digital workplace thesis

Digitalisation in the Workplace: The Role of Technology on Employee Engagement and Creativity Teams

• First Online: 18 May 2021

Cite this chapter

• Lize Stofberg 3 ,
• Arien Strasheim 3 &
• Eileen Koekemoer 3  

1472 Accesses

5 Citations

Technology is increasingly infiltrating the workplace and has already become embedded and integrated into employees’ daily lives. Literature points to the use and development of digital technologies to facilitate innovation, streamlining business processes and ensuring competitiveness and sustainability. However, how employees react to digitalisation of work in a team setting is not fully understood. The chapter aims to add to the current body of knowledge regarding digitalisation and Industry 4.0 by providing recent literature on this subject matter as well as practical implications for managing agility, creative self-efficacy and engagement. Furthermore, the chapter aims to provide more insight into understanding employees’ experiences (as part of a team) of digital technologies in their daily tasks using an evidence-based case study approach.

The chapter commences with a brief overview of digitalisation in the workplace and the required skills necessary for employees to flourish or perform in the new Industry 4.0, followed by the introduction of IT identity, creative self-efficacy and engagement within a digitalised environment and practical implications for managing such concepts. The chapter concludes with a brief description of an evidence-based case study, which examined the role of technology on employee engagement and creativity in individuals working in teams. Both qualitative and quantitative data were obtained from eight participants from four respective teams for whom technology forms an integral part of their daily job. The focus of the study was on the unique experiences of the participants’ engagement and their creative self-efficacy using digital technologies. It was found that engagement through a digital platform has both positive and negative effects on employees. Further, findings suggested that IT identity and creative self-efficacy could be viewed as enablers for employees; however, digital platforms were also found to be disabling, especially with the blurred lines between work and personal life, due to the “always-on” culture. The management of these platforms is just as important as having employees adopt to these digital technologies in order to stay relevant. Furthermore, the significance of the human aspect and relationships within a digitalised workplace was emphasised. Overall, the literature and the empirical data presented in the chapter suggest that creative self-efficacy results in creative outcomes, strengthening digital employee engagement.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Subscribe and save.

• Get 10 units per month
• Download Article/Chapter or eBook
• 1 Unit = 1 Article or 1 Chapter
• Cancel anytime
• Available as PDF
• Read on any device
• Instant download
• Own it forever
• Available as EPUB and PDF
• Compact, lightweight edition
• Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
• Free shipping worldwide - see info
• Durable hardcover edition

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Digital Employee Experience Engagement Paradox: Futureproofing Retention Practice

Impact of employee digital competence on the relationship between digital autonomy and innovative work behavior: a systematic review

Engaging the Modern Workforce: Bridging the Gap Between Technology and Individual Factors

Abrams, L. C., Cross, R., Lesser, E., & Levin, D. Z. (2003). Nurturing interpersonal trust in knowledge-sharing networks. Academy of Management Executive, 17 (4), 64–79.

Google Scholar  

Ågerfalk, P. J., Conboy, K., & Myers, M. D. (2020). Information systems in the age of pandemics: COVID-19 and beyond. European Journal of Information Systems, 29 (3), 203–207. https://doi.org/10.1080/0960085x.2020.1771968

Article   Google Scholar  

Ahuja, M. K., Chudoba, K. M., Kacmar, C. J., Mcknight, D. H., & George, J. F. (2007). It road warriors: Balancing work-family conflict, job autonomy, and work overload to mitigate turnover intentions. MIS Quarterly, 31 (3), 1–18. https://doi.org/10.2307/25148778

Arvanitis, S., & Loukis, E. (2014). An empirical investigation of the impact of ICT on innovation in European hospitals. In Twenty Second European Conference on Information System (pp. 1–14).

