Description
Book SynopsisOrganizations and U.S. workers across the life course indicate increased interest in flexible work arrangements. More organizations have flexibility on the books, but rates of utilization remain low, and both workers and organizations note operational challenges and concerns. Noticing the commonality of these experiences across organizational settings and the need for more in-depth examination of workplace structure and culture not limited to circumstances immediately surrounding flexibility, Lisa Fisher set out to identify specific elements of the structure and culture of work that impeded flexibility in an organization that had a history of struggle with it. Using interviews and non-participant observation to conduct a qualitative case study, she found that the struggle, happening on the ground within the daily processes of work, was not the result of unsupportive management or overly-cautious employees. Instead, she found evidence of something much more powerful and all-encompassing
Trade ReviewWorkers and organizations both need greater flexibility to adapt to the changes that have occurred in the nature of families and work. Yet attaining such flexibility remains an elusive goal in corporate America. This case study of a large corporate workplace illustrates vividly how efforts to enact flexible work arrangements are impeded by larger cultural ideas and institutional logics about work and workers. In so doing, it provides theoretical insights and practical tools for overcoming the obstacles that impede implementation of organizational policies related to flexibility. -- Arne L. Kalleberg, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Table of Contents1. Ideologies and Institutional Logics 2. Tools for Looking Broader and Digging Deeper in Workplaces 3. Findings on the Structure of Work 4. Findings on the Culture of Work 5. Visibility, Connectivity, Reactivity and the System of Silence 6. Interpersonal Cultural Tensions 7. Discursive/Processual Tensions 8. Working within Internal Logic of Workplace Structure and Culture to Support Flexibility
