Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
IBM announced that it will close five service centres in Sweden and the union fears that 500 jobs will go. ‘We have announced our intention to close down five locations in Sweden and as a result of that we have notified the employees in those locations' said Åsa Barsness, IBM Sweden's communications manager. She would not confirm a report on the technology union Sif's newspaper website that the closure of service centres in the cities of Vasterås, Eskilstuna, Linkoping, Alingsås and Huskvarna would mean the loss of more than 500 jobs. ‘It's too early to say. What we need to do right now is sit down with the union and start those negotiations' said Barsness, who added that the closures were designed to ‘consolidate delivery operations in Sweden and become more efficient.' IBM currently has about 4,000 employees in Sweden. The union said the company has moved 200 to 300 jobs abroad in the 2004.
Eurofound (2005), IBM, Internal restructuring in Sweden, factsheet number 61298, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/61298.