Arvanitis, S., Loukis, E., & Diamantopoulou, V. (2013). The effect of soft ICT capital on innovation performance of Greek firms. Journal of Enterprise Information Management, 26 (6), 679–701. https://doi.org/10.1108/JEIM-07-2013-0048

Auricchio, G., & Káganer, E. (2015). How digitalization is changing the way executives learn: The road to omni-learning. IESE Insight, 26 (26), 31–38. https://doi.org/10.15581/002.ART-2747

Ayyagari, R., Grover, V., & Purvis, R. (2011). Technostress: Technological antecedents and implications. MIS Quarterly, 35 (4), 831. https://doi.org/10.2307/41409963

Bajer, J. (2017). Digital transformation needs the human touch. Strategic HR Review, 16 (2), 99–92. https://doi.org/10.1108/SHR-02-2017-0011

Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: Toward a unifying theory of behavioural change. Psychological Review, 84 , 191–215.

Bulgurcu, B., Cavusoglu, H., & Benbasat, I. (2010). Information security policy compliance: An empirical study of rationality-based beliefs and information security awareness. MIS Quarterly: Management Information Systems, 34 (3), 523–548.

Burke, R. J., & Ng, E. (2006). The changing nature of work and organizations: Implications for human resource management. Human Resource Management Review, 16 (2), 86–94. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2006.03.006

Butts, M. M., Becker, W. J., & Boswell, W. R. (2015). Hot buttons and time sinks: The effects of electronic communication during nonwork time on emotions and work-nonwork conflict. Academy of Management Journal, 58 (3), 1–26.

Carter, M., Compeau, D., Kennedy, M. I. L., & Schmalz, M. (2017). The content and context of identity in a digital society . Association for Information Systems. Paper presented at the Twenty-Fifth European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS), Guimarães, Portugal, 2017

Carter, M., & Grover, V. (2015). Me, My Self, and I(T): Conceptualizing Information Technology (IT) identity and its implications. MIS Quarterly, 39 (4), 931–957. https://doi.org/10.25300/MISQ/2015/39.4.9

Carter, M., & Petter, S. (2015). Leveraging consumer technologies: Exploring determinants of smartphone use behaviors in the workplace. Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences , 2015 – March (pp. 4619–4628). https://doi.org/10.1109/HICSS.2015.550

Chan, K. A., Oerlemans, L. A. G., & Pretorius, M. W. (2010). Knowledge exchange behaviors of science park firms: The innovation hub case. Technology Analysis & Strategic Management, 22 (2), 207–228. https://doi.org/10.1080/09537320903498546

Chan, K. A., Pretorius, M. W., & Oerlemans, L. A. G. (2012). A relational view of knowledge transfer effectiveness in small new technology-based firms: An empirical analysis of a south African case. African Journal of Business Management, 6 (11), 3930–3940. https://doi.org/10.5897/AJBM11.230

Colbert, A., Yee, N., & George, G. (2016). The digital workforce and the workplace of the future. Academy of Management Journal, 59 (3), 731–739.

Eshet-Alkalai, Y. (2004). Digital literacy: A conceptual framework for survival skills in the digital era. Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 13 (1), 93–106.

Galluch, P. S., Grover, V., & Thatcher, J. B. (2015). Interrupting the workplace: Examining stressors in an information technology context. Journal of the Association of Information Systems, 16 (1), 1–47.

Gatautis, R., Kazakeviciute, A., & Medziausiene, A. (2013). Partial distributed teams as learning practice: Experience from PDT project. In International Conference on Advanced Information and Communication Technology for Education , (Icaicte), 309–312.

Gilson, L. L., & Shalley, C. E. (2004). A little creativity goes a long way: An examination of teams’ engagement in creative processes. Journal of Management, 30 (4), 453–470. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jm.2003.07.001

Haas, M. R., Crisculo, P., & George, G. (2015). Which problems to solve? Online knowledge sharing and attention allocation in organizations. Academy of Management Journal, 58 (3), 680–711.

Harris, J., Ives, B., & Junglas, I. (2012). IT consumerization: When gadgets turn into enterprise IT tools. MIS Quarterly Executive, 11 (3), 99–112.

Hecklau, F., Galeitzke, M., Flachs, S., & Kohl, H. (2016). Holistic approach for human resource management in industry 4.0. Procedia CIRP, 54 , 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procir.2016.05.102

Hirt, M., & Willmott, P. (2014, May). Strategic principles for competing in the digital age. McKinsey Quarterly , pp. 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13398-014-0173-7.2

Holley, R. (2003, October). Developing a digitisation framework for your organisation (feel the fear and do it anyway). Lianza , pp. 1–8.

