier (Brummelhuis, Ter Hoeven, Bakker, & Peper, 2011, p. 274). They feel constantly connected to communication technology during off-work hours which causes workhome interference. When employees use off-work hours to meet job demands, they may feel stress and burnout because they cannot unwind and spend time with their families. The employees are not able to replenish their resources because they did not have a proper complete break from work. Ernst & Young as a company is negatively affected by employees being stressed as it results in more absenteeism and lowered job performance (Brummelhuis et al., 2011, p. 268). Brummelhuis (2011) et al. suggests that highly intrinsically motivated employees can improve

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resource recovery and more likely to participate in pleasurable activities than employees that are not intrinsically motivated (p. 278). Based on this theory, EY can improve job satisfaction and performance by redesign jobs to be more intrinsically motivating.

Recommendations and Implementation

Increasing Intrinsic Rewards and Task Significance Employees at EY feel that they are constantly at work, therefore they are not using their off-time to replenish properly. Employees are too often focused on work that they neglect other important factors in their life such as good sleep habits, exercise, and nutrition, which can lead to burnout (Valcour, 2016). To help employees’ replenishment their energy, EY can add intrinsic rewards, allow employees to work with non-profit organizations or allow employees to work with a client of their own choosing. These activities will increase their task significance and intrinsic motivation. EY can provide incentive rewards to employees such as movie tickets or a gym membership. Exercising and spending time with the family is a great way to intrinsically replenish resources (Valcour, 2016). To increase task significance, EY can provide the opportunity to work for a non-profit organization or allow employees to work on a project of their own choosing. Examples of the effectiveness and success of this specific recommendation can be found in current organizations such as Google and Triage. Google allows its employees to use 20% of their work hours to work towards a project of their own choosing. Giving control to employees to work with a desired client can increase intrinsic motivation, and in turn reducing employee burnout (Fatemi, 2016). Additionally, Triage grants every employee 16 hours of paid volunteer time off every year to dedicate to causes that reflected their own passions (Triage, 2017).

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These benefits should be implemented one at a time, over a period of 4 months per implementation so that the effectiveness of each recommendation can be reviewed. The successful implementation of these strategies, in relation to the loss cycle burnout theory, will allow employees to deal with the increasing external demands because employees will be more intrinsically motivated and recover the necessary job resources.

Specific Client Goal Strategy It is acknowledged by Ernst & Young employees that flexible telecommuting technology in the workplace causes negative consequences which have impacted their home life. We wish to advocate the development of a communication strategy with a realistic and attainable goal which will channel employee time and efforts effectively and efficiently, to improve employees’ wellbeing and their client’s satisfaction. The recommendation is for EY employees to be responsible for two clients every week. Not only does this goal reduce the employee’s job demands, but additionally allows the employees to focus their effort (Langton, Robbins & Judge, 2016, p. 139). This goal gives ample time for employees to adjust their workload to address the client's business needs and satisfy corporate objectives. By restricting their services to 2 clients, the clients will be appreciative of Ernst and Young staff attentiveness to their business needs, as employees can dedicate more time to each client. For this recommendation to be successful, it must suit the client's business needs. Regarding implementation, a monthly review process will happen during the first year to ensure that there is an improvement in client quality service and ensure that employees feel less demanded from their work.

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Policies and Training From the analysis of the boundary theory, we suggest creating formal policies that will thoroughly redefine the boundaries between family and work life. The policies that we recommend is allowing employees to respond to emails within 1-2 business days and restricting employees to check emails after 8pm. New policies that limit the use of CTs combined with training may improve employees’ boundary management skills. Firstly, employees must be given a realistic time frame to respond to emails. A timeframe of 1-2 business days to answer emails is a reasonable and manageable time expectancy for employees to follow. EY consultants feel compelled to answer emails as soon as they receive them, however, this can lead to information overload as emails can continue to be sent back and forth several times and stack up over time. If employees’ expectations are set to respond within 1-2 days, they are given more control over the flow of information, therefore able to better manage and reduce their workload. Secondly, a policy that restrict the ability for employees to check emails after 8pm gives employees the ability to recover for the next day and cuts the connections of the 24/7 organizational culture. Heidi Grant Halvorson, a social psychologist, suggest turning off smartphones at 8pm, he says: “Whatever it is, it can wait until tomorrow” (Knight, 2015) Sonnetag (2001, as cited in Derks, Brummelhuis, Bakker, 2014) argues “employees need evening hours to detach from work in order to recover from stress expenditure properly” (p.82). Cutting the psychological attachment to work in the evenings will allow employees to recover resources for the next day and reduce their work-home interference. We suggest creating a pilot program during the first month of implementation. Members of the pilot program should undergo new training and give necessary feedback to improve the

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policies and training program. The training should involve teaching employees’ boundary management skills that make employees reduce reallocation of resources to the work domain (Furtado et. al, 2016, p. 1340). This can involve learning the organization’s etiquette of using CT after work hours and develop strategies for employees to recover during off-work hours. Ron Friedman, founder of a consulting firm, suggest scheduling “restorative experiences that [one] look forward to… [such as] making plans to play tennis with a friend or cook a meal with your spouse” (Knight, 2015). Improving employee’s ability to manage boundaries can reduce employees WHI, which will cut the connection between WHI and burnout (Derks, Brummelhuis, Bakker, 2014, p.87). If the pilot program is successful, the training should be given to all EY employees before the policies are made formal. After implementation of the policies and training, the progressive discipline method can be used to enforce the policies. The progressive program follows an incremental increase in penalty each time an employee disobeys a policy. The 4-stages of penalties are oral warnings, written warnings, suspension, and termination (“Managing the Workplace,” 2012). During the oral warning stage, it is important for managers to step in and reassess strategies in managing their off-work time commitment.

Monitoring Work Hours A strategy will be developed with clear expectations to ensure the work week does not exceed 50 hours. Our final recommendation is for managers to track employee hours, step in and reassess staff if they unauthorizedly exceed 50 hours per week. This recommendation addresses the specific procedures for EY management team to track their employees working hours. This will be accomplished with the assistance of EY corporate information technology department

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and will conform to EY corporate policies governing the use of EY computer network. With the recommendation of “Timeware” software managers would be able to track employees work hours efficiently (Workforce-management system at Sysco, 2015, p. 18). This software has a proven track record of accurately tracking employee access to a computer network (Workforcemanagement system at Sysco, 2015, p. 20). Managers will have a business tool to monitor their employees’ time activity. Employees who exceed 50 hours of work will be required to meet with their manager to discuss the cause and mutually come to an agreement on how to effectively address the cause with the purpose to reduce their working hours. This strategy is successfully used in Insight Sourcing Group, a consulting firm, to ensure work-home interference is mitigated (Adams, 2015). Managers may also step in during the oral warning stage of the progressive discipline plan. Employees may value their manager's engagement for open dialogue for the overall benefit of the employee and it caters to their specific needs by developing a personal plan that reduces employee burnouts. Employees may improve their work life balance and allowing them to replenish their resources and improve productivity (Beehr & Ragsdale, 2016, p. 911).

Conclusion We as consultants have determined the problem at Ernst & Young is high employee ...