Job crafting to ensure a balance between focus and connection

Recent work environment developments coupled with the pandemic have provided employees with increased opportunities to shape their workspaces. In semi-structured interviews conducted with 40 employees working on large-scale construction projects in two different work environments (open office and virtual work settings), we examined how and why job crafting was undertaken. Our analysis of the interview data revealed that, across both types of work environments, environmental disruptions that resulted in a perceived imbalance between focus and connection with colleagues were responded to with job crafting efforts. These job crafting efforts took the form of building bridges (to connect or coordinate with others more closely) and constructing barriers (to make it easier to focus). Individuals built bridges through the use of space or physical location, signaling, and coordination, whereas they constructed barriers via physical barriers, scheduling/prioritization, and mindfulness of others. This work contributes to job crafting research by expanding our understanding beyond work–life considerations of how and why individuals make adjustments within two relatively new types of work environments. Additionally, this research offers the contributions of increasing our understanding of interrelationships among types of job crafting and expanding our knowledge about how to make open office and virtual work arrangements more effective.