Melinde Coetzee - Thriving in Digital Workspaces: Emerging Issues for Research and Practice

This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG

The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

This book collection proffers some initial thoughts and narrative discourses on the extent to which the technological revolution will impact human thriving. The collection of chapters serves as a birds-eye view of the mindset shifts required, and the psychological foundations and preconditions of human thriving in digital workspaces. The concept of thriving is revisited in terms of new emerging issues that potentially may arise for research and practice as a result of the digital revolution. The book proposes future directions for research and practice and contributes novel insights towards creating the conditions for facilitating individual and organisational thriving amidst the turbulence, complexities and velocity of agility and learning that are required by organisations and workers. The primary audience for this book is advanced undergraduate, graduate and post-graduate students, as well as scholars and practitioners in applied multidisciplinary psychology settings. In addition, organisational decision-makers, human resource managers and professionals, wellness counsellors and public policy-makers will have an interest in this book. This book is useful for employees themselves in order to better understand their psychological experiences and roles in adapting to digital workspaces. Employees, managers and practitioners will also gain a better understanding of the demands, challenges and possibilities of the digital era workplace for human and organisational thriving, development and success.

We acknowledge that our understanding of the construct of human thriving has been shaped by forerunners in the field who offered various meritorious conceptual debates and research on human thriving. As authors, we regard human thriving and flourishing as essential concepts and way of functioning in modern-day organisations. We endeavour to build in this book collection on the extant knowledge and theory on human thriving. We offer new knowledge and insights by positioning the construct in the rapidly emerging Industry 4.0 space of work. We are therefore also grateful to the scholars and practitioners who are breaking new ground by their exploration of the impact of smart and digital technology on human well-being in workplaces of the Fourth Industrial Revolution era. We acknowledge that we are at this stage just starting to tap into the tip of the so-called iceberg of the technological revolution. The chapter contributions in this book offer emerging insights, narratives and probabilities of the factors and conditions to consider in facilitating human thriving in workspaces that will be continuously transformed by smart digital technology. As Editor, I salute the team of authors for their courage in breaking new ground, their quality contributions, hard work and their dedication to the field of human thriving and flourishing.

Note: The manuscript and chapters in this book collection have been independently peer-reviewed before publication. A blind peer-review process was followed. The editor and authors would also like to express their gratitude to the reviewers for their feedback and suggestions for improving the quality of the chapter contributions and the book in general.

Welcome to thriving in digital workspaces!