Huy, Q., & Shipilov, A. (2012). The key to social media success within organizations. MIT Sloan Management Review, 54 , 73–81.

Isaksson, D., & Wennberg, K. (2016). Digitalization and collective value creation (Ratio Working Paper, 283). http://ratio.se/app/uploads/2016/12/di_kw_digitalization_collective_value_creation_283.pdf

Jackson, T., Dawson, R., & Wilson, D. (2001). The cost of email interruption. Journal of Systems and Information Technology, 5 (1), 81–92.

Kane, G. C., Palmer, D., Phillips, A. N., Kiron, D., & Buckley, N. (2016). Aligning the organization for its digital future. MITSloan Management Review, 58180 , 1–29.

Karimi, J., & Walter, Z. (2015). The role of dynamic capabilities in responding to digital disruption: A factor-based study of the newspaper industry. Journal of Management Information Systems, 32 (1), 39–81. https://doi.org/10.1080/07421222.2015.1029380

Karsten, H., & Jones, M. R. (2008). Giddens’s structuration theory and information systems research. MIS Quarterly, 32 (1), 127–158.

Karwowski, M. (2011). It doesn’t hurt to ask...But sometimes it hurts to believe: Polish students’ creative self-efficacy and its predictors. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 5 (2), 154–164. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0021427

Knierim, S. (2020). The virtual office of the future: are centralized workplaces obsolete? Microsoft. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/uploads/prod/2020/07/NFW-40-Knierim.pdf

Köffer, S. (2015). Designing the digital workplace of the future -what scholars recommend to practitioners. In Thirty sixth international conference on information systems, fort worth 2015 (pp. 1–21).

Kuegler, M., Smolnik, S., & Kane, G. (2015). What’s in IT for employees? Understanding the relationship between use and performance in enterprise social software. Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 24 (2), 90–112. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsis.2015.04.001

Larkin, J. (2017). HR digital disruption: The biggest wave of transformation in decades. Strategic HR Review, 16 (2), 55–59. https://doi.org/10.1108/SHR-01-2017-0006

Lasrado, F., & Bagchi, T. (2011). A cross-cultural evaluation of the contemporary workplace and its managerial implications. Social Sciences, 2 (1), 1–15. http://ijbmss-ng.com/vol2no1_ijbmss/ijbmss-ng-vol2-no1-pp1-15.pdf

Liu, N., & Chan, H. C. (2010). Understanding the Influence of Social Identity on Social Support Seeking Behaviors in Virtual Healthcare Community. In ICIS 2010 Proceedings , 161 . Retrieved from http://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2010_submissions/161/

Loose, M., Weeger, A., & Gewald, H. (2013). BYOD–The next big thing in recruiting? Examining the determinants of BYOD service adoption behavior from the perspective of future employees. In AMCIS Proceedings , January 2015, (pp. 1–12). http://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis2013/EndUserIS/GeneralPresentations/12/

Mamaghani, F. (2006). Impact of information technology on the workplace of the future: An analysis. International Journal of Management, 23 (4), 845.

Mazmanian, M., Orlikowski, W. J., & Yates, J. (2013). The autonomy paradox: The implications of mobile email devices for knowledge professionals. Organization Science, 24 (5), 1337–1357. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.1120.0806

Meluso, J., Johnson, S., & Bagrow, J. (2020). Making virtual teams work: Redesigning virtual collaboration for the future. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/wehsk

Mittal, S., & Dhar, R. L. (2015). Transformational leadership and employee creativity: Mediating role of creative self-efficacy and moderating role of knowledge sharing. Management Decision, 53 (5), 894–910. https://doi.org/10.1108/MD-07-2014-0464

Myers, K. R., Tham, W. Y., Yin, Y., Cohodes, N., Thursby, J. G., Thursby, M. C., et al. (2020). Unequal effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on scientists. Nature Human Behaviour, 4 (Sept), 880–883. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-020-0921-y

Oldham, G. R., & Da Silva, N. (2015). The impact of digital technology on the generation and implementation of creative ideas in the workplace. Computers in Human Behavior, 42 , 5–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2013.10.041

Paquet, R. (2009). Technology trends you cannot afford to ignore. Gartner , 1–26.

