burnout: e.g. ‘60% of your team is working after hours for more than an hour a week’. This gives them the opportunity to introduce intervention strategies and check if the team needs additional resources. CARING WORK ENVIRONMENT The use of analytics alone was not sufficient to develop the needed employee engagement in the hybrid workplace. Another theme that emerged was evidence of a caring, human-centred work environment. Employees talked about being given a choice to attend either in-person or online meetings, rather than being told they had to attend in-person. As part of developing a caring environment, new practices emerged that enable employees to remain connected with the organisation and to feel that they are valued when they choose to work remotely. For example, someone talked about being sent chocolates out of the blue, a signal that ‘we have not been forgotten’. INCLUSIVE LEADERSHIP The third emerging theme is the practice of inclusive leadership. Participants reported having more frequent one-to-one meetings than in the pre-pandemic period, more meetings just to check on each other, and how they are coping with workload, contributing to a more humanised and empathetic leadership style. Leaders were also seen as modelling desired behaviours – not sending emails or having their Teams on before 9am, for instance, and there was an overall feeling that everyone tried to be kinder to others. Such forms of inclusive leadership reinforce the caring culture that has been associated with hybrid work in this organisation. BETTER INSIGHTS Our study demonstrates that with the increasing use of analytics in hybrid work, there are renewed possibilities for leaders to develop insights about employees’ experiences that can be used to develop personalised engagement practices and interventions in a timely and targeted manner. Engagement can be achieved in nontraditional work settings such as hybrid work, and leaders should adapt their behaviour and practices within the hybrid work setting to take account of the challenges employees may experience in this form of work arrangement. These practices appear to be more inclusive, humanised and empathetic. We show that algorithmic management tools, such as Viva, and work analytics go beyond the provision of metrics on employee performance. They provide opportunities for adopting a humancentric leadership approach, one that encompasses attention to learning and development, wellbeing, and work-life balance. Individuals who lead in hybrid work settings need the skills and knowledge to deal with the challenges that employees are experiencing, so they can develop appropriate responses. Ultimately, organisational leaders need to pay close attention to the data generated by algorithmic management tools. They should employ work analytics for the design and implementation of initiatives that consider the changing nature of work while ensuring the provision of individualised resources and the support required in the hybrid workplace. FIFTY FOUR DEGREES | 29 Niki Panteli is a Professor of Digital Business in the Department of Management Science. Her research interests cover digital transformation, digital platforms, cybersecurity leadership, algorithmic management, hybrid work and online collaborations. n.panteli1@lancaster.ac.uk Blooma John is an Associate Professor and Capability Leader of Information Systems at the University of Canberra, Australia. Her research interests include digital transformation, social informatics, and design science research. Dr Zeena Alsamarr’I is a Lecturer in digital business transformation and programme director of the Business Informatics (BI) programme at the University of Canberra. Her research interests include digital workplace transformation, hybrid work, knowledge mobilisation, and theory– practice research. This article is based around work on Reconfiguring digital embeddedness in hybrid work: The case of employee experience management platforms, published in Information Systems Journal; and Enhancing employee experience in the era of hybrid work: the case of Microsoft viva, published in IEEE Software, both authored by Dr Blooma John, Dr Zeena Alsamarra’I, and Professor Niki Panteli. This work was supported by the British Academy of Management (BAM)-Australian and New Zealand Academy of Management (ANZAM) Collaborative Research Award (2021-262-BAM-ANZAM).
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