Complimenting Invisible Work: Identifying Hidden Employee Contributions through a Voluntary, Positive, and Open Work Review System

Invisible work is an important CSCW research agenda, and also integral to operations within companies. To reveal these hidden practices, studies to date have suggested that companies use IT systems to share location, task progress, and enquiry information among employees, or to conduct research work which identifies informal practices. In this paper, we examine a work review system, in the form of a smartphone app feature, to identify hidden employees’ contributions. This Complimenting Feature, developed in April 2017 by an air cargo handling company in Hong Kong, allows its terminal staff to compliment other employees—anyone they like, and anytime they like. In December 2017, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 19 terminal staff regarding their experiences using the app. Our analysis of the interviews found a wide range of invisible work being identified despite the existence of a similar paper review form. We have also found evidence of increased employees’ motivation and social learning.