Organizations and Employee Control

I am confronted with a set of paradoxes that explain my ambivalence and for the most part my critical outlook towards organizations, particularly if analyzed from the labor standpoint.

• While organizations are widely regarded as administrative repertoires comprised of and fueled by individuals who come together in pursuit of some common objectives, do they really act as stewards and custodians of those who partake?

• Do organizations constitute a level-playing platform that brings and knits people to- gether and, in the process, creates and delivers shared yet equitable value for everyone involved? Or are they carefully devised instruments of and by the elite to reproduce – rather imperceptibly – the prevalent social order and power structure?

• Is there something inherently divisive and disenfranchising about the very concept of organizations? Has their identity been legitimized for the economic or developmental value they generate without thinking too much about how they transform, for better or worse, the society at large and its underlying dynamics?

I do not shy away from conceding to the fact that organizations as collectivities have ushered in an age of tremendous economic growth: what was once extraordinarily complex for an individual to accomplish has become downright effortless. Yet, they have also become a breeding ground or rather a persistent and durable source of socio-economic disparities with far-reaching consequences. To understand why this could be the case, we need to delve into organizational control, its types, and how it is enforced and exercised over employees. As I put my mind to it, I can immediately think of four different sources of employee control based on my personal experiences as a corporate worker. I would like to call them physical, psychological, legal, and normative . This should not be construed as any definitive conceptual or theoretical claim overriding any of the existing scholarly work or well-established typology of the bases of social control. I am just trying to introspect and make sense of my own personal experiences by proposing a plausible classificatory scheme.

• Physical: Workers could be siloed into different units and departments and even dis- tributed across different locations, especially at the floor level, to suppress collective consciousness and forestall events of mass mobilization and retaliation. A slightly more plausible scenario involves managing and controlling the flow of information through rigid and often obfuscated organizational hierarchies. The prior literature on organi- zations and social movements underscores the importance of free spaces for workers to mobilize themselves, organize in groups, and effect organizational change (Polletta 1999, Kellogg 2009, and Rao & Dutta, 2012).

• Legal: Workers also find themselves circumscribed because of extensive legal contracts and systems in place. From specifying employment best practices to what constitutes an admissible workplace behavior, a large part of an employee’s individual existence is codified and translated into a bunch of soul-deprecating contracts. Most of these contracts are tilted in the favor of the employer, laying an imbalanced foundation for the so-called partnership of equals. As a matter of fact, it is not even surprising that organizations allude to some of these clauses to justify retrenchment and mass layoffs and foster an impersonal environment that may prompt employees into quiet-quitting and moon-lighting.

• Psychological: Organizations often deploy a combination of monetary and non-monetary devices to create and heighten the sense of dependency amongst its workers. In one of the readings assigned for this week, such tactics have been alluded to as welfare capitalism. The increased psychological dependency – as organizations act paternalistic and engineer systems and processes to become more involved and influential in workers’ personal and professional lives – create cognitive frames that may limit employees’ sense of independence and agency. It could be difficult or rather virtually impossible for them to even think of a life without far-reaching organizational involvement and support.

• Normative: By normative, I emphasise the constraining impact of what is deemed a professional normative behavior in organizational context. Workers are expected never to dismiss superiors or rather act subservient to them as a badge of professional loyalty and commitment. Even the white-collar employees are often indoctrinated to comply with some of these norms and ideals in the name of professional grooming to make their way into organizations and subsequently climb up the ladder. In short, the inability to challenge the status quo and defy organizational control and domination partially stems from heedless adherence to what constitutes professionally normative or acceptable.

The impact of such influence and control would be felt differently by different employees depending on a host of contextual factors. Although the shared part of such experience seems to have been both institutionalized on a so-called professional level and normalized on a personal level to a great extent. While not always true, work can be dehumanizing and self-deprecating for employees if they are simply treated as “means” expendable to achieve a desired end.

As Marx puts it, while a part of labor is directed towards furnishing tangible produce – an object sold and exchanged in markets – it is not only the physical, alien, and power- independent commodity that the labor generates but also the power-dependent part of itself that is constantly surrendered and succumbed to the domination of the elite in the process of bringing the underlying commodity to life. But given the world reeks of capitalism – in both implicit and explicit ways – is it even possible to preclude the vitiation of labor? Or is it a fanciful dream realizable only to the extent that benefits the organizational elite? Is this one of the reasons most workers do not feel committed to their respective jobs? The fact that over three-fourths of the workplace either did the bare minimum or were actively disengaged at the job is itself quite alarming and concerning 1. This leads me back to the question – are organizations meant to subjugate the powerless to preserve and perpetuate the social order?