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1 – 10 of over 148000Vanessa Sandra Bernauer, Barbara Sieben and Axel Haunschild
With a focus on service encounters in the luxury segment of hospitality and tourism, the authors analyse how inherent social class distinctions and status differences are…
Abstract
Purpose
With a focus on service encounters in the luxury segment of hospitality and tourism, the authors analyse how inherent social class distinctions and status differences are (re-)produced and which role gender plays in this process of “doing class”.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors combine concepts of class work and inequality regimes with a focus on intersections of class and gender. The empirical study is based on interviews in Germany with first-class flight attendants, five-star hotel employees, and luxury customers on how they perceive and legitimize luxury services, working conditions and status differences.
Findings
The authors identify perceptions and practices of status enhancement and status dissonance among luxury service workers, as well as gender practices and meanings such as specific feminized roles service workers take on. The authors also conceptualize these intersecting patterns of inequality reproduction as “gendered class work”.
Originality/value
The study broadens empirical accounts of labour relations in the service industries. The concept of organizational class work is extended towards worker–customer interactions. With the concept of gendered class work, the authors contribute to research on the intersectionality of class and gender and the reproduction of inequalities.
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Jean Elizabeth Wallace and Tom Buchanan
This study aims to explore how status differences relate to strained working relationships with co-workers and clients. Two statuses, gender and occupation, are examined using…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore how status differences relate to strained working relationships with co-workers and clients. Two statuses, gender and occupation, are examined using data from veterinarians and animal health technologists (AHTs). Competing perspectives regarding exposure to stressful relationships and access and effectiveness of work-related resources are considered.
Design/methodology/approach
An explanatory sequential mixed-methods design is used that combines quantitative survey data with open-ended qualitative data. The survey data are used to examine how interpersonal strain and access to work-related resources vary by status. The qualitative data are used to illustrate how strain is experienced by these workers and aids in interpreting the quantitative findings.
Findings
Status is linked to interpersonal client strain and access to resources. Challenging work is widely available to all three groups, but is more beneficial in reducing higher status veterinarians’ client strain. Autonomy is a scarce resource for the lowest status group (female AHTs), yet appears effective in reducing co-worker strain for everyone. Unexpectedly, work overload and market concerns appear to aggravate work-related strain and greater numbers of the lowest status group exacerbates interpersonal tensions with clients.
Originality/value
This paper contributes by examining stressful interactions experienced by two occupations who work side-by-side in the same employment settings, but who vary significantly by gender representation and occupational status. The authors argue that in addition to gender and occupational status, the organizational health of employing clinics and the feminization of veterinary practice may offer insights into how status differences are related to interpersonal conflict experienced in these work places.
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Managerial mindset and cognitive bias can be barriers to any transformation strategy. In the case of telework, most employees express willingness to telework, yet, few firms…
Abstract
Purpose
Managerial mindset and cognitive bias can be barriers to any transformation strategy. In the case of telework, most employees express willingness to telework, yet, few firms formally enable it during regular business hours. The status quo is a daily commute to the traditional workplace. The purpose of this paper is to test framing interventions designed to harness cognitive biases through choice architecture.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing upon behavioral strategy and prospect theory, this paper presents two studies: quasi-experiments with 146 senior business students and experiments in the field (replication using random assignment and extension) with 84 senior decision makers. Both studies use a one-way between-subjects design and chi-square analysis.
Findings
Findings support the proposition that, although cognitive biases can act as barriers to transformation, they can be re-framed through strategic interventions. Specifically, in both studies, there was a drastic increase in adoption simply by changing the way the choice was presented. Findings in the lab were cross-validated in the field. Observed shifts in preferences provide evidence that embedding the right reference point within communications can frame a decision choice more favorably. Findings also support that a bias for an implicitly perceived status quo can be overruled through an explicitly stated reference point.
Research limitations/implications
It is an assumption of behavioral strategy that most individuals simply respond to the gains/loss framing without being influenced by other psychological or contextual factors, and though these effects dissipate through aggregation, it is a limitation nonetheless. Indeed, using an individual construct to explain an organizational phenomenon is a well-debated topic in the field of strategy, with proponents on both sides. The distinguishing factor, here, is that behavioral strategists are only interested in results at the aggregated level.
Practical implications
Practitioners attempting to roll out telework adoption, or any transformation, now have proven strategies for designing frames of reference that intervene against and harness the power of loss aversion and the status quo.
Social implications
This paper measures micro processes that have an effect at the macro level. It explains systematic aversion to adoption as an aggregation of decision-making behavior that is seemingly subconscious. In doing so, it highlights the impact of bounded rationality perpetuated through social systems, while measuring effective interventions designed to make systematic behavior more predictable.
