Labour Geographies of Workplace Restructuring: An Intra-Labour Analysis

This paper traces the diffusion of cross-functional process improvement teams in a multinational bank's Six Sigma program. Rates of team formation were high where clerical workers received low wages relative to managers and professionals, experienced weak wage growth, were less likely to rise into supervisory positions, and formed a shrinking proportion of bank employment; and where managerial and professional wage gains and employment growth were strong. These conditions did not provide a stable basis for participatory improvement, however, and team formation faltered in more stratified work-places over time. We argue that team projects are most useful to managers where recent or ongoing workplace restructuring has marginalized the position of clerical staff. In the long run, quality teams prove ephemeral due to tension between their participatory ethos and the technocratic project they embody.

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How do Restructuring Processes Influence Low- and Unskilled Immigrant and Nonimmigrant Workers and their Managers in a Norwegian Hospital?

Nordic Journal of Working Life Studies ◽

10.19154/njwls.v4i4.4707 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 4 (4) ◽

pp. 47 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Heidi Enehaug ◽

Svenn-Erik Mamelund

Keyword(s):

Sick Leave ◽

Work Environment ◽

Well Being ◽

Subjective Health ◽

Work Environments ◽

Immigrant Workers ◽

Immigrant Worker ◽

Restructuring Process ◽

Workplace Restructuring ◽

Depth Interviews

It is a well-known fact that workplace restructuring has undesirable effects on the psychosocial work environment, health, and sick leave, but no attention has been given to the health effects of work environments characterized by restructuring, a multicultural staff, and a strong socioeconomic occupational hierarchy. In this casestudy, we examine a large Norwegian hospital in which all of these features are present. Through in-depth interviews with employees and their managers we investigate the healthiness of the restructuring process, and the consequences of the restructuring process on the work environment, subjective health, and sick leave. Results show that immigrant workers received less information, had higher level of frustration and less control over work, and experienced a decrease in well-being, autonomy, and social support. Immigrant worker vulnerability, that is, the handicap of poor understanding of the Norwegian language and a lack of understanding of general and local organizational norms and practices in the Norwegian workplace, is an important explanation. Immigrant workers with a poor Norwegian language understanding are even worse off. We conclude that a strong occupational hierarchy within the hospital exerts an overall influence on the position of low/unskilled employees in the restructuring process as well as their perception of and involvement in it.

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