An official website of the United States government
We advance the concept of deconstructed identity to explain how online workers' identities are being reshaped, diminished and controlled by digital labor platforms. We focus on online freelance workers and contribute to contemporary conceptualizations regarding worker's self-presentation. The empirical basis for our analysis and theorizing build from two rounds of a longitudinal panel study of online freelance workers and their interactions with online labor platforms. Findings illuminate how online freelancer's identity presentation is constrained by the structuring of their profile, the ratings and client feedback, the algorithms used by the digital platform, and platform's terms of use. Data demonstrate that workers' profiles are focused on skills, reflecting the realities of competing for work in under-regulated labor markets. Study participants report the centrality of client and platform ratings of their work, and the need to manage client feedback and ratings as a core part of their online identity presentation. These findings suggest that, far from a subjective and personal story, a freelancer's identity on a digital labor platform is better understood as a standardized depiction of skills, ratings, and metrics controlled by platform algorithms. Coupled with use policies and evolving platform designs, this platform control creates what seems to be a form of indentured servitude. We further note online freelancers both recognize this control and resist their deconstructed identity.
more »
« less
How Managers Maintain Control Through Collaborative Repair: Evidence from Platform-Mediated “Gigs”
This paper develops a new understanding about how “client managers”—those using platform labor markets to hire and manage workers—attempt to maintain control when managing skilled contractors. We conducted an inductive field study analyzing interactions between client managers and contractors in software development “gigs” mediated by a platform labor market. The