Originality/value
A novel contribution is made in designing/testing a new frame for systematic resistance to change that frames the status quo as the losing prospect. In this frame, the perceived loss is in the choice not to change, and loss aversion proves to be an effective tool for facilitating systematic change.
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Antje Schwarz, Ayhan Adams and Katrin Golsch
This study analyzes the effects of gender and occupational status differences on parents’ work-to-family conflicts, comparing COVID-19 pandemic and pre-pandemic periods. It is…
Abstract
This study analyzes the effects of gender and occupational status differences on parents’ work-to-family conflicts, comparing COVID-19 pandemic and pre-pandemic periods. It is examined whether this association is mediated by parents’ telework. Theoretically, we use the work/family border theory and flexible resource versus greedy role perspectives to shed light on the gender- and status-related use of telework and illustrate the influence of flexible working practices on parents’ work-to-family conflicts. Using moderated mediation analysis combined with bootstrapping, we analyze data from two waves of the German Family Panel (pairfam), covering pre-pandemic (2017/18, 2019/2020) and pandemic periods (2020) (N = 3,315). Our results show higher work-to-family conflicts for parents with higher occupational status as well as teleworking parents. Furthermore, we find supporting evidence for the mediation from occupational status to work-to-family conflicts via telework, with a slightly stronger relationship among mothers than fathers. Under the consideration of the pandemic, the mediating effect was only provable for mothers but not for fathers. However, the mediating effect of telework does not strengthen under the pandemic conditions. Our findings support the greedy role perspective, in particular for employees with higher-status occupations, and the assumption of a negative influence of work–family integration through telework for work-to-family conflicts.
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Heather C. Vough, Joseph P. Broschak and Gregory B. Northcraft
Many workers today are employed under a variety of nonstandard work arrangements, such as contract work and agency temporary work. While prior research has shown that the use of…
Abstract
Many workers today are employed under a variety of nonstandard work arrangements, such as contract work and agency temporary work. While prior research has shown that the use of nonstandard workers can be detrimental to standard workers’ attitudes and behaviors, producing conflict between nonstandard and standard employees, that research has not shown how or why. We propose a model in which threat to status of, and accommodation by, standard workers cause negative reactions to nonstandard workers, contingent upon the competence of nonstandard workers. The model helps explain how subtle differences among seemingly similar nonstandard work arrangements can produce dramatically different challenges to work group effectiveness. Implications for the effective blending of work groups are discussed.
Cara-Lynn Scheuer and Catherine Loughlin
The purpose of this paper is to help organizations capitalize on the potential advantages of age diversity by offering insight into two new moderators in the age diversity, work…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to help organizations capitalize on the potential advantages of age diversity by offering insight into two new moderators in the age diversity, work group performance relationship – status congruity and cognition-based trust.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors surveyed 197 employees and 56 supervisors across 59 work groups to test for the moderating effects of status congruity and cognition-based trust on the age diversity, work group performance relationship.
Findings
The results demonstrated, on the one hand, that under conditions of status congruity (i.e. when there were high levels of perceived status legitimacy and veridicality) and/or when perceptions of cognition-based trust were high within the group, the relationship between age diversity and work group performance was positive. On the other hand, under conditions of status incongruity and/or low levels of cognition-based trust, this relationship was negative.
Research limitations/implications
The findings contribute to the literature by being the first to provide empirical evidence for the theorized effects of status on the performance of age-diverse work groups and also by demonstrating the effects of cognition-based trust in a new context – age-diverse work groups.
Practical implications
Arising from the study’s findings are several strategies, which are expected to help organizations enhance perceptions of status congruity and/or trust and ultimately the performance of their age-diverse work groups.
Originality/value
The paper is the first to empirically demonstrate the moderating effects of status congruity and cognition-based trust on the age diversity, work group performance relationship. The study also establishes important distinctions between the effects of objective status differences vs status perceptions.
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The purpose of this study is to examine the association between employment status and financial resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine the association between employment status and financial resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Design/methodology/approach
This study employed US nationally representative data. A financial resilience index was created based on households' ability to pay for basic living expenses and the resources used to meet such needs. Employment status was categorized into seven groups based on whether the respondent worked for pay in the last seven days, experience of income shock since the start of the pandemic for workers' household and reasons for not working for non-workers' household. A generalized linear model (GLM) model was used to examine the relationship between respondent employment status and household financial resilience. An ordinary least square (OLS) logistic regression with no proportional odds assumption was employed to investigate the association between the respondent's employment status and household ability to pay for basic living expenses. A logistic regression was utilized to explore the relationship between respondent employment status and resources used by the household to pay for basic living expenses.
