If you want to think of it as a study aide, useful only as a guide to know what not to submit go ahead, unless you are happy with barely scraping a pass.
Managing rapid change within particular work settings
This essay will explain both upskilling and deskilling of workplaces and the changes that can occur for the employees in the workplace. The essay will first explain what is meant by deskilling, and will provide the theory that the deskilling of the jobs effect the employees job security and removes the need for highly skilled workers to be employed with the technological advancements. After this the essay will focus on the way that chefs have had their profession deskilled by both the outsourcing and pre-preparation of the food that is served in the restaurant and technological advancements that have allowed this to occur. Following this the essay will highlight the growth of highly skilled job sectors in post-industrialised nations and how this has affected the economy and moved it away from traditional manufacturing to one based on professional knowledge based jobs or the service industry. Finally the essay will look at the rise of computer based jobs in the US from the 1960’s to 1990 and how this has coincided with a greater demand for highly skilled professional working in many sectors of work involving the technology.
Changes in the workplace can be caused by a variety of different parameters; one of these is the deskilling of jobs that can occur in workplaces. There are many benefits for companies to change the methods of production that they use and to deskill the work that takes place by their employees through new innovations in technology. Zuboff referred to the process of adopting technology in the workplace as automating, “The process of automating work operations involves the replacement of living labour with technology: thus it is characterised by a deskilling of work” (Noon, Blyton 1997; 117) the automating of the workplace reduces the amount of employees needed to produce the service provided by the company, and those who do remain in their jobs after the automating process find that many of the skills required before the technology was in place are no longer needed, so the company does not need the skilled professionals to produce the service. Deskilling allows for the employer to pay the employees within their organisation a significantly lower rate of pay, this reduces the pay roll and offers the company a larger profit margin. This process also offers the employer the flexibility of being able to hire a larger amount of people to do a job, and as such allows the company to be able to hire and fire employees far more easily. The deskilling of work is often known as Taylorism or Fordist mass production, this process involves a regimented approach to the work that employees undertake. Jobs are made routine and simplified, often with the help of machinery or other forms of technological advancement, for the employer the benefit of this is that people can easily be moved from one role into another due to the low level of skill required to perform the tasks they are given. Braverman claimed that this is “central to capitalist production in its industrial phase” (Sayer, 1991; 50) although Braverman was writing about this process in an industrial sector of work de-skilling is a change that can occur in many areas of work beyond industrialised areas of work, when this form of change occurs those working in this sector can find that they have less security in their employment. Within white-colour jobs such as the design industry, the effects of the deskilling of the job has also been researched, the results give support the Braverman’s deskilling thesis. Cooley’s researched the impact of computer aided design on those employed in this role, Cooley stated that “There is already evidence to show that CAD, when introduced on the basis of so-called efficiency, gives rise to deskilling of the design function and a loss of job security” (Cooley, 1987 cited in Edgell, 2006; 59). This research suggests that the impact technology has when introduced to help companies make profits can often lead to the employees of companies to feel less secure in their jobs. The deskilling of the jobs that these employees undertake can result in a higher level of staff turnover for the company, this could be partly due to the task of hiring an equally skilled replacement becoming easier as the skill level required to design, craft or operate a piece of machinery is lessened.
Highly skilled jobs are not free from the risk of becoming deskilled, jobs where creativity is important to the employees are also frequently standardised with the aim of increasing efficiency. A study done in the hospitality sector of work, found that chefs have a high attrition and turnover rate in work, this can be attributed to the standardisation of their workplace and the food. Robinson and Barron explained that “The application of technology and standardisation can both ensure higher profitability and ease the burden on an underskilled and underresourced kitchen” (Robinson and Barron 2007; 916). The turnover of staff in the chef profession can be attributed to this deskilling of their work, although the business may benefit from the adoption of the new technology and standardised practises, the chefs may feel that its use in the kitchen limits their creativity in their work and reduces their technical skill development that they might otherwise have gained through the experience of more traditional cooking methods (Robinson and Barron 2007). Fine researched the use of outsourcing to improve efficiency in a kitchen; he noted that chefs were often worried about the application of the outsourcing of the food preparation and the widespread usage of these pre-prepared produce. Fine observed that there are “two principle observable mechanisms of deskilling in the professional kitchen: the use of convenience foods, and capitalisation and the application of technologies” (Robinson and Barron 2007; 918).
