Monitoring And Surveillance In Call Centres: Some Responses From Australian Workers

Abstract

The call centre industry has grown rapidly both in Australia and overseas. Research on the industry has been wide-ranging, with one strand of the research involving a reassessment of labour process debates about managerial control and employee resistance. This reassessment has been partially sparked by the distinct technological features of call centre operations. Technical systems in call centres automatically distribute calls, and management have acquired an increased capability to measure and monitor employee performance and behaviour. These advances have led some scholars to argue that new heightened forms of control have emerged within the call centre industry. This article examines the extent and nature of monitoring in the call centres of two large telecommunications firms and analyses the way customer service representatives (CSRs) responded to such conditions. The article questions whether increased monitoring and surveillance, characteristic of the industry, can be conceptualised as a new form of totalising labour control. It suggests that control has not proved to be complete. As in other workplaces, workers have been able to undertake a variety of actions that attempt to restore a sense of power over their work conditions.