Between Scylla and Charybdis: How Turkish Financial Mid-Level Managers Handle Challenges of Teleworking for Organizational Sustainability

Many have been announcing that teleworking is the “new normal”. While teleworking has historically been prevalent in knowledge-intensive sectors, it has become a widespread business practice during the Covid-19 pandemic. Empirical studies have demonstrated the positive effects of teleworking on various aspects of work performance, including efficiency, performance, autonomy, information technology skills, flexibility, and time savings. The rise in teleworking also has the potential to boost women employment, cut greenhouse gases and slow urbanization, which align with the sustainable development goals, although integrated policies are required to address challenges including work-life balance, energy consumption, sedentary lifestyles, time constraints, and social isolation. Nevertheless, the recent decision by big corporations (such as Alphabet and Apple) to recall their employees back to the office suggests that there are some underlying issues with teleworking. In this context, to gain insight into the relation between organizational sustainability and teleworking we conducted in-depth interviews with employees of one of Türkiye's major commercial banks who were gradually recalled as of summer 2024. Our preliminary findings indicate that the parameters affecting this relation from the employees' perspectives are the requirements of the department, organizational position, changing work motivations across generations, socialization as a means of satisfaction, and other parameters (family life, time budgeting, and so on). The results also demonstrate that organizations encounter an impasse in achieving organizational sustainability through teleworking that pertains to group dynamics, including organizational climate, organizational culture, and organizational learning. In addressing this impasse, it becomes evident that those occupying mid-level managerial positions assume a proxy mission that links lower-level staff with upper-level managers both of whom face difficulties in navigating the complexities of teleworking. This study examines the challenges mid-level managers in the finance sector encountered and the practices they developed in response to them in fulfilling their proxy mission.