Employees at Deutsche Telekom/T-Systems were undergoing prolonged periods (several months) of job insecurity after having preliminarily been selected into groups with quotas for retrenchment during annual waves of mass-layoffs. Prolonged uncertainty, owing to organizational and legal constraints, placed considerable strain on the emotional experience and mental well-being of the employees and limited their perceived options to structure, attributing primarily externally with almost no perception of agency (contingency). Hierarchies have been found as a central element that dominates the individual reconstruction of the workplace experience after being notified of the preliminary selection, limiting both cognitive experience and execution of agency. Advanced epistemological constructions of self (independent-event, homeostatic or morphogenetic thinking) have either been absent, or have been dependent on increased levels of individual social security. Networked, interdependent approaches at social security may alleviate mental well-being on the level of societies.

Full study: Stoll, J. D. (2015). Networking Social Security. The Effects of Prolonged Uncertainty in Restructuring Programs on Reconstruction of Employees Work Experience.pdf [0.31 MB]