Preda, A., Crisan, D., & Stanica, J. (2014). The impact of ICT on innovation performance in Europe. Case of Romania. Journal of Information Systems & Operations Management, 8 (1), 197–206. http://www.rebe.rau.ro/RePEc/rau/jisomg/Su14/JISOM-SU14-A16.pdf

Pulakos, E. D., Kantrowitz, T., & Schneider, B. (2019). What leads to organizational agility: it’s not what you think. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 71 (4), 305–320. https://doi.org/10.1037/cpb0000150

Richter, A. W., Hirst, G., van Knippenberg, D., & Baer, M. (2012). Creative self-efficacy and individual creativity in team contexts: Cross-level interactions with team informational resources. Journal of Applied Psychology, 97 (6), 1282–1290. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0029359

Savic, D. (2020). COVID-19 and work from home: Digital transformation of the workforce. The Grey Journal, 16 (2), 101–104. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/341493908

Shamim, S., Cang, S., Yu, H., & Li, Y. (2016, October). Management approaches for Industry 4.0: A human resource management perspective. In 2016 IEEE Congress on Evolutionary Computation, CEC 2016 (pp. 5309–5316). https://doi.org/10.1109/CEC.2016.7748365

Shanks, R., Sinha, S., & Thomas, R. J. (2015, September). Managers and machines, unite! Three things managers must do to make the most of cognitive computing . Accenture Strategy. https://www.accenture.com/_acnmedia/PDF-19/Accenture-Strategy-Manager-Machine-Unite-V2.pdf .

Sonnentag, S., Binnewies, C., & Mojza, E. J. (2008). “Did you have a nice evening?” a day-level study on recovery experiences, sleep, and affect. Journal of Applied Psychology, 93 (3), 674–684.

Sycara, K., & Lewis, M. (2002). Integrating agents into human teams. Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting, 46 (1), 413–417. https://doi.org/10.1177/154193120204600342

Tarafdar, M., Tu, Q., Ragu-Nathan, T. S., & Ragu-Nathan, B. S. (2011). Crossing to the dark side: Examining creators, outcomes, and inhibitors of technostress. Communications of the ACM, 54 (9), 113. https://doi.org/10.1145/1995376.1995403

Tierney, P., & Farmer, S. M. (2002). Creative self-efficacy: Its potential antecedents and relationship to creative performance. Academy of Management Journal, 45 (6), 1137–1148. https://doi.org/10.2307/3069429

Van Bavel, J. J., et al. (2020). Using social and behavioural science to support COVID-19 pandemic response. Nature Human Behaviour, 4 (May), 460–471. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-020-0884-z

van Heck, E., van Oosterhout, M., van der Meulen, N., & van Baalen, P. (2012). Achieving high performance in a mobile and green workplace: Lessons from microsoft Netherlands. MIS Quarterly Executive, 11 (4), 175–188.

Van Knippenberg, D., Dahlander, L., & George, G. (2015). From the editors: Information, attention, and decision making. Academy of Management Journal, 58 (3), 649–657.

Walumbwa, F. O., Christensen-Salem, A., Hsu, I.-C., & Misati, E. (2018). Creative self-efficacy and creative performance: Understanding the underlying mechanisms. Academy of Management Proceedings, 1 , 10208–10215.

Yim, M., Gomez, R., & Carter, M. (2017). Facebook’s “free basics” and implications for development: IT identity and social capital. In Proceedings of the 50th Hawaii International Conference on System Science (HICSS-50) (pp. 2590–2599). http://doi.org/http://hdl.handle.net/10125/41469

Zoroja, J. (2016). Impact of ICTs on innovation activities: Indication for selected European countries. Naše Gospodarstvo/Our Economy, 62 (3). https://doi.org/10.1515/ngoe-2016-0017

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Department of Human Resource Management, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

Lize Stofberg, Arien Strasheim & Eileen Koekemoer

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Eileen Koekemoer .

Editor information

Editors and affiliations.

