‘WE RECRUIT ATTITUDE’: THE SELECTIO

‘WE RECRUIT ATTITUDE’: THE SELECTION AND SHAPING OF
ROUTINE CALL CENTRE LABOUR*
Abstract: Call centres are growing rapidly and are receiving attention from politicians, policy makers and academics. While most of the latter focus on work relations, notably patterns of control and surveillance, this paper explores the role of recruitment, selection and training in the shaping call centre labour. The paper uses data from a case study of a call centre (Telebank) to argue that the increased significance of social competencies within interactive service work gives these procedures greater salience and that they are used by management to address the indeterminacy of labour, in part, outside the labour process. Primary data from management and customer service representatives is used to examine and contrast their respective perceptions of recruitment, selection and training. The paper shows the contested and contradictory tendencies associated with how a particular company identifies and then uses social competencies. Tensions in the labour process between the mobilization of employee attributes and the deliberate moulding and standardization of such competencies is merely part of wider and unresolved tensions concerning the contested nature of emotional labour and the demands of quantity and quality in the management of call centre work.

Introduction:
Call centres represent important new forms of work; both in terms of the increasing size of the sector and number of employees (Datamonitor, 1998) and through the nature of the labour process. Understandably, therefore, call centres are attracting an increasing amount of academic attention. Equally unsurprisingly the work process and its attendant control and employment relations has been the primary focus of debate (Fernie and Metcalf, 1997; Frenkel et al., 1998). Given that these employees will be working in an environment where job tasks are often highly scripted and performance is closely monitored, some authors have pointed to the similarities of this work to assembly line production (Taylor and Bain, 1998).
Researchers do, of course, recognize the important differences from classic manual and white collar work regimes. Most significantly the labour and product of call centre work is relatively intangible. Though this is not exclusive of factory work, the emphasis is almost exclusively on the quality of communication. Call centre work is a good example of interactive service sector work, which Leidner (1993) defines as work involving face-to-face or voice to voice interaction with customers. In such work the management of particular attitudes and feelings – sometimes
summed up in the term emotional labour – are combined with product knowledge in order to maximize the quality and quantity of output, often measured in terms of customer satisfaction (Taylor, 1998).
So far, however, little attention has been paid to call centre recruitment, selection and training by critical researchers. This is surprising given that call centres are part of a wider trend towards increasing service work in the economy. In such work, empathy towards the customer plays a key role in recruitment, induction and training (Korczynski et al., 1999). For HR managers this means that: ‘The aims are to select staff with the required attitudinal and behavioural characteristics, induct them into a quality culture and, equally important, but often neglected, retain their services . . . selection often focuses on attitudes to flexibility and customer service rather than skill or qualification levels’ (Redman and Mathews, 1998, p. 60). Restated in the language of labour process theory, recruitment and training may be being used to address aspects of the indeterminacy of labour – the gap between purchased potential and profitable outcomes – normally addressed through rules and control structures in situations of routine work (Thompson, 1989). Suitable employees are thus screened in, as well as unsuitable ones selected out. Call centres, like many other service areas, are putting considerable emphasis on attempting to identify potential employees who are predisposed to become effective customer service representatives. This makes call centres an excellent location in which to examine the relationship between the move to interactive service sector work and explore the effectiveness of human resource policies.
Part of the explanation for the existing limited attention, is that issues of selection and training have normally been the domain of personnel specialists or writers in Organization Behaviour, leaving organization theory out of the picture (Iles and Salaman, 1994, p. 203). Within the mainstream behavioural literature there has been growing recognition of a movement from job to competency-based organizational requirements, particularly in the service sector (Lawler, 1994); which, in turn, leads to the use of a wider variety of psychometric and other assessment techniques such as work sampling (Pearn and Kandola, 1988). An increasing number of studies are also trying to rectify a situation where ‘little research has directly examined the personality characteristics of performance in jobs where interactions with others is a critical component’ (Mount et al., 1998, p. 161). The focus of attention has been on utilizing the traditional five factor taxonomy of personality measures-extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism and openness to new experience – in order to develop more effective predictors of job performance in a service or sales context (Vinchur et al., 1998). Service orientation is assumed to be a stable pattern of personality characteristics that can
be used to identify individuals predisposed to effective customer interactions, and who would benefit from further training (Frei and McDaniel, 1998, p. 3).

