Penny Dick

Dirty work designations: How police officers account for their use of coercive force:

The concept of ‘dirty work’ has much potential to offer insights into processes related to the construction of organizational identities and work-group cultures. In this article, I use a social constructionist framework, to argue that ‘dirty workers’ perform their identities in two conceptually distinct contexts: ‘front regions’ and ‘back regions’ (Goffman, 1959), each producing its own subjective challenges. I use a critical discourse analysis to explore how, within the research interview setting, police officers deal with the moral dilemma of their use of coercive authority. I argue that what is designated as ‘dirty’ within any specific role differs according to the perspective of the observer, revealing the boundaries and landscape of different moral and social orders and how these overlap and compete. It is further argued that, within specific interactional contexts, occupational identity comprises a site of contestation for these different moral and social orders. The utility of the dirty work concept is explored in relation to its ability to illuminate the dynamics of ideological reproduction and transformation.

Barriers to Managing Diversity in a UK Constabulary: The Role of Discourse

The literature on diversity management has tended to obfuscate some of the theoretical and methodological shortcomings associated with research in this area. Specifically, the literature tends to make a number of rather naive assumptions about the experiences and aspirations of disadvantaged groups. This paper seeks to problematize the universalist and partisan tendencies that typify much of the diversity literature by focusing on the issue of ‘resistance’. Using a form of discourse analysis informed by Foucauldian principles, the paper explores how ‘resistance’ to diversity initiatives is expressed by both ‘dominant’ and ‘subordinated’ groups in a UK police force. It is argued that ‘resistance’ is better thought of as a discursive resource that can be drawn upon to justify or account for one’s own organizational experiences and, in turn, the need to both justify and account for one’s experiences is located in broader discursive fields that reproduce dominant ideologies of liberal democracies. The theoretical implications of this position are discussed and a case is presented for more critical and theoretical approaches in the diversity management literature.

The Position of Policewomen: A Discourse Analytic Study:

This article is concerned with exploring issues surrounding the position of policewomen in UK police forces, with the aim of problematizing the notion that women are difficult to retain because they are unable to meet the demands of police work once they have children.The article examines how policing is socially constructed, and why policewomen ‘consent’ to dominant, yet potentially ‘oppressive’ constructions of police work. In the article, the research interview is seen as an interactional context that predicates ‘identity work’. Using Foucauldian principles, the article argues that the power relations operating in both the interview and the broader socio-cultural context are productive of discourses through which individuals constitute their identities. It is this constitutive act that produces women’s consent to dominant constructions of policing because at the same time, this ‘resists’ broader ideological discourses that threaten their integrity.

The Victorious English Language Hegemonic Practices in the Management Academy

This study explores hegemonic linguistic processes, that is, the dominant and unreflective use of the English language in the production of textual knowledge accounts. The authors see the production of management knowledge as situated in central or peripheral locations, which they examine from an English language perspective. Their inquiry is based on an empirical study based on the perspectives of 33 management academics (not English language speakers) in (semi) peripheral locations, who have to generate and disseminate knowledge in and through the English language. Although the hegemony of the center in the knowledge production process has long been acknowledged, the specific contribution of this study is to explore how the English language operates as part of the “ideological complex” that produces and maintains this hegemony, as well as how this hegemony is manifested at the local level of publication practices in peripherally located business and management schools.

Reproducing gender inequalities? A critique of realist assumptions underpinning personnel selection research and practice

Occupational discrimination and segregation along gendered lines continue to be seen as problematic throughout the UK and the USA. Women continue to be attracted to occupations that are considered to be womens work, such as clerical, secretarial and personal service work, and inequalities persist even when women enter traditional male domains such as management. Work psychologys chief, though indirect, contribution to this field has been through personnel selection research, where methods aimed at helping organizations to make more fair and unbiased selection decisions have been carefully examined. Our aim in this paper is to argue that, on their own, such methods can make very little difference to the position of women (and other minorities) in work organizations. The processes that are fundamental to organizational attraction and adjustment cannot, we contend, be understood adequately through reductionist approaches that treat organizational and individual characteristics as context independent realities. Drawing on critical management research and using the specific example of police work, we argue that work roles and work identities can be more fruitfully understood as social constructions that, when deconstructed, illuminate more powerfully how processes that lead to the relative subordination of women (and other groups) are both reproduced and challenged.

