The shifting locations of work: new statistical evidence on the spaces and places of employment

The aim of this article is to chart with available data, including surveys of workers & surveys of employers in the UK, the shifting locations of work -- both inside & outside the office -- & to identify which types of people & jobs have been most affected. The article reports on the changing proportions & numbers of people carrying out work away from the conventional physical boundaries of the office or factory. It also examines the past, current, & future use employers are making of techniques intended to effect this change for office workers in particular. It is concluded that overall, the evidence suggests office work is becoming increasingly detached from individual & personalized cubes of space marked by a walled cell or by an allocated desk in an open plan building, & that instead, office work is being carried out in a variety of places -- in the home, in an assortment of locations within the office, & in "third places" such as the train, the car, & the plane -- that for some constitute a mosaic of contrasting sites. 4 Tables, 26 References. T. K. Brown