Workplace communications around the world were drastically altered by Covid-19, related work-from-home orders, and the rise of remote work. To understand these shifts, we analyzed aggregated, anonymized metadata from over 360 billion emails within 4,361 organizations worldwide. By comparing month-to-month and year-over-year metrics, we examined changes in network community structures over 24 months before and after Covid-19. We also examined shifts across multiple communication media (email, instant messages, video calls, and calendaring software) within a single global organization, and compared them to communications shifts that were driven by changes in formal organizational structure. We found that, in 2020, organizations around the world became more siloed than in 2019, evidenced by increased modularity. This shift was concurrent with decreased stability within silos. Collectively, our analyses indicate that following the onset of Covid-19, employees began to shift more dynamically between subcommunities (teams, workgroups or functional areas). At the same time, once in a subcommunity, they limited their communication to other members of that community. We term these network changes dynamic silos. We provide initial insights into the meaning and implications of dynamic silos for the future of work.

翻译：全球工作场所的沟通方式因新冠疫情、相关居家办公指令及远程工作的兴起而发生了根本性改变。为理解这些转变，本研究分析了全球4361个组织内超过3600亿封邮件的聚合匿名元数据。通过比较月度与年度指标，我们考察了新冠疫情前后24个月内网络社区结构的演变。研究还深入分析了单一全球性组织内跨多种通信媒介（电子邮件、即时消息、视频通话及日历软件）的交互模式转变，并将其与正式组织结构调整引发的通信变化进行对比。研究发现，相较于2019年，2020年全球各组织呈现更显著的孤岛化特征，表现为网络模块化程度的提升。这种转变伴随着孤岛内部稳定性的下降。综合而言，我们的分析表明：自新冠疫情爆发后，员工开始更频繁地在不同子社区（团队、工作组或职能领域）之间动态流动；而一旦进入某个子社区，其沟通范围则严格局限于该社区成员。我们将此类网络结构变化定义为"动态孤岛"。本文首次揭示了动态孤岛的内涵及其对未来工作模式的启示。