IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ssi/jouesi/v8y2021i3p210-225.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Characteristics of distance work organization in SMEs during the COVID-19 lockdown: case of western Lithuania region

Author

Listed:
  • Giedrė Strakšienė

    (Klaipėda University, Lithuania)

  • Henrika Ruginė

    (Klaipėda University, Lithuania)

  • Laura Šaltytė-Vaisiauskė

    (Klaipėda University, Lithuania)

Abstract

The article is based on the findings of the applied research project Assessment of the Effectiveness of COVID-19-Related Restrictions on Economic Activity and the Impact of State Intervention Measures on Enterprises in the Klaipėda Region (No. P-COV-20-51). The aim of the research is to reveal the characteristics of distance work in small and medium business enterprises of Klaipėda Region in the context of COVID-19. The main research question focuses on how the variety of work activities be realized in distance way and to what extent is it effective? To identify the situation, a mixed research methodology, quantitative (questionnaire) and qualitative (focus group) research methods were used. 73 business entities participated in the survey, and 7 focus group discussions were organised remotely in 7 municipalities, with the participation of 61 respondents (on average, 8 in each group). The research findings revealed that the problems of distance work in SME‘s were generally an under-researched topic, and the definition and concept of distance work varied. Problems emerged that could be divided into two subgroups: the first related to the IT infrastructure(a shortage of equipment, Internet disruption and the resulting increased costs), while the second subgroup concerned mainly human factors (the issues of employees' communication skills and attitudes or emotions when working remotely, lack of methodology for organising distance work, etc.). It is worth adding that, in the course of the current research, identification of a broader field of problems and discussions of their causes were possible due to the cooperation of researchers-representatives of various scientific areas.

Suggested Citation

  • Giedrė Strakšienė & Henrika Ruginė & Laura Šaltytė-Vaisiauskė, 2021. "Characteristics of distance work organization in SMEs during the COVID-19 lockdown: case of western Lithuania region," Entrepreneurship and Sustainability Issues, VsI Entrepreneurship and Sustainability Center, vol. 8(3), pages 210-225, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:ssi:jouesi:v:8:y:2021:i:3:p:210-225
    DOI: 10.9770/jesi.2021.8.3(12)
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://jssidoi.org/jesi/uploads/articles/31/Straksiene_Characteristics_of_distance_work_organization_in_SMEs_during_the_COVID19_lockdown_case_of_western_Lithuania_region.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://jssidoi.org/jesi/article/776
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.9770/jesi.2021.8.3(12)?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Igor Denisov & Yelena Petrenko & Irina Koretskaya & Stanislav Benčič, 2021. "The Gameover in Universities Education Management during the Pandemic COVID-19: Challenges to Sustainable Development in a Digitalized Environment," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(13), pages 1, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    distance work; COVID-19; Small and Medium Enterprise (SME);
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • O15 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Economic Development: Human Resources; Human Development; Income Distribution; Migration
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ssi:jouesi:v:8:y:2021:i:3:p:210-225. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Manuela Tvaronaviciene (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.