Impact of Virtual Workplace on Employee Behaviour-Evidence from Australian SMEs

This paper reports on a study conducted to explore the impact of a Virtual workplace on employee behavior. The empirical evidence in this paper is based on the surveys and interviews from Australian SMEs located in Greater Western Sydney (GWS) region. We believe this study is vital in the upcoming age of self-managed teams and self-managed employees. This is mainly because of the “loose affiliations” of teams and employees with their organizations due to advancement of internet based technologies and the demand for the around the clock work norms. Virtual workplace is not new in itself, but its study in the context of SMEs and keeping in mind the technology impacts is new in this paper. The discovery that virtual workplaces are productive only when combined with and maintaining traditional work norms is an interesting insight derived in this study.