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Critical Perspectives on Management and Organisations (An ideal worker…
Critical Perspectives on Management and Organisations
An ideal worker & the professional identity
Who is an ‘ideal worker’?
Due to a move towards a 24/7/365 work cycle, employees today are expected to prioritise work ahead of family, personal needs, and even health
Therefore, an ‘ideal worker’ is one who is totally committed to and always available to fulfil his or her work duties
Employees who embrace this expectation is richly rewarded, especially those performing professional or managerial jobs
What is a professional identity?
Role identities comprise of goals, values, beliefs, norms, interaction styles, and time horizons associated with a given role
Two main forms of professional identities:
– Expected: employer expectations and beliefs
– Experienced: own expectations and beliefs
Organisations employing professionals (e.g. surgeons, consultants, lawyers, academics) expect their workers to conform to the ideal worker image
When a worker’s experienced professional identity does not meet the ideal worker image (i.e. expected professional identity) conflict arises
This expectation has lead to persisting gender inequality in the workplace
How do organisations control employees’ professional identity?
Structure of work
The successful performance of the professional role been contingent upon always prioritising work demands over all other life demands and therefore always being available to the employer
Performance evaluations
Reinforcing the above structure of work by rewarding (e.g. promotions, salary increments, non- monetary rewards - stars) those who fulfil such ‘expected’ professional identity requirements
Taken together, the structure of work and the performance evaluation system creates a self- fulfilling prophecy of professionals continuously adopting the ‘expected’ professional identity
How do employees cope with conflicting
professional identities?
Congruence vs. conflict
If an employee’s expected and experienced professional identities are in sync and congruent they are unlikely to experience conflict
However, a large percentage of professionals experience conflict between the two identities
Historically, researchers and practitioners focused on women (based on popular gender norms), especially those with young children as being the main cohort of professionals who would experience conflict, recent research indicates that conflict is not only restricted to them
Professionals cope with conflicting identities by ‘straying’ from the expected identity (i.e. ideal worker image)
They do so by either passing or revealing
Passing: intentional or accidental misrepresentation of membership in the favoured group (i.e. expected professional identity)
Revealing: intentional or accidental disclosure of non-membership in the favoured group (i.e. expected professional identity)
Integrated identity management strategies for multiple audiences
Combining passing and revealing
Factors influencing the use of passing and/or revealing when interacting with audiences
Audience status
Pass to high-status while revealing to same-status audiences
Closeness of relationship
Pass to those distant while revealing to close friends (colleagues) and mentors
Perceived access to formal accommodations
Reveal if having access to formal accommodations (e.g. parental leave) and pass if not
Extremity of the conflict experienced
When faced with extreme circumstances in work (e.g. excessively demanding project) or personal life (e.g. death of a close family member) reveal while passing on all other circumstances
Spillover of perceptions across audiences
Efforts to pass or reveal to one audience (e.g. high-status) can spillover and influence the perceptions held of the professional by other audiences (e.g. same- or low-level)
Passing to high-status audiences tends to facilitate passing to equal- or low-status audiences
Revealing to close colleagues often results in informal re-structuring of work which enables one to pass to wider high-status audiences
Revealing to high-status audiences often results in revealing to broader audiences across the organisation
Consequences of using integrated identity
management strategies for professionals
Gender differences
On average:
– Women less likely to engage to identity management strategies that allows passing to high-status audiences and more likely to reveal
– Men are equally likely to use passing as well as revealing identity management strategies
The reasons for the above patterns are complex – often attributed to women being more likely to utilise formal accommodations (e.g. parental leave) provided by employer than men
Senior audience perceptions of professionals dictate the performance evaluation system
External perceptions and performance evaluation
High performance ratings given to:
– Those who embrace the expected professional identity (i.e. congruent with their experienced professional identity)
– Those who use passing (especially to senior-status audiences) identity management strategies to cope with conflict
Low performance rating given to those who use revealing (especially to senior-status audiences) identity management strategies to cope with conflict
High performance rating results in stable and straightforward career paths and at times accelerated advancement while low performance ratings results in missing out on promotions and/or unstable career trajectories