13 www.virtual-teams.eu 2. Introduction to teleworking 2.1. Teleworking Teleworking refers to all types of work performed outside a default place of work with the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) to communicate back to one’s workplace (Madsen, 2001) The term “telecommuting” was one of the first, proposed by Nilles back in 1975. Since then, a lot of different definitions have been provided. There are various distinctions between the terminology proposed for different types of teleworking taking into account the physical place the work is conducted, the proximity of the worker with the physical office etc. In Europe and for the purposes for the current toolkit, the term of “e-worker” is going to be used interchangeably with teleworker, remote worker and virtual team member, as an effort to include and incorporate all the different types of workers and team leaders working partially or fully outside of the traditional office concept (Charalampous, Grant, Tramontano & Michailidis, 2019). Based on the research conducted for the purposes of the Virtual Team’s project, eworkers mentioned that they prefer working fully remotely or in a hybrid model (with some physical presence at the office), only if they have some form of control on their schedule upon when to work from the office. 2.2. The need for teleworking The need of teleworking became widely evident after the rise of the Covid-19 pandemic, which forced companies abruptly to either “shut down their engines” completely or find a way to work remotely. But this was not the beginning as many might think. Research shows that from the early 2000 and forth, companies are relying more and more on teleworking as a means of employability. This allowed them to employ talents in a geographically large area and reduce overhead expenses and cost of office facilities. In addition, it is more environmentally friendly since emissions from commuting are diminished. These were made possible with the expansion and growth of technology and the internet which provided many tools for companies to work efficiently in distance (American Psychological Association, 2019).
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