Social support in remote work: the impact on organizational identification and engagement

With the introduction of Smart Working globally, mainly due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many workers have to face a shift from classic presence configurations to a remote context, characterized by reduced face to-face interactions. This removal from the environmental context may also have affected the quality and quantity of social relations within the organizational context. The study, currently underway and which will involve managers and professionals hired in companies where the practice of Smart Working has become structural post-pandemic, aims to analyze these forms of relationships and social support (both from direct line managers and colleagues), which could be one of the most incident variables in promoting occupational well-being and engagement, as well as maintaining organizational identity. On the contrary, in the condition of Smart Working, an absence or partial presence of social support can create detachment and be negatively related to the development or maintenance of identification. Social support, therefore, could be the variable that guarantees the retention of talents in the company in this period of transformation of working methods in the company.