Organizational Behavior
PROJECT OBJECTIVES
To complete this project, you must
1. Conduct research to
a. Define the concept of emotional labor
b. Describe, explain, and discuss perspectives on
emotional labor in general as well as in different
workplace settings
2. Conduct limited field research aimed at assessing varying
understandings and experiences of emotional labor
in at least three work settings
3. Analyze and summarize findings from your field research
4. Prepare a term paper on the topic of emotional labor in
workplace settings based on both your field research
and your background research
INSTRUCTIONS
Before you begin, read through this entire procedure. Then,
follow these steps to complete your project:
1. Create your own working definition of emotional labor.
Your definition should include likely effects of emotional
labor, such as fatigue, workplace stress, anxiety, and
alienation. Use your definition to guide your field
research and clarify your thinking prior to beginning
work on your term paper.
2. Use the following sources to conduct background
research. Note: You must use all of these sources for
your project.
a. Robert P. Vecchio, Organizational Behavior,
pages 262–263
b. Online sources
1) Context Magazine, “Feeling around the World,”
Arlie Hocschild, page 80
http://contexts(dot)org/articles/spring-
2008/feeling-around-the-world/
2) Wikipedia: Defining Emotional Labor
http://en(dot)wikipedia(dot)org/wiki/Emotional
_labor
3) “What Is Emotional Labor?” (feminist view)
http://tinyurl(dot)com/kn2zn5y
c. At least one source of your own from the Internet, a
library source, or elsewhere
3. Prepare a survey for interviewing people in different work
settings. On the survey, leave room for notes you take
during or immediately following your interview with any
subject. Although you may add questions of your own,
include the following questions on your survey:
a. On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your
satisfaction with your job?
b. On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your
satisfaction with your present workplace
environment?
c. Are you expected to present yourself in certain ways
to customers (patients, passengers, clients, and so on)?
c. If so, how are you expected to present yourself? To
help the interviewee answer this question, you may
ask one or more of the following questions:
1) Are you expected to follow a sales script?
2) Are you expected to “up-sell” special offers?
3) Are you instructed to always be polite?
4) Are you expected to encourage and
support patients?
5) Are you supposed to smile when you would
prefer to scream or frown?
d. Do you feel stress when you feel one way and have
to pretend you feel another way? Can you give me
examples?
e. When you feel some kind of work stress, can you
tell me how you feel about it? (If interviewees need
help answering this question, you may ask, “Does
stress make you feel tired? Frustrated? Amused?
Irritable? Sad?”)
4. Follow these guidelines for conducting your research:
a. Interview people in at least three different work settings.
Your subjects might include fast-food workers,
bus or taxi drivers, firefighters, law enforcement officers,
sanitation workers, bank tellers, airline flight
attendants, public school teachers, paramedics, and
social workers—to offer some examples.
b. Interview at least two people from each work setting.
c. To find individuals to interview, begin making contacts
through people you know.
d. During the interview, complete the surveys yourself.
Don’t ask the subjects to fill out the forms.
e. Before beginning an interview, tell each subject that
his or her responses will be anonymous. Indeed, it’s
advisable to create fictitious names for particular
work venues, for the subjects themselves, and for
any persons mentioned by the subjects. Also, inform
each subject that your written report is for a course,
and that it will not be published anywhere.
f. Allow your respondents to speak freely. Don’t allow
your survey form to keep you from taking notes on
unexpected comments, observations, and information
provided by subjects. In other words, keep an
open mind.
g. Don’t record an interview on any electronic device,
such as a tape recorder, cell phone, or camcorder,
without the express permission of the subject. If you
do record any interview, destroy or delete any such
digital information upon completion of your
research project.
5. Prepare a five- to eight-page term paper based on your
research. Draft your paper on the basis of your background
reading and your field research. Edit and revise
your draft prior to submitting it to your instructor.
