When We Work. Delphi Results on Time and Temporality Within Futures of Work

Abstract

<p>This paper examines time and temporality as central but often overlooked dimensions that shape the futures of work. While workplace transformation discussions often emphasise spatial aspects of working environments, our study reveals that temporal structures fundamentally determine how work is organised, experienced, and valued. In a two-round Delphi study conducted in 2024, we used a novel Delphi approach with provocations and paradox probing. As a result, we gained understanding on how temporal (i.e., time-related) issues function as critical elements in future work environments. Our findings indicate that novel temporal arrangements and understandings are associated with transformations in working environments. However, the possibility of novel temporal arrangements and their utilisation often follow existing power structures, which create inequities between different sectors, roles, and people. To conceptualise time as an active element rather than neutral background, we contextualise the analysis to literature on time in futures studies and related fields. In this way, our research contributes through the Delphi study to understanding how changing temporalities might affect whether workplace innovations succeed in fostering productivity, well-being, and equity or whether they create novel problems and new forms of exclusion. The results of our Delphi study are particularly timely given how workplaces change in the context of the so-called double twin transition of digital/green and virtual/physical transforming our societies. Where and when cannot be separated when it comes to the futures of work, given the double twin transition.<br></p>