search query: @indexterm clerical workers / total: 31
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| Author: | Browner, C. H. |
| Title: | The paradoxical control of american clerks |
| Journal: | Organization Studies
1991 : VOL. 12:2, p. 233-250 |
| Index terms: | CLERICAL WORKERS USA PRODUCTIVITY WORK INVOLVEMENT CAREER GUIDANCE |
| Language: | eng |
| Abstract: | Some of the control strategies used by a multinational manufacturer of communication technology to influence the attitudes and productivity of its clerical employees are described. In an exploratory ethnographic research production quotas were applied to all clerical activities, but workers were also rewarded for creative on-the-job problem solving. Clerks were socialized to regard their jobs as careers and make personal sacrifices to benefit the corporation. The clerical staff's responses to these control efforts are described and analyzed. These responses ranged from superhuman efforts to meet targeted goals to quasi-legal manoeuvres to circumvent them. However, the company's combination of ideological strategies achieved the desired effect. |
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