Findings
The top three least financially resilient households include those in which the respondent's work was affected by the pandemic, the respondent did not work due to being sick with COVID or caring for someone with COVID and the respondent did not work due to fear of COVID.
Research limitations/implications
Future research should distinguish the reasons for not working when examining the association between unemployment and household financial resilience as well as their overall financial wellbeing. Cross-sectional data cannot establish a causal relationship. Findings using US data may not be generalized to other countries.
Practical implications
Workers with health and employment risks and financial professionals working with these clients should consider these risks when building household financial safety net. Policymakers should develop measures to allow normal business operations while effectively contain the spread of the COVID-19 virus.
Originality/value
This study created a financial resilience index that considers various household situations, allows both internal and external resources to be utilized to cover basic living expenses and reflects the diverse nature of financial resilience. This study is the first to look into voluntary and involuntary labor force separation for COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 related reasons.
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Chiara Mussida and Dario Sciulli
This paper evaluates how the first job when individuals entered the labor market affects the probability of youth being currently employed in formal or informal work in Bangladesh.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper evaluates how the first job when individuals entered the labor market affects the probability of youth being currently employed in formal or informal work in Bangladesh.
Design/methodology/approach
The analysis is based on data from the ILO School-to-Work Transition Surveys. The authors use a full-information maximum likelihood approach to estimate a two-equation model, which accounts for selection into the labor market when estimating the impact of entry status on current work outcomes. The main equation outcome follows a multinomial distribution thus avoiding a priori assumptions about the level of individual’s utility associated with each work status.
Findings
The authors find that entering the labor market in a vulnerable employment position (i.e. contributing family work or self-employment) traps into vulnerable employment and prevents the transition to both informal and, especially, formal paid work. This finding holds when accounting for endogeneity of the entry status and it is valid both in the short and in the long run. Young women are less likely to enter the labor market, and once entered they are less likely to access formal paid wok and more likely to being inactive than young men. Low education anticipates the entry in the labor market, but it is detrimental for future employment prospects.
Originality/value
The findings indicate the presence of labor market segmentation between vulnerable and non-vulnerable employment and suggest the endpoint quality of the school-to-work transition is crucial for later employment prospects of Bangladeshi youth.
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Francesca Francavilla and Gianna Claudia Giannelli
This paper aims to study the relation between the employment of mothers and the activities of children with the aim of contributing to the understanding of child work in India.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to study the relation between the employment of mothers and the activities of children with the aim of contributing to the understanding of child work in India.
Design/methodology/approach
Multinomial logit specifications of children's activities and mothers' employment are estimated on survey data drawn from the National Family Health Survey 1998‐1999 for all India. The joint specification combines four states of children aged 6‐14 (studying, working in the market, working for the family or being inactive) with the employed/not employed status of mothers.
Findings
The results show that the mother's preferred choice is not working and sending children to school. This is especially true for more educated mothers. Also the father's education is positively (negatively) related to child schooling (work), but the effect is smaller as compared to that of mothers. All specifications yield the result that the probability of children working increases if their mothers work. Higher levels of household wealth play a fundamental role in lowering the risk of child work.
Research limitations/implications
This empirical model does not take into account the unobserved heterogeneity of two types – namely, the residual correlation among the outcomes of mothers and children, and the residual correlation among children of the same mother.
Practical implications
The evidence that children of employed mothers have a higher risk of working suggests that the problem may be related to the low quality and pay of jobs accessible to women in India, especially in rural areas. The policy indication would then be to improve the condition of women in the labour market and also to improve the welfare of their children.
Originality/value
While women's and children's time allocation has been studied in separate settings, in this paper these two aspects are analysed together for the first time.
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Amy E. Randel, Lee Chay-Hoon and P. Christopher Earley
This chapter examines how individuals’ perceptions of others’ task competence, treatment of other group members, tendency to conform, and work group identification depend on both…
Abstract
This chapter examines how individuals’ perceptions of others’ task competence, treatment of other group members, tendency to conform, and work group identification depend on both status and identity commitment. We integrate tenets of both role identity theory and status characteristics theory in formulating propositions concerning which of multiple status attributes are utilized when assessing others’ task competence and treating other group members, when a solo low-status group member is less likely to conform with the group, and when a solo high-status group member has low identification with his or her group. Our theory development highlights the value of integrating these theories in understanding group phenomenon for both research and practice.