From Time Sheets to Tablets: Documentation Technology in Frontline Service Sector Managers’ Coordination of Home Healthcare Services

Abstract

Research on service work theorizes a triangle of power alliances between workers, managers, and customers, while studies on electronic health records (EHRs) focus on user experiences. Using an ethnography of a home healthcare company, this article explores how EHR affects the roles of frontline managers in the service triangle. Managers using traditional paperwork perform mediational authority. They interpret accounts from workers and clients to create an official record. Managers using app-based EHR software perform directive authority by telling staff how to document, but they lack the power to directly alter the record. Thus, documentation technologies have unintended implications for roles and relationships in service sector work.