Department of Human Resource Management, University of South Africa, Gauteng, South Africa

Nadia Ferreira  & Ingrid L. Potgieter  & 

Department of Industrial and Organisational Psychology, University of South Africa, Gauteng, South Africa

Melinde Coetzee

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Stofberg, L., Strasheim, A., Koekemoer, E. (2021). Digitalisation in the Workplace: The Role of Technology on Employee Engagement and Creativity Teams. In: Ferreira, N., Potgieter, I.L., Coetzee, M. (eds) Agile Coping in the Digital Workplace. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70228-1_12

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70228-1_12

Published : 18 May 2021

Publisher Name : Springer, Cham

Print ISBN : 978-3-030-70227-4

Online ISBN : 978-3-030-70228-1

eBook Packages : Behavioral Science and Psychology Behavioral Science and Psychology (R0)

Share this chapter

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Publish with us

Policies and ethics

• Find a journal
• Track your research

• Liberty University
• Jerry Falwell Library
• Special Collections
• < Previous

Home > ETD > Doctoral > 5984

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

So why, d&i a study on diversity and inclusion in the workplace in the digital age.

Dina Abed Abughannam , Liberty University Follow

School of Behavioral Sciences

Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology (PhD)

Angela Rathkamp

diversity, inclusion, perceived management, job performance, employee engagement, employee commitment, human resources management (HRM), digitalization

Disciplines

Psychology | Social and Behavioral Sciences

Recommended Citation

Abughannam, Dina Abed, "So Why, D&I? A Study on Diversity and Inclusion in the Workplace in the Digital Age" (2024). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects . 5984. https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/5984

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations have adapted new models of work that shifted diversity and inclusion initiatives within the workplace digitally. There is very little research that currently exists on diversity and inclusion initiatives in the workplace in the digital age. The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to examine the relationship between perceived management involvement in diversity and inclusion initiatives and employee performance, commitment, and engagement. Additionally, this study sought out to determine whether work location (remote, hybrid, onsite) moderated the relationship between the perceived management involvement in diversity and inclusion initiatives and employee performance, commitment, and engagement to bridge the gap in literature. A quantitative, correlational design was used to examine the relationship between the independent variable of this proposed study (manager/ employer involvement) on the dependent variables (employee performance, commitment, and engagement) while work location acted as a moderating variable (in-person, hybrid, virtual). Multiple regression analysis was used for data analysis. The results found a significant and positive correlation between management involvement on diversity and inclusions initiatives and employee engagement, performance, and commitment within the workplace while mode of work moderated the relationship with perceived employee engagement, performance, and commitment, and perceived management involvement in diversity and inclusion initiatives. These findings emphasize the importance of management involvement in the workplace and the impact of organizational involvement on employee functioning.

Since August 29, 2024

Included in

Psychology Commons

• Collections
• Faculty Expert Gallery
• Theses and Dissertations
• Conferences and Events
• Open Educational Resources (OER)
• Explore Disciplines

Advanced Search

• Notify me via email or RSS .

Faculty Authors

• Submit Research
• Expert Gallery Login

Student Authors

• Undergraduate Submissions
• Graduate Submissions
• Honors Submissions

Home | About | FAQ | My Account | Accessibility Statement

Privacy Copyright

More From Forbes

Why we don’t need to fear ‘digital’ employees.

• Share to Facebook
• Share to Twitter
• Share to Linkedin

Three professionals collaborating on a project behind a laptop

A software company made headlines recently when it announced it would give its “digital” workers official employee records, onboarding and training them just like a human employee. HR software business Lattice claimed to have “made history” by integrating its digital workers, powered by artificial intelligence, alongside its human staff. But not everyone was quite so enthusiastic - after a surge of online backlash to the announcement, just three days later the company said it would no longer treat its AI employees in the same way.

There’s no denying that AI will transform how we work. There are a broad range of predictions for how this will play out, from the International Monetary Fund suggesting 40% of jobs to be affected by generative AI tools such as ChatGPT, to McKinsey forecasting that up to 30% of hours worked could be automated by 2030. Whichever prediction becomes a reality, this level of change is destabilizing for the current workforce, and something leaders need to handle with care rather than seeking a publicity campaign.

