Trusting Telework in the Federal Government

• Published in: Qualitative report Vol. 21; no. 1; p. 87
• Main Authors: Brown, Courtney, Smith, Pearl, Arduengo, Nancy, Taylor, Martha
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Fort Lauderdale Nova Southeastern University, Inc 18.01.2016; The Qualitative Report
• Subjects: Brown, Courtney; Compensation and benefits; Creativity; Federal employees; Federal government; Job Satisfaction; Leaders; Leadership; Managers; Organizational Effectiveness; Personnel Management; Productivity; Smith, Nancy; Social science research; Supervisors; Telecommunications; Telecommuting; Teleworking; Trust; Trust (Psychology); Wages & salaries; Work at home; Work life balance; Workers; New York; United States > US
• DOI: 10.46743/2160-3715/2016.2466
• ISSN: 1052-0147

Despite an Executive Office mandate to permit federal workers to telework, federal managers still deny employees this benefit. Several factors have been attributed to their aversion, including lack of trust. Findings from a hermeneutic phenomenological study exploring the lived experiences and perceptions of 12 federal government managers who prohibit their employees from teleworking (Brown, 2013) was analyzed to identify themes related to trust. Of the eight themes Brown identified, five focused on lack of trust. This paper discusses those five trust-related themes and recommends success factors for enabling leaders’ trust of telework are discussed.