Call centre job functions and the quality of work life: revisiting the job characteristics model.

• Author: Hannif, Zeenobyah
• Position: Report

1. INTRODUCTION

   The concept "quality of working life (QWL)" is a dynamic and multi-dimensional construct that incorporates any number of measures relating to employment quality and the well- being of the worker (Brown et al, 2004). The QWL is an employee-centred concept and therefore focuses on what is fundamentally good for the worker (Green, 2005). Well-being and satisfaction are central to this notion, emphasizing the innate subjectivity that underlies assessments about the quality of jobs (Kalleberg and Vaisey, 2005). The QWL issues raised in the extant literature are therefore, wide and varied, including concerns such as training and development, work life balance, pay, working hours, and occupational health and safety. To narrow the scope, this paper will focus on examining one key element of the work environment in relation to its impact on the QWL: job function. When referring to job functions, the focus is placed on three interrelated elements, which form part of Hackman and Oldham's (1975, 1976) five 'core job characteristics' that relate to the motivation and satisfaction of employees. The first is job content, which aims to measure how strongly employees identify with their job content, and how satisfied they are with the content of their work. The second and third indicators stem from this. Job variety is concerned with the degree to which the job requires different skills and the completion of different tasks. Job autonomy looks at the extent to which the job allows the jobholder to exercise choice and discretion over their work. Researchers (e.g. Hutchinson, Purcell and Kinnie, 2000; Holman, 2002; Paul and Huws, 2000; Holman, 2002; Houlihan, 2002) suggest these indicators hold a great deal of relevance to call centre workplaces, as many are predicated on management models that foster repetitive, monotonous and restrictive work practices.

   The findings reported in this study are based on empirical case study research conducted in two call centre settings. Call centres epitomize the shift towards technology-based work, and have emerged as critical elements of the business cycle of organizations in the new economy. Although these organizations have grown in prominence, the job quality issues that have emerged in the broader Australian socio-economic context, particularly with the transition to the new economy, are also highly relevant to these workplaces (Green, 2005). Green (2005) has highlighted the value of capturing the experience of those in the frontline, given their tendency to be the most intimately acquainted with the work, and thus, their potential to produce the most reliable data. For these very reasons, in this study, the empirical study will mainly be based on interviews with customer service operators (CSOs), whose subjective accounts of their own lives are the foremost source of information. Whilst the findings reported in this paper are by no means intended as generalizations, they do offer important insight into the relationship between call centre job functions and the QWL phenomena.

   This paper will commence with a brief literature review on the relationship between the QWL, and call centre job functions, drawing on the call centre literature. An overview of the research methodology will then be provided, and this will be followed with an explication of the key findings. The paper will close with a brief discussion.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

   While job functions, specifically, job content, job variety and job autonomy, have been investigated in relation to call centre workplaces, the focus has been chiefly placed on the variations in call centre management models. To date, there is yet to be a study that examines the relationship between job functions and QWL, despite a large body of literature that highlights poor job quality outcomes.

   As reported extensively in research papers, call centre work is often depicted as monotonous, intense, repetitive and routinised, dominated by short cycle times and the prioritisation of quantitative call throughput (Connell and Harvey, 2004; Kinnie et al, 2000; Russell, 2004; Townsend, 2004). The lack of control over work scheduling was featured regularly in the call centre literature (see Crome, 1998; Frenkel et al, 1998; Singh, 2000; Holman and Wood, 2002; Paul and Huws, 2002; Taylor et al, 2002). As call centre technologies automatically route calls to the next available CSO, it is the number of incoming calls that dictate CSO workload and pace (Crome, 1998; Taylor and Bain, 1999; Hutchinson et al, 2000). Control over work timing is therefore largely out of the hands of those on the frontline. In many ways, this appears to be another job characteristic that is not only inherent to call centre work, but also potentially detracts from the quality of the work in these organisations. Calls were often not actively answered, but rather, automatically 'dropped-in' to the CSO's phone line each time a call was completed. As Russell (2002: 479) suggests, CSOs from both call centres were "literally tied to the phones" and under the "managerial locus of control" up until the point an incoming call was answered or an outgoing call was placed. CSOs can thus be considered passive recipients in the work scheduling process. Only once a call was answered (either by CSO or customer), CSOs enter the employee domain of control, suggesting CSOs are able to control both the duration and content of the call (Russell, 2002). Russell (2002) also observed that CSOs were required to be available to receive or make calls by being logged on to the system at all times, with the exception of break periods.