Deskilling is not the only form of change in working environments that can occur, the opposite can also occur, this is called the upskilling. When writing about the upskilling of labour in a post-industrial society, Bell’s thesis argues that in a post-industrial society traditional power sources such as the possession of wealth or property have become less important, in a post-industrialised society the power is in knowledge and those who possess knowledge have a greater share of the power in the society through this knowledge (Edgell, 2006), this argument is supported in The Brave New World of Work, Beck writes on the subject of this transition from a industrialised economy to one based on knowledge that “Knowledge, not work, will become the source of social wealth” (Beck 2000; 40). Within the upskilling thesis Bell explains that is the key to the post-industrial society, with the economy moving from industrial work to service and professional jobs the change has an impact on many people working within that society. The upskilling of the labour market means that not only those within education have to learn new skills but also many people in full time employment may find that they are being trained or have to learn new skills in order to compete in the labour market. The post- industrialised society according to Bell would see a change in the nature of work and this would result in a larger proportion of jobs being taken up by the service sector, Bell argues that this would see a “decline of blue-collar workers and the increase in white-collar workers, especially the scientific and technical occupational category” (Edgell, 2006; 63). This increase in knowledge based jobs has been recorded by the OECD Jobs Study 1994; the study noted that there was a significant increase in jobs that are typical of a knowledge based economy (Warhurst and Thompson, 1998) and a movement towards this kind of economy with education being the primary source of access to power in the workplace. This knowledge based occupational group has become more prominent in our society as the economy has evolved. To be employed in the sectors that these professional workers are you require a high level of education, often university degrees, as such those seeking employment in a knowledge based society must first achieve a high standard of education. This movement in the job market can cause issues amongst those in full time employment within a society; the workers may find that in areas with traditionally manufacturing based economies the risk of unemployment increasing, with jobs moving out of these towns or cities into countries where manufacturing the goods is cheaper. This may lead to a significant proportion of the population of that town or city unemployed and needing to re-skill or up-skill to increase their employability in order to find new work.
Much of the upskilling of work within society has come from advances in computer based technologies, these technologies can often require an in depth knowledge of the systems to run the programs or provide the input to achieve results. A study conducted in the US by Autor et al. between the 1960’ and 1990 found that “increase in the rate of growth of demand for more educated workers is concentrated in the most computer-intensive industries and those industries with rapid growth in computer investments” (Young-Hwa 2002; 94-95). Autor et al further researched into the possible link between the relationship between the educational upskilling and the rate of computer usage of the workforce in the US and the investment in these high end technologies and computer based jobs.
Deskilling has had a huge effect on the work lives of many people in society, they have been forced to deal with a rapid change in their work lives and have been subjected to a loss of security in their jobs as a result of the deskilling of their labour. Many find that the jobs they are working in have become increasingly monotonous in their nature or that the need for their skills is becoming less important as technological advances are replacing human skill with the precision and efficiency of machinery. Many jobs have seen an increase in production from this new technologies and staff numbers decrease at the same time, this has allowed for teams of low skilled workers to be employed on a less expensive salary than the skilled workers. Although this has largely occurred in the manufacturing sector it has also occurred in professional or formerly professional jobs, for example chefs or clerical workers. However, the UK is now a post-industrial country with an ever increasing growth in highly skilled professions this is where the upskilling of the labour market has occurred primarily. There has been a rise in these knowledge based jobs with an emphasis on educational achievement as a gateway into the higher professional jobs. The knowledge based economy has become a large proportion of the economy in western countries and employers therefore must adapt and learn new techniques and gain more knowledge in order to achieve good career prospects. This therefore, has been the most important change in the working environment for many employees, they must continually adapt to the changing environment to be able to retain their jobs in this knowledge economy.
References
Sayer, D. (1991) Capitalism and Modernity An Excursus on Marx and Weber, London: Routledge.
Edgell, S. (2006) The Sociology of Work, London: Sage
Beck, U. (2000) The Brave New World of Work, Polity Press: Cornwall
Noon, M. & Blyton, P. (1997) The Realities of Work, Macmillan Press: Basingstoke
Warhurst, C. & Thompson, P. (1998) Hands, Hearts and Minds: Changing Work and Workers at the End of the Century, in Thompson, P. & Warhurst, C, eds. (1998). Workplaces of the Future, Palgrave: Basingstoke
Robinson, R. & Barron, P. (2007) Developing a framework for understanding the impact of deskilling and standardisation on the turnover and attrition of chefs, International Journal of Hospitality Management, 26, 4, pp. 913-926.
Young-Hwa, K. (2002) A State of Art Review on the Impact of Technology on Skill Demand in OECD Countries, Journal of Education and Work, 15, 1, pp. 89-109
Hope you enjoyed reading the single worst piece of work I have submitted for anything.
P.S. I can't remember if this was a draft or final version... Submitted way too long ago
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