This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Web of Science (42) Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Rosenthal, P. Articles by Peccei, R. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Checking Out Service: Evaluating Excellence, HRM and TQM in Retailing

Management Centre King's College London Campden Hill Road, London W8 7AH

Stephen Hill

London School of Economics Houghton Street, London WC2AE

Riccardo Peccei

London School of Economics Houghton Street, London WC2AE

We evaluate a number of the claims made in the debate between the prescriptive and critical literature that surrounds `excellence', with a particular focus on human resource and quality management. The critical literature contains two positions, broadly a traditional control perspective and the other concerned with the structuring of meaning. The empirical basis of the paper is an investigation of an HRM and quality initiative in a leading supermarket company. The initiative embodies many of the prescriptions of the gurus of excellence. We present both qualitative and quantitative data collected from shopfloor and managerial staff. Our findings lend little support to the traditional criticism that, if management objectives are realised, they are achieved through some combination of sham empowerment, work intensification and increased surveillance. Our evidence lends more support to the optimistic view that modern techniques of quality and human resource management can benefit employees. We suggest that the alternative concern with the way meanings are constructed has more plausibility, because the new managerial discourse of quality has affected the attitudes of a significant number of employees towards customer service. However, there was considerable variation in how employees received the programme's message and thus its effects are by no means uniform. Moreover, we encounter an unanticipated and previously unremarked consequence of managerial discourses, that employees use these as resources in their struggles with managers in order to bring managers into line with workforce expectations.

Work, Employment & Society, Vol. 11, No. 3, 481-503 (1997)
DOI: 10.1177/0950017097113005


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				Hooi Lai Wan Remuneration Practices in the Chemical Industry in Malaysia: The Impact on Employee Satisfaction Compensation Benefits Review, August 1, 2007; 39(4): 56 - 67. [PDF]

				J. Gamble The rhetoric of the consumer and customer control in China Work Employment Society, March 1, 2007; 21(1): 7 - 25. [Abstract] [PDF]

				C. C. H. Chiu Changing Experiences of Work in Reformed State-Owned Enterprises in China Organization Studies, May 1, 2006; 27(5): 677 - 697. [Abstract] [PDF]

				J. Hughes Bringing emotion to work: emotional intelligence, employee resistance and the reinvention of character Work Employment Society, September 1, 2005; 19(3): 603 - 625. [Abstract] [PDF]

				J. Belanger, P. K. Edwards, and M. Wright Commitment at Work and Independence From Management: A Study of Advanced Teamwork Work and Occupations, May 1, 2003; 30(2): 234 - 252. [Abstract] [PDF]

				P. EDWARDS and M. COLLINSON Empowerment and Managerial Labor Strategies: Pragmatism Regained Work and Occupations, August 1, 2002; 29(3): 272 - 299. [Abstract] [PDF]

				C. Rees Worker Responses to Quality Organisation: Discourse and Materiality in Organisational Change Work Employment Society, December 1, 2001; 15(4): 743 - 761. [Abstract] [PDF]

				S. Taylor and M. Tyler Emotional Labour and Sexual Difference in the Airline Industry Work Employment Society, March 1, 2000; 14(1): 77 - 95. [Abstract] [PDF]

				I. Grugulis, T. Dundon, and A. Wilkinson Cultural Control and the `Culture Manager': Employment Practices in a Consultancy Work Employment Society, March 1, 2000; 14(1): 97 - 116. [Abstract] [PDF]

				J. Storey and A. Harrison Coping with World Class Manufacturing Work Employment Society, December 1, 1999; 13(4): 643 - 664. [Abstract] [PDF]

				N. Bacon The Realities of Human Resource Management? Human Relations, September 1, 1999; 52(9): 1179 - 1187. [PDF]

				D. Foster and P. Hoggett Change in the Benefits Agency: Empowering the Exhausted Worker? Work Employment Society, March 1, 1999; 13(1): 19 - 39. [Abstract] [PDF]

				Y. Gabriel Beyond Happy Families: A Critical Reevaluation of the Control-Resistance-Identity Triangle Human Relations, February 1, 1999; 52(2): 179 - 203. [Abstract] [PDF]

				P. Edwards, M. Collinson, and C. Rees The Determinants of Employee Responses to Total Quality Management: Six Case Studies Organization Studies, May 1, 1998; 19(3): 449 - 475. [Abstract]