Call centres illustrate the consequences of globalisation for labour perhaps more clearly than any other form of employment. Call-centre workers sit at the interface between the global and the local, having to transcend the limitations of local time zones, cultures and speech patterns. They are also at the interface between companies and their customers, having to absorb the impact of anger, incomprehension, confusion and racist abuse whilst still meeting exacting productivity targets and staying calm and friendly. Finally, they take the brunt of the conflict at the contested interface between production and consumption, having to deal in their personal lives with the conflicts between the demands of paid and unpaid work. Drawing, amongst others, on organisational theory, sociology, communications studies, industrial relations, economic geography, gender theory and political economy, this important collection brings together survey evidence from around the world with case studies and vivid first-hand accounts of life in call centres from Asia, North and South America, Western and Eastern Europe. In the process it reveals many similarities but also demonstrates that national industrial relations traditions and workers' ability to negotiate can make a significant difference to the quality of working life in call centres.
By:
Ursula Huws
Imprint: The Merlin Press Ltd
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 234mm,
Width: 156mm,
Spine: 9mm
Weight: 248g
ISBN: 9780850367003
ISBN 10: 085036700X
Pages: 170
Publication Date: 07 August 2009
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Professional and scholarly
,
Further / Higher Education
,
Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Out of Print
Contents: Working at the interface: call centre labour in a global economy, Ursula Huws; Global or embedded service work? the (limited) transnationalisation of the call-centre industry, Ursula Holtgrewe, Jessica Longen, Hannelore Mottweiler and Annika Schonauer; Experiencing depersonalized bullying: a study of Indian call centre agents, Premilla D'Cruz and Ernesto Noronha; Double workload: a study of the sexual division of labour among women telemarketing operators in Brazil, Claudia Mazzei Nogueira; Looking behind the line: information privatisation and the reification of work in the call centre of a Brazilian state-owned telecommunication company, Simone Wolff; Call centre work, convergent unionism, and the Canadian telecommunications sector: assessing the Aliant strike, Enda Brophy; Standardising public service: the experiences of call centre workers in the Canadian federal government, Norene Pupo and Andrea Noack; In spite of everything: professionalism as mass customised bureaucratic production in a Danish government call centre, Pia Bramming, Ole H. SA rensen and Peter Hasle; Creating trust through practicing gender in call centre work, Paivi Korvajarvi; Employment in call centres in Bulgaria, Vassil Kirov and Kapka Mircheva.