Hasil (Bahasa Indonesia) 1:

'KAMI MEREKRUT SIKAP': SELEKSI DAN PEMBENTUKANRUTIN PANGGILAN PUSAT BURUH *Abstrak: Call Centre yang berkembang pesat dan menerima perhatian dari politisi, pembuat kebijakan, dan akademisi. Sementara sebagian besar kedua fokus pada hubungan kerja, terutama pola pengendalian dan pengawasan, makalah ini membahas peran perekrutan, pemilihan dan pelatihan dalam membentuk panggilan pusat tenaga kerja. Kertas menggunakan data dari studi kasus call centre (Telebank) untuk berpendapat bahwa pentingnya peningkatan kompetensi sosial dalam layanan interaktif pekerjaan memberi arti-penting besar prosedur dan bahwa mereka yang digunakan oleh manajemen untuk mengatasi indeterminacy buruh, sebagian, di luar proses kerja. Data primer dari manajemen dan perwakilan layanan pelanggan digunakan untuk memeriksa dan kontras persepsi mereka masing-masing perekrutan, pemilihan dan pelatihan. Karya menunjukkan kecenderungan ditentang dan bertentangan yang terkait dengan bagaimana perusahaan tertentu mengidentifikasi dan kemudian menggunakan kompetensi sosial. Ketegangan dalam proses kerja antara mobilisasi karyawan atribut dan disengaja moulding dan standardisasi kompetensi tersebut adalah hanya bagian dari ketegangan yang lebih luas dan belum terselesaikan mengenai sifat diperebutkan emosional pekerja dan tuntutan kuantitas dan kualitas dalam pengelolaan panggilan pusat pekerjaan.Pendahuluan:Call centres represent important new forms of work; both in terms of the increasing size of the sector and number of employees (Datamonitor, 1998) and through the nature of the labour process. Understandably, therefore, call centres are attracting an increasing amount of academic attention. Equally unsurprisingly the work process and its attendant control and employment relations has been the primary focus of debate (Fernie and Metcalf, 1997; Frenkel et al., 1998). Given that these employees will be working in an environment where job tasks are often highly scripted and performance is closely monitored, some authors have pointed to the similarities of this work to assembly line production (Taylor and Bain, 1998).Researchers do, of course, recognize the important differences from classic manual and white collar work regimes. Most significantly the labour and product of call centre work is relatively intangible. Though this is not exclusive of factory work, the emphasis is almost exclusively on the quality of communication. Call centre work is a good example of interactive service sector work, which Leidner (1993) defines as work involving face-to-face or voice to voice interaction with customers. In such work the management of particular attitudes and feelings – sometimessummed up in the term emotional labour – are combined with product knowledge in order to maximize the quality and quantity of output, often measured in terms of customer satisfaction (Taylor, 1998).So far, however, little attention has been paid to call centre recruitment, selection and training by critical researchers. This is surprising given that call centres are part of a wider trend towards increasing service work in the economy. In such work, empathy towards the customer plays a key role in recruitment, induction and training (Korczynski et al., 1999). For HR managers this means that: ‘The aims are to select staff with the required attitudinal and behavioural characteristics, induct them into a quality culture and, equally important, but often neglected, retain their services . . . selection often focuses on attitudes to flexibility and customer service rather than skill or qualification levels’ (Redman and Mathews, 1998, p. 60). Restated in the language of labour process theory, recruitment and training may be being used to address aspects of the indeterminacy of labour – the gap between purchased potential and profitable outcomes – normally addressed through rules and control structures in situations of routine work (Thompson, 1989). Suitable employees are thus screened in, as well as unsuitable ones selected out. Call centres, like many other service areas, are putting considerable emphasis on attempting to identify potential employees who are predisposed to become effective customer service representatives. This makes call centres an excellent location in which to examine the relationship between the move to interactive service sector work and explore the effectiveness of human resource policies.Bagian dari penjelasan untuk yang ada terbatas perhatian, adalah masalah pilihan dan pelatihan biasanya telah domain personil spesialis atau penulis dalam perilaku organisasi, meninggalkan teori organisasi keluar dari gambar (Iles dan Salaman, 1994, ms. 203). Dalam literatur perilaku arus utama telah ada pengakuan meningkatnya gerakan dari pekerjaan untuk berbasis kompetensi persyaratan organisasi, terutama di sektor jasa (Lawler, 1994); yang, pada gilirannya, menyebabkan penggunaan yang lebih luas berbagai psikometrik dan teknik penilaian lain seperti bekerja sampling (Pearn dan Kandola, 1988). Peningkatan jumlah studi juga berusaha untuk memperbaiki situasi di mana 'penelitian kecil telah langsung memeriksa kepribadian karakteristik kinerja dalam pekerjaan mana interaksi dengan orang lain adalah komponen kritis' (Gunung et al., 1998, ms. 161). Fokus perhatian telah memanfaatkan taksonomi lima faktor kepribadian langkah-extraversion, agreeableness, membangun kesadaran, neuroticism dan keterbukaan untuk pengalaman baru-untuk mengembangkan lebih efektif prediksi dari kinerja kerja dalam layanan atau penjualan konteks (Vinchur et al., 1998). Berorientasi pada pelayanan dianggap stabil pola karakteristik kepribadian yang dapatdapat digunakan untuk mengidentifikasi individu yang cenderung untuk interaksi dengan pelanggan yang efektif, dan yang akan mendapat manfaat dari pelatihan lebih lanjut (Frei dan McDaniel, 1998, halaman 3).