Digital Transformations in the Challenge of Activity and Work

16Simulating Digital Activity in the Making: Elements of Methodology

Digital transitions are not limited to technological transformations, but embody with them organizational, spatial, social, material transformations and so on. This chapter describes the interest of activity simulation, to globally apprehend the new work configurations that prefigure these transformations, and help to design them. Through two illustrations, it shows in particular how digital activity, considered as a human activity developed within a digital economy, is characterized by very concrete dimensions that simulation devices must be able to account for, in order to help the subjects keep control of it.

16.1. Introduction

The “digital tsunami” (Valenduc and Vendramin 2016) that some media are announcing should, if we are to believe them, sweep away the old worlds of economy, employment and work, replacing them with a now digital economy, a predominantly uberized job and an inevitably virtual job. Faced with this prospect, it is enough to make us dizzy, as it seems difficult to imagine the outlines of tomorrow’s work. How can we plan for it? How can we prepare for it? How can we act on it and put it in our hands rather than the other way round?

Notwithstanding the fact that the announced disruptions are not always considered as such and that the future transformations are in part an acceleration of existing trends (ibidem), it can also be argued that tomorrow’s work activities will always have very ...