   Lack of control and extensive monitoring, including the prevalence of targets, as well as the strain of dealing with customers all day, means that call centre work is frequently experienced as pressurised, intensive and emotionally stressful (Richardson, Belt and Marshall, 2000; Deery and Kinnie, 2002). However, it could be argued that these factors have more to do with work organization than they do job content. As Koskina (2006) illustrated in her study involving nearly 200 call centre operators in four call centres in Greece there are other ways to manage call centre work. Respondents involved in her study held high-discretionary work roles, felt that they had high degrees of freedom and autonomy with regard to what they said to customers and the trust they believed management had in them. Consequently, those CSOs said they found the work challenging and stimulating.

   Those call centres with the goal of minimizing costs and maximizing volume tend to emphasize service standardization, hence, turning the work into a series of "repetitive, routinised and highly scripted tasks" (Deery and Kinnie, 2002: 4) leaving employees with limited job variety and little decision-making discretion (Paul and Huws, 2000; Houlihan, 2002). Alternatively, those organizations that compete on service quality are more likely to design tasks to maximize employee discretion and individual autonomy, in order to allow more individualized service (Hutchinson, Purcell and Kinnie, 2000a; Deery and Kinnie, 2002). Callaghan and Thompson (2002) note that managers restrict autonomy by requiring CSOs to conform to scripting while also exerting control over the conversational process. Sprigg et al (2003) also observe that the amount of autonomy call centre CSOs have over timing and work methods is lower than in every other job for which norms are available. This includes comparisons with the lean production environment of garment sewing (Sprigg et al, 2003). Researchers (see Knights and McCabe, 1998; Houlihan, 2001) suggest that call centres rarely afford their CSOs with autonomy as any increase in employee discretion can prove counter-productive to the fulfilment of corporate goals. Job variety is also extremely limited. Frenkel et al (1998) through their case study research of six call centres found that while selected CSOs may have an opportunity to do off-phone work that allows for more creativity, these opportunities rarely take up more than 10 per cent of CSOs' total work time.

   Undoubtedly, poor job function leads to burnout experienced by CSOs in call centres (see Singh, 2000; Healy and Bramble, 2003) and high turnover rates are recorded in this industry. The main factors that are reported as contributing to high turnover in call centres are: the nature of call centre work, recruitment practices, ineffective training and development and lack of career opportunities (Harvey and Connell, 2004). Whether or not high turnover matters depends on the viewpoint of the organisation. Some organisations are content to function under a "sacrificial HR strategy" where managers accept that after a certain period of time, usually around 12 to 18 months, call centre employees are likely to burn out and leave the organisation. This strategy operates on the premise that it costs more to provide programs to try and raise morale and keep the staff than it does to find and train new staff (Van den Broek 2002; Wallace, Eagleson and Waldersee, 2000).

   While the extant literature highlights the relationship between job function and the various management models used in call centres, so far there has been little understanding of how job function impacts on QWL in these contexts. More specifically, the issue of job variety does however remain virtually unexplored (Hannif and Vo, 2011). Some exceptions include a British study conducted by Holman (2002) where higher levels of employee wellbeing were correlated with employees having greater control over work methods and procedures and a German study of 650 employees in 14 call centres where it was found that only 22.1 % of respondents said they had some say in how work was allocated (Weinkopf, 2006). Furthermore, research conducted by Sprigg et al (2003) suggests CSOs who were active in their work scheduling report less stress and work more effectively than those who play...