7. Use the following outline as a suggested guide for the
body of your paper:
a. Introduction. Summarize your paper. Briefly
describe what the paper is about and how you went
about writing it.
b. Emotional Labor: Psychological Stress in the
Workplace. Describe emotional labor, including
different perspectives on its nature and its psychological
costs. The material for this section should
come mainly from your background research.
c. Interviews. Explain what you learned from your
interviews, including anecdotal material to engage
the reader and, to a limited extent, offer your interpretations
and impressions.
d. Summary and conclusion. Discuss your overall
impressions, your view on the causes of emotional
labor, and perhaps, how it might be managed or
reduced.
Emotional labor
Student:
Professor:
Course title:
Date:
The term emotional labor in the field of work has begun to exist in the recent past. it can be said to be the kind of work t hat involves dealing with feelings of other people as the basic prescription of one’s duty. It is a notion perceived by many as care and service job. Generally, emotional labor is perceived in different perspectives. Also at specific work places it is viewed at different angles. This paper analysis the different perspectives of emotional labor, generally and in three different work places. Limited research was carried out in order to come up with the different perspectives of emotional labor at different work places.
Emotional labor
Wikipedia alludes that emotional labor is simply said to be the kind of work that requires the employees to express some required emotions that are stipulated by the management. Emotions are complex states of the mind which elicit physical and psychological changes that will affect behavior. Although at every work place, workers exercise some form of emotion, some work places require emotional labor than others. This view is because of the nature of the work that they do where withholding the necessary emotions would mean less productivity. Thus, there would be underperformance which could result to downfall of the organization and subsequent loss of jobs. Emotional labor is more common in service providing ventures than in manufacturing organizations. This notion emanates from the fact that emotions are directed to fellow human beings are not necessary in dealing with products without the presence of other persons.
Wikipedia notes that emotional labor sometimes amounts to psychological stress because the employees may, sometimes be unable to meet the standards of emotions required in their work. The effects associated with it then begin to appear in the form of anxiety, fatigue and workplace stress.
Allen, Diefendorff & Ma (2014) claim that; as many businesses shift from manufacturing of goods to provision of services, there emerges more need for emotional labor. This requires that the employees have the knowledge and the right perspective concerning emotional labor.
Perspectives on emotional labor
According to Context magazine; different people have different perception of emotional labor. Emotional labor is viewed as the kind of labor that requires face to face or voice to voice interaction with the client. It is also perceived as the kind of work that requires the employee to produce a kind of emotion to the client. Emotional labor is also described as the kind of labor that allows the managers to have control on the emotions of the employees through training and supervision.
Allen, Diefendorff & Ma (2014) maintain that emotional labor is perceived as involving three dimensions. These are, cognitive, bodily and expressive. Cognitive dimension is of emotional labor is whereby; the employee is expected to make deliberate attempts to change the images and ideas associated with an emotion. For instance, a person could associate a family photo with happiness. Bodily perspective is whereby; physical activities are associated with changes of emotion. For instance, breathing deeply so as to reduce the emotion of anger. Expressive dimension of emotion is whereby, a person attempts to display expressive gestures in order to reveal an inner feeling. For instance, when one is trying to express the feeling of happiness, he may make attempts to smile.
According to ‘What is Emotional Labor’ (feminist view) many people associate emotional labor with the private sector but, even in the public sector, emotional labor is still applicable. This field require management just like any other area because, emotional labor need to be applied according to the requirement of the employer.
Rathi (2014) suggests that; employers should make efforts to put measures in place for management of emotional labor. This view is from the understanding that, emotional labor requires management just like any other form of labor. In order to come up with high quality management, the managers need to have knowledge on the emotional labor.
Emotional labor in hospi...
👀 Other Visitors are Viewing These APA Essay Samples:
-
Radio Shack
3 pages/≈825 words | 4 Sources | APA | Business & Marketing | Research Paper |
-
Unit VIII: Importance of Business Ethics
5 pages/≈1375 words | 10 Sources | APA | Business & Marketing | Research Paper |
-
Radio Shack's Brand Positioning
4 pages/≈1100 words | 4 Sources | APA | Business & Marketing | Research Paper |