‘You Can Checkout Anytime, but You Can Never Leave’: Spatial Boundaries in a High Commitment Organization
研究组织边界如何作为控制工具,通过文化管理项目重新定义呼叫中心员工的内外空间划分,将私人空间纳入生产、组织规范延伸至工作之外,引发对员工自主性的担忧。
This article suggests that the concept of organizational boundaries evokes a spatial metaphor. While the scant literature exploring the social geography of organizational life has pointed to the powerladen nature of spatiality, it does so only within the workplace. Our article maintains that the very boundary separating the inside from the outside of organizations is an equally important instrument for controlling labour. In light of the permutations that this boundary is currently undergoing, a field study is presented identifying aspects of a culture management programme aimed at significantly reorganizing the meaning of the inside/outside spatial divide among call-centre employees. This entailed a two-way process in which typically ‘private’ spatial practices are drawn into the site of production and organizational norms are encouraged outside work. The implications that these techniques have for employee autonomy are raised as important concerns.