Page 42 - WHERE WE WORK - Schlegelmilch

Moving between places
moment. The choice of destination is not determined by their business but by a search for adventure and freedom (Jarrahi et al., 2019; Reichenberger, 2017; Sutherland & Jarrahi, 2017). This often leads them to exotic locations, such as Bali (Chayka, 2018), and in some locations digital nomad communities develop (MacRae, 2016). Also, in comparison to expats, the intensity and frequency of changing locations for digital nomads are much higher because expats tend to stay up to several years in a place. Thus, digital nomads belong to the ‘kinetic elite’ (Costas, 2013). Lastly, digital nomads are not only location-independent but also mostly organization- independent, as they are self-employed or entrepreneurs (Liegl, 2014).
Recent studies have defined the boundaries of the phenomenon ‘digital nomad’ (Aroles et al., 2020; Müller, 2016; Reichenberger, 2017), but otherwise, research on digital nomads has been very limited and dispersed. For example, in the field of tourism studies, a study describes the relationship between the digital nomad community and the locals as 'optional' and detached (MacRae, 2016). Furthermore, studies within the discipline of Computer-Supported Cooperative Work studied how digital nomads work, such as knowledge management (Jarrahi et al., 2019), branding or contracting (Sutherland & Jarrahi, 2017). Both studies emphasize how nomadic workers rely heavily on digital tools to enable work as well as an active community dimension for knowledge management (Jarrahi et al., 2019; Sutherland & Jarrahi, 2017). Also, they found that digital nomads “make places” by “bringing local situations, and whatever resources they might provide, into harmony with nomadic work practices” (Sutherland & Jarrahi, 2017, p. 13). An earlier study in this field also narrates the careers of two nomads in the form of two life stories (Czarniawska, 2013). This making of places emphasizes the necessity to “bring local infrastructural affordances into sync with more global, more broadly accessible infrastructural elements” (Sutherland & Jarrahi, 2017, p. 13) and suggests that despite these worker's highly digital work practices, place may be more in the foreground of organizing than we know so far.
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