Between a rock and a hard place: The dilemmas of managing part‐time working in the police service

The expansion of part‐time or reduced hours working into skilled, managerial and professional jobs is increasing. This expansion is generally viewed positively. Not only does it herald a change of status for part‐time working but also suggests that organisations are taking Equal Opportunities policies and specifically, family‐friendly policies, seriously. However, the emerging literature in this area suggests that part‐time working within professional roles poses a considerable HRM problem. Using an explicitly pluralistic perspective, this paper presents the results of a case study into the management of part‐time working in a UK police force. It is argued that part‐time working has different meanings for managers and part‐time employees, producing conflicting needs and expectations that are not readily reconcilable. The cultural and institutional factors that reproduce these differences are explored and the implications for human resource management are identified.

The transition to motherhood and part-time working: mutuality and incongruence in the psychological contracts existing between managers and employees

In this article, the psychological contract existing between line managers and employees is examined in the context of the transition to motherhood and reduced hours or part-time working. The article argues that professional work norms, including working long hours and being ever-available, operate to legitimise the reduction in career development opportunities that accompanies the transition from full to part-time work in professionalised occupations. On one level, therefore, these norms generate mutuality between managers and employees. When combined with demands of motherhood, however, they fundamentally influence how each party interprets their obligations to each other, generating incongruity and, potentially, a breach of the psychological contract. These arguments are illustrated with the use of case study data collected from part-time police officers and their managers in three UK police forces. The theoretical and practical implications of this analysis are developed and discussed.

Line Manager Involvement in Work-Life Balance and Career Development: Can't Manage, Won't Manage?.

ABSTRACT Line manager involvement in HRM is an increasing trend across Europe. With the numbers of employees taking advantage of work-life balance policies also on the increase, line manager responsibility for this specific policy area is likely to become more marked. In this paper, we argue that line managers have a critical role to play in the career development of reduced-hours employees, but that due to a number of cultural and institutional processes, the extent of this involvement is likely to be limited. Using qualitative data from interviews with police managers and police officers who have reduced their hours, we argue that gendered assumptions, deeply embedded in taken-for-granted organisational practices and structures, operate in ways that encourage line managers and reduced-hours workers to locate career barriers in the psyche of the latter. The implications of these processes for line manager involvement in the career development of reduced-hours professionals are explored and explicated.

The relationship between ceremonial adoption of popular management practices and the motivation for practice adoption and diffusion in an American MNC

The literature on multinational corporations (MNCs) has assumed that the parent is generally motivated to transfer practices to subsidiary units that will improve subsidiary efficiency or facilitate comparison of subsidiary performance. Based on this assumption, problems with the transfer process have been understood as related to difficulties in balancing local versus global requirements. In this paper, we question this assumption. Using case-study data, we argue that MNCs may transfer management practices aimed at preventing longer-term economic and social losses, and implementation efforts may be low. In such circumstances, ceremonial adoption may be a possible outcome.

Bending over Backwards? Using a Pluralistic Framework to Explore the Management of Flexible Working in the UK Police Service

Professional reduced-hours working is a form of flexible working that runs counter to the increasing trend of employer-led flexibility, and exemplifies the rise of the so-called ‘idiosyncratic’ employment deal. Although an emerging body of literature, there is evidence to suggest that despite the claim that professional reduced-hours working provides ‘better’ part-time employment than usually typifies this pattern, it actually confers considerable costs to both individuals and organizations. Some academics have called for a more strategic approach to the introduction and management of professional reduced-hours working, in order to combat these problems. Utilizing a pluralistic perspective on the employment relationship, I draw on data from research in three metropolitan UK police forces to argue that the needs of the part-time employee and the organization will be difficult to integrate. Showing how the negotiation context of the employment relationship has changed and resulted in a power shift from the manager to the part-timer, I argue that the best that can be achieved is a minimal integration of the needs of both parties, and draw out the theoretical and practical implications of this position.