This study examined differences in email and boundary management practices between academic and professional services staff at a university. Through interviews and surveys, the researchers identified two groups: academics had more permeable boundaries and checked work email outside of work hours, while professional services staff maintained rigid boundaries between work and personal life. Both groups faced challenges around availability, interruptions across devices, and managing multiple accounts. The researchers suggest implications like contextual notifications and automatic email tagging to address the lack of one-size-fits-all solutions for boundary management in organizations.

1. Working 9-5? !
Professional Differences in Email and
Boundary Management Practices
Marta E. Cecchinato, Anna L. Cox, Jon Bird
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2. Today, 58% of Americans own a
smartphone and 89% use
them to check emails. "
(PEW Research, 2014)
Mobile devices allow frequent
‘micro-role transitions’ (Ashforth et al.,
2000), i.e. shifts between our roles
(parent, colleague, etc.).
TECHNOLOGY FACILITATES FLEXIBLE
WORKING…

3. Interference between work and
personal life is positively correlated
with stress, particularly when work
permeates non-work (Kossek et al., 2012).
…BUT THIS CAUSES STRESS
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4. WORK-LIFE BALANCE?

5. Boundaries between work and
home can be conceptualised along
an integration/segmentation
continuum (Nippert-Eng, 1996).
WORK-HOME BOUNDARIES
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6. Email can increase
boundary permeation
between work and
personal life
(Capra et al., 2013).
EMAIL AS A BOUNDARY ARTEFACT
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source:
h.p://poofytoo.com/

7. 1) How do people manage personal and work email
accounts across devices?
2) What are the boundary management strategies
adopted for personal and work email accounts across
devices?"
3) Are there email and boundary management differences
between two professional groups from the same
organization?
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
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1) Interviews"
2) Screenshots of inbox"
3) Work-Life Indicator Scale"
(Kossek et al., 2012)"
• Work Interruption Non-Work (WINW)
• Non-Work Interrupting Work (NWIW)
• Boundary Control (BC)
• Family Identity (FI)
• Work Identity (WI)
METHOD

9. 16 university employees:"
• 9 academic staff "
(e.g. post-doc, lecturer)
• 7 professional service staff
(e.g. librarian, HR manager)"
o 11 females
o 20-54 years old
PARTICIPANTS
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10. FINDINGS #1
We identify two user groups, based on:
• Work and non-work interruptions
• Differences in when, where and how "
work and personal emails are managed
Academics
prof. services staff
&
are different!
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source:
h.p://perezhilton.com/2009-­‐01-­‐26-­‐ugly-­‐be.y-­‐headed-­‐to-­‐the-­‐tv-­‐graveyard
Image
source:
my
supervisor!

11. “I would never ever check my
[work] email outside of work,
purposely. It's not the kind of job
that I think about when I’m not
here. I'm not allowed to work from
home"
– P13, Female, PS.
a) Rigid Boundary Management

12. b) Permeable Boundary Management
“The first check is probably right after
I woke up.
I will probably have another look
during my commute.
And once I'm in my office. Once I’m
home I have a second work shift after
my son goes to bed until quite late in
the night”
– P15, Male, A.

13. Individual Differences
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14. a) Boundary Challenges:
availability
“It does irritate my partner. Like if
we're in front of the TV and she's
playing on a game on her phone and I
check my work email then that would
irritate her ‘cause [...] she sees
it like me being in work rather than
spending time with her.”
– P5, Male, A.
FINDINGS #2
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15. “I check my emails on the toilet”
– P5, Male, A.
@dbpharrison

16. b) Boundary Challenges: "
cross-device interaction
“What I’ll do on my phone is
[…] I’ll go into my work email
[…] at night time and then I’ll
say 'I’ll sort all those tomorrow
when I go to work’ but
because they're not marked as
unread anymore, whenever I go
to work I forget to reply.”
– P8, Female, A.

17. MICRO-BOUNDARY PRACTICES
Through accounts:
• One account per role
• Dedicated folders across accounts
"
Through devices:
• Personal email only on smartphone, "
work email only on laptop.
• Deliberately removing work email from phone during time
off, e.g. on holiday"
Through software:
• Different apps on smartphone for personal and work email
“a strategy to limit the impact of micro-role transitions caused
by cross-domain technology mediated interruptions”
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18. IMPLICATIONS
1. Setting contextual notifications based
on locations and account type.
2. Automatically tagging email with
device icons based on where they
were first opened.
Ø No one-size-fits all solution for all the
staff in a single organisation.
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19. Working 9-5? !
Professional Differences in Email and
Boundary Management Practices
Marta E. Cecchinato
Anna L. Cox
Jon Bird
m.cecchinato@cs.ucl.ac.uk
anna.cox@ucl.ac.uk
jon.bird@city.ac.uk
Image
source:
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