R-Map collaboration agreement

Remote work has become business-as-usual since the COVID-19 pandemic. However, private and public organisations are still trying to find a balance about hybrid work, namely for the same employees working in the workplace and remotely.

Given the growing capabilities of the Future of Work Research Centre, a collaboration has been established with the R-Map project.

R-Map is a €3m-Horizon Europe (2024-27) project which focuses on the impact of remote working arrangements on the disparities between urban and rural regions. An integrated Impact Assessment Framework based on the R-Map model will be developed by project partners to assess the social, economic, environmental and spatial impact of remote working arrangements. Six use-case areas have been selected as the R-Map focus areas and Surrey features as a main rural and peri-urban area. Other R-Map use-cases are in Austria-Switzerland, Germany, The Netherlands, Greece, Italy and Turkey.

The key output of R-Map aims to allow decision-makers to monitor and assess how remote working arrangements affect people, communities, space, the environment, as well as the local and regional economies in urban and rural regions. By achieving this, R-Map will formulate policy recommendations about creating environments conducive to remote work that are tailored to the needs of local and regional governments in both urban and rural settings.

Establishing this collaboration with the R-Map project is an opportunity for our Research Centre to share our research outputs with international experts and at the same time to learn from remote work policy-makers and practitioners in other European countries. I am looking forward to supporting Nikolas and Tracy in developing this collaboration further by 2027.

Prof Ying Zhou, Director of the Future of Work Research Centre

The R-MAP project has received funding from the Research and Innovation Programme of the European Union under Grant Agreement No. 101132497.

The R-Map collaboration with the Future of Work Research Centre will provide mutual benefit to this Horizon Europe project and to the University of Surrey. Led by Dr Nikolas Thomopoulos and supported by the Future of Work Research Centre Co-Director, Dr Tracy Xu, Surrey contributions will allow to showcase outputs not only to local partners in Surrey, but also across the UK and Europe.