While the level and speed of disruption AI brings to business seems overwhelming, we have been here before. Before March 2020 and the arrival of the pandemic, many businesses still believed that employees working from home would mean a slump in productivity and that their goals would not be achieved. Companies quickly pivoted to online meetings and new workflows, and although there may have been a few teething problems, targets were still met and teams achieved a better work-life balance in the process.

So when it comes to meeting the unknown challenges of AI, businesses have shown they can adapt to this level of change already. AI is simply the next hurdle to overcome - something we need to adapt to and move forward with - as much about a mindset shift as anything else. As with the pandemic, there will be a fear of the unknown, not helped by fear-mongering headlines or the dizzying array of AI-powered products on the market. Ultimately it will be about how we use AI to our advantage, rather than it replacing jobs and controlling how we do business.

After all, customers still want to deal with people, so incorporating “digital” employees into the business is a misnomer. McKinsey’s research shows that, alongside demand for the technical skills required to make the most of AI, demand for social and emotional skills will also rise as these cannot be replaced by an algorithm. Similarly, businesses will be looking to recruit or develop people with critical thinking skills and creativity - people that who can offer an edge over the computer-generated outcomes of AI tools.

‘Strap In’—Fed Suddenly Braced For A U.S. Dollar ‘Crisis’ That’s Predicted To Spark ‘Total Collapse’ And A ‘Critical’ Bitcoin Price ‘Tipping Point’

Trump vs. harris 2024 polls: harris leads by 6 points in latest likely voter survey, viral ‘chase bank glitch’ isn’t the hack people thought it was.

They will also need to invest wisely, as with any workplace technology. As a CEO I am bombarded with marketing messages every day trying to entice me to buy a new piece of AI-driven software. Many of these tools and companies are still young, so due diligence is required to ensure you invest in a tool that will still be fit for purpose several years down the line. Go back to basics - where are the inefficiencies in your business and how could AI provide a solution? Any other approach is just jumping on the bandwagon.

As businesses embrace AI in more areas, the usual principles of good management apply. Firstly, make sure as many internal stakeholders as possible are involved in the integration of any new system. Team champions will help to ensure that resistance is reduced once employees begin to use it. Accept that there will be hurdles along the way and be flexible. If people feel they can share any difficulties openly, these pain points can be overcome and employees feel like they have buy-in in the process.

Finally, it’s crucial to have one eye on the future and how regulators might evolve their approach to AI across the globe. Companies that embrace corporate responsibility (such as B-Corp certified businesses, of which we are one) will want to adopt AI ethically. Although the European Union is introducing the Artificial Intelligence Act, other regions are yet to build their own legal frameworks to ensure that AI is developed and used responsibly. Being on the front foot by creating your own company - and role-specific guidelines will help your teams to understand where human input comes in, and that it is still valued. Despite some of the attention-grabbing stories we see in the media, AI could make many of our jobs easier and allow us to focus on more rewarding tasks. Encourage colleagues to see the benefits, rather than anticipate a threat that will likely never happen.

• Editorial Standards
• Reprints & Permissions

Join The Conversation

One Community. Many Voices. Create a free account to share your thoughts. 

Forbes Community Guidelines

Our community is about connecting people through open and thoughtful conversations. We want our readers to share their views and exchange ideas and facts in a safe space.

In order to do so, please follow the posting rules in our site's  Terms of Service.   We've summarized some of those key rules below. Simply put, keep it civil.

Your post will be rejected if we notice that it seems to contain:

• False or intentionally out-of-context or misleading information
• Insults, profanity, incoherent, obscene or inflammatory language or threats of any kind
• Attacks on the identity of other commenters or the article's author
• Content that otherwise violates our site's  terms.

User accounts will be blocked if we notice or believe that users are engaged in:

• Continuous attempts to re-post comments that have been previously moderated/rejected
• Racist, sexist, homophobic or other discriminatory comments
• Attempts or tactics that put the site security at risk
• Actions that otherwise violate our site's  terms.

So, how can you be a power user?

• Stay on topic and share your insights
• Feel free to be clear and thoughtful to get your point across
• ‘Like’ or ‘Dislike’ to show your point of view.
• Protect your community.
• Use the report tool to alert us when someone breaks the rules.

Thanks for reading our community guidelines. Please read the full list of posting rules found in our site's  Terms of Service.