Abstract
This essay argues that, during the period following the financial crisis of 2007–8, several different trends, already visible in earlier periods, have converged to create a new pattern of work organisation, a pattern which is now approaching critical mass. Across all sectors of the economy, primary, secondary or tertiary, whether previously classified as public or private, formal or informal, manual or white-collar, high-skilled or low-skilled, this emerging model of work introduces a range of common features whose combined impact is large enough to justify the proposition that a new paradigm of work is in creation, perhaps representing the final dissolution of the normative model that emerged in developed economies in the third quarter of the twentieth century. In this new model, workers are increasingly managed via online platforms, monitored indirectly and expected to produce measurable outcomes. Their work is ‘logged’ in three distinct senses: it is cut up into standard, quantifiable components; it is subjected to continuous surveillance and monitoring; and it requires the worker to be connected to an online platform in order to obtain work. In a curious paradox, work is increasingly formalised even while it becomes less predictable and more precarious, with workers having to resubmit themselves repeatedly for employment, funding, promotion or inclusion in a particular team, and required to respond at short notice to unpredictable demands for work. The ramifications of this development are huge, since it creates major mismatches between the realities of the labour market and other aspects of social and economic life, including welfare systems, labour and consumer regulation and time regimes. The article draws on a large body of past work by the author on work organisation restructuring as well as current research on online labour platforms.
Highlights
This essay argues that, during the period following the financial crisis of 2007–8, a number of different trends, already visible in earlier periods, have been converging to create a new pattern of work organisation, a pattern which is approaching criticalWork organisation, labour & globalisation Volume 10, Number 1, Spring 2016 mass, referred to here as ‘logged labour’
The concluding section draws attention to the convergent nature of many of these trends. It argues that in the economic shake-up following the global financial crisis of 2007–8, several of them reached a tipping point, whereby what had previously been minority practices became normalized.1. The convergence of these trends is leading to the formation of a new pattern of work organisation, with a range of common features whose combined impact is large enough to justify the proposition that a new paradigm of work is in creation, representing a final dissolution of the normative model that was established in developed economies in the third quarter of the twentieth century
By the early 2000s, the use of PCs and the Internet was normal in most companies, with a significant proportion using them intensively in intranets, extranets or full online integration of business processes (UNCTAD, 2004a). Associated with this was the requirement for all employees to possess the generic skills required to use these technologies. The spread of these skills in turn reinforced a trend for workers to be self-servicing, carrying out for themselves a range of tasks that used to be the preserve of specialist administrative support staff: managing their own correspondence and diaries, using online systems to arrange meetings, enrol on training courses, book rooms, process expense claims, log working hours, report on progress or access human resource (HR) functions
Summary
This essay argues that, during the period following the financial crisis of 2007–8, a number of different trends, already visible in earlier periods, have been converging to create a new pattern of work organisation, a pattern which is approaching criticalWork organisation, labour & globalisation Volume 10, Number 1, Spring 2016 mass, referred to here as ‘logged labour’. As these companies expanded, they were able to exploit their market power and the economies of scale they could offer to create a situation where the contractual terms (and the labour processes of the workforce) were increasingly likely to be set by the supplier, rather than the purchaser, of these services (Huws et al, 2009).
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