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The article sought to address real or perceived “teleworking hesitancy” by generating empirical evidence on employee exposure to teleworking in a global south context. The results of the empirical investigation were integrated with the growing body of research on the future of the post-pandemic workplace. The results depicted the opposite and significant effects of perceived workload and organizational teleworking support on employee teleworking experience and the (growing) desire to utilize flexible working options. Furthermore, the results showed the significant effects of nonwork demands (negative) and resources (positive) on work engagement and the moderating role of external support contacts. The results further affirmed the mediating role of work engagement on perceived productivity. Based on these results, incremental “A-E” policy and practice considerations that place talent at the heart of organizational efforts to remain sustainably future-fit are proposed. The proposed policies and practices carry a futuristic bias, a conscious recognition that the future workplace will be “hybrid.” Areas for future research are presented.

The Decent Work Agenda recognises the role of work and work-related contexts in giving meaning, fulfilment, opportunities for development and growth to the employed and those who aspire to work. The Decent Work Scale (DWS) is a commonly referenced measure to appreciate the experience of decent work in organizations. Limited research has examined the quality of the DWS measurement model in the developing countries, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. This study examined the factor structure of the DWS using bifactor modelling. The study also conducted invariance tests using multi-group confirmatory factor analysis. Last, the study evaluated the predictive validity of the decent work construct using covariance-based structural equation modelling. A probability sample from a large manufacturing firm in Zimbabwe informed the analysis. Bifactor analysis suggested the presence of a strong underlying general factor for DWS. The measure was invariant across gender groups. Decent work had significant, positive relationships with organisational learning and work engagement.

Orientation: Working from home eliminated the work–nonwork divide. The lives of employees at home were instantaneously connected to their engagement and productivity at work. The mechanisms and pathways through which an individual’s access to and management of nonwork resources and demands influence behaviours and outcomes at work have been scantily investigated.Research purpose: Hinged primarily on the conservation of resources theory, the study examined the influence of the external support, nonwork demands and resources on work engagement and employee productivity.Motivation for the study: Understanding how work–nonwork resources and demands interact(ed) to shape behaviour and outcomes in the work domain could shape cross-domain resource conservation and enhancement efforts.Research approach/design and method: Data were collected from a convenient sample of 185 nongovernmental organisation employees using a standard questionnaire. Structural models, with bootstrapping, were used to evaluate the hypothesised moderating and mediating effects.Main findings: Nonwork resources were positively associated with work engagement. External support moderated the negative relationship between nonwork demands and work engagement. Work engagement mediated the effects of nonwork resources and nonwork demands on employee productivity.Practical/managerial implications: Organizational leaders should appreciate the ecological conditions within which work and nonwork resources are generated and expended. This has implications on desirable, value creating workplace behaviours and related outcomes.Contribution/value-add: The study further exposed the interdependence of the work and non-work domains. Workplaces that enrich both domains will likely enjoy sustained value generation.

Practical and managerial implications: Despite the intensification and extensification of work characterising teleworking environments, the results affirm a growing desire to utilise telework opportunities as circumstances permit. Ensuring access to and availability of appropriate telework resources is paramount to satisfying this desire. Contribution or value-add:Insights on employee desires and the associated influence levers offer leadership teams an opportunity to translate them into dedicated actions that enhance the employee experience, and by extension, create thriving organisations.

Purpose Exposure to a public health threat of significant proportions made current models inadequate to explain the failure phenomenon in small businesses. Hence, the need to reimagine the phenomenon. Borrowing from the principles of biology, this study extended theoretical and empirical perspectives on the failure phenomenon by unpacking its constituent elements and the measurement metrics using the regeneration lens. Design/methodology/approach Based on a cohort tracked over time, the study estimated the survival probabilities of small and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs) with and without regeneration using the Kaplan–Meier method. The study investigated the factors that predict enterprise regenerative capacity using the multivariate Cox proportional hazard ratios. Findings Rates of interruption in business activity, by month, ranged between 0% and 18% during the follow-up period. True mortality rates hovered between 0% and 4% over the same period. Over three in five SMEs that experienced interruption in business activity without ceasing operations regenerated at some point in time during the follow-up period. The survival probabilities beyond the follow-up period were 0.85 and 0.44 with and without regeneration effects, respectively. Fresh capital injection (+), the introduction of new/improved processes or products/services (+), perceived business outlook (+) and the presence of debt (−) influenced the capacity to regenerate. Research limitations/implications The cohort was followed for only six months. There is a need to continue interrogating the failure phenomenon in other contexts over longer periods using the regeneration lens. Bringing on board academia, financial institutions and other SME-related ecosystem players will be strategic. Practical implications The approach provides a more nuanced understanding of the life and well-being of enterprises under conditions of disruption. Improving the precision and validity of failure-related statistics enhances their utility in policy and remediation-related discussions. Social implications The results did not show significant differences in SME mortality rates between male and female-owned enterprises. The results provide further evidence that the failure phenomenon is ungendered. As such, financial institutions and the SME ecosystem at large must eliminate perceptual gender biases in the financing and other support to SMEs. Originality/value The study used the principles of biology to reimagine the failure phenomenon in small businesses. The approach breathes life into entrepreneurship research and policy.

Orientation: Faced with high contextual dynamics, organisational leaders are looking to resilience as a resource to help their employees manage their well-being as they adapt to the changes. Appreciating the complementary resource streams that help employees adapt or transform the context is an urgent priority.Research purpose: Drawing on the conservation of resources theory, the study evaluated the moderating role of political skill in the relationship between work engagement and resilience at work.Motivation for the study: The quality of the employees’ personal and social resources at work could explain the degree to which they move beyond mere adaptation to thriving.Research approach/design and methods: The data collected from a convenient sample of over 200 individuals were used to construct a hierarchical multiple regression model.Main findings: There was a significant association between work engagement and resilience at work. The interaction term between work engagement and political skill accounted for a significant proportion of the variance in resilience at work.Practical/managerial implications: The result suggests that work engagement and political skill act in an integrative way to replenish adaptive resources at work. Organisational leaders must inculcate and nurture cultures that promote these complementary capabilities if they are to enjoy adaptive advantages. These capabilities are learnable and, hence, developable.Contribution/value-add: The study model deepens our understanding of the integrative mechanisms that nourish employee resiliency.