Platform-Capital’s ‘App-etite’ for Control: A Labour Process Analysis of Food-Delivery Work in Australia

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 388-406 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Veen ◽  
Tom Barratt ◽  
Caleb Goods
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Process Analysis ◽  
Food Delivery ◽  
Technological Infrastructure ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Performance Management Systems ◽  
Labour Process ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
Distinct Features ◽  
Process Controls

This qualitative case study adopts a labour process analysis to unpack the distinctive features of capital’s control regimes in the food-delivery segment of the Australian platform-economy and assesses labour agency in response to these. Drawing upon worker experiences with the Deliveroo and UberEATS platforms, it is shown how the labour process controls are multi-facetted and more than algorithmic management, with three distinct features standing out: the panoptic disposition of the technological infrastructure, the use of information asymmetries to constrain worker choice, and the obfuscated nature of their performance management systems. Combined with the workers’ precarious labour market positions and the Australian political-economic context, only limited, mainly individual, expressions of agency were found.

scholarly journals ‘If you are having a go at me, I am going to have a go at you’: the changing nature of social relationships of bank work under performance management

2016 ◽  
Vol 30 (6) ◽  
pp. 1000-1016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Knut Laaser
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Social Relationships ◽  
Moral Economy ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Performance Management Systems ◽  
Labour Process ◽  
The Social ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Work And Employment

Over the last three decades work and employment in the private and public sector are increasingly subject to marketization processes. A defining feature of marketized employment is the rise of performance management systems (PMS). This article utilizes a novel framework of Sayer’s moral economy approach and labour process theory to explore the changing nature of bank work and social relationships between branch managers and branch workers before and after the implementation of PMS in UK banks. This article illustrates how the social and moral texture of the social relationships between branch workers and their managers deteriorated after the implementation of PMS, resulting in the rise of hostile forms of engagement.

scholarly journals EXPRESS: The gaming of performance management systems in British universities

2021 ◽  
pp. 001872672110528
Author(s):  
Btissam Aboubichr ◽  
Neil Conway
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Derived Categories ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Performance Management Systems ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Public And Private Sector ◽  
The University

Performance management (PM) systems are intended to positively influence employee behaviour but do they also motivate significant gaming? This concern is increasingly noted in the literature yet research into gaming and how it arises has been very limited. Using data collected from 65 semi-structured interviews with academics working in 13 research intensive business schools/schools of management in the United Kingdom (UK), this paper demonstrates how PM systems can encourage employees to engage in a range of behaviours termed gaming in order to navigate PM systems. It categorises gaming behaviours into five types: gratuitous proliferation, hoarding performance, collusive alliances, playing safe and cooking the books. The paper then examines the distinctive features of each type and illustrates how it arises as a response to PM systems. Given the widespread use of PM systems and the close similarities in the way they are implemented in different public and private sector organisations, the derived categories are relevant to contexts beyond the university setting.

Performance management in public universities: overcoming bureaucracy

2018 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
pp. 736-753 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nunzio Angiola ◽  
Piervito Bianchi ◽  
Letizia Damato
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Public Universities ◽  
Organizational Factors ◽  
Public University ◽  
Management Systems ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Performance Levels ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Performance Management Systems ◽  
Adoption And Implementation

Purpose Considering a micro performance perspective, the purpose of this paper is to analyze whether and to what extent the adoption of better performance management systems could improve the performance levels of a public university. Design/methodology/approach With reference to a period of four years (2011-2014), the quality of performance management systems of 29 Italian universities (response rate: 48 percent) was examined and the possible effects on performance levels of these institutions were analyzed by means of statistical methodologies (multiple regression analysis). Outcome indicators were considered. Findings The findings indicate the need to go further “measurement,” and to take care of performance “management,” especially in complex organizations as universities, where academicians identify themselves more with their professions than with the organization and where technicians and administrative employees might look at the performance-based reform with “bureaucratic eyes.” A fruitful cooperation between the professional soul and the bureaucratic one is paramount. Originality/value Studies which analyze organizational factors that could affect the adoption and implementation of performance management systems are rare, and use in prevalence qualitative methods or refer to machine bureaucracies, not many to professional ones as public universities. Moreover, the performance management literature in a public university context deepens the topic of the selection of KPIs and the focus is mainly on macro performance or on management tools for gathering and analyzing performance measures.

The Decline of Labour Process Analysis and the Future Sociology of Work

Sociology ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 43 (5) ◽  
pp. 931-951 ◽  
Author(s):  
Damian O'Doherty ◽  
Hugh Willmott
Keyword(s):  
Process Analysis ◽  
Sociology Of Work ◽  
Labour Process ◽  
The Future

Beyond technological determinism: revitalising labour process analyses of technology, capital and labour

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 139-159
Author(s):  
Paul Thompson ◽  
Knut Laaser
Keyword(s):  
Industrial Revolution ◽  
Process Analysis ◽  
Economic Systems ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Technological Determinism ◽  
Strategic Choices ◽  
Work Relations ◽  
Labour Process ◽  
Digital Era ◽  
Critical Commentary

Technological determinism is a recurrent feature in debates concerning changes in economy and work and has resurfaced sharply in the discourse around the ‘fourth industrial revolution’. While a number of authors have, in recent years, critiqued the trend, this article is distinctive in arguing that foundational labour process analysis provides the most effective source of an alternative understanding of the relations between political economy, science, technology and work relations. The article refines and reframes this analysis, through an engagement with critical commentary and research, developing the idea of a political materialist approach that can reveal the various influences on, sources of contestation and levels of strategic choices that are open to economic actors. A distinction is made between ‘first order’ choices, often about adoption at aggregate level and ‘second order’ choices mainly concerned with complex issues of deployment. This framework is then applied to the analysis of case studies of the call centre labour process and digital labour platform, functioning as illustrative scenarios. It is argued that the nature of techno-economic systems in the ‘digital era’ open up greater opportunities for contestation.

Conducting Midterm Performance Reviews: An Exercise for Teaching Performance Management

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-19
Author(s):  
Rebecca A. Bull Schaefer
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Performance Appraisal ◽  
Performance Feedback ◽  
Individual Performance ◽  
Performance Management Systems ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
Performance Review ◽  
Performance Reviews ◽  
Multiple Measure ◽  
Full Class

Although the annual performance review has received much criticism from practitioners and researchers alike, organizations continue to use coaching and/or reviews to maximize employee effectiveness and minimize liabilities. A semester class is a great context to practice skills relating to tracking and reviewing performance. This article describes how management instructors can implement performance reviews as an experiential exercise designed to improve students’ confidence related to receiving performance feedback. During a “Performance Appraisal Week,” instructors conduct individual performance reviews designed to discuss individual students’ class performance and elicit student–teacher feedback. Students experience the emotions of a professional face-to-face review, practice multiple-source and multiple-measure feedback interpretation, engage in performance-related dialogue, and consider plans to meet goals. During a full-class reflection and debrief, students apply concepts and discuss elements of performance management systems, and they build their confidence in how to navigate performance-related feedback discussions.

scholarly journals How can work be designed to be intrinsically rewarding? Qualitative insights from South African non-profit employees

2016 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle Renard ◽  
Robin J. Snelgar
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
South African ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Extrinsic Rewards ◽  
Intrinsic Rewards ◽  
Non Profit ◽  
Performance Management Systems ◽  
Managerial Implications ◽  
Value Add ◽  
Traditional Performance

Orientation: Intrinsic rewards are personal, psychological responses to the work thatemployees perform, which stem from the manner in which their work is designed.Research purpose: This study sought to discover in what ways non-profit employees arepsychologically rewarded by the nature of their work tasks. The use of a qualitative approachto data collection and analysis ensured that in-depth responses from participants were gained.Motivation for the study: Intrinsic rewards are of particular importance to non-profitemployees, who tend to earn below-market salaries. This implies that their motivationoriginates predominantly from intrinsic as opposed to extrinsic rewards; yet, research into thisarea of rewards is lacking.Research approach, design and method: In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conductedusing a sample of 15 extrinsically rewarded non-profit employees working within South Africa.Thematic analysis was utilised in order to generate codes which led to the formation of fiveintrinsic rewards categories.Main findings: Intrinsic rewards were classified into five categories, namely (1) MeaningfulWork, (2) Flexible Work, (3) Challenging Work, (4) Varied Work and (5) Enjoyable Work.These rewards each comprise of various subcategories, which provide insight into why suchwork is rewarding to non-profit employees.Practical/managerial implications: Traditional performance management systems shouldbe re-evaluated in the non-profit sector to shift focus towards intrinsic rewards, asopposed to focusing only on the use of extrinsic rewards such as incentives to motivateemployees.Contribution/value-add: The study provides a qualitative understanding of how extrinsicallyrewarded non-profit employees perceive their work to be intrinsically rewarding, whichbridges the empirical gap pertaining to intrinsic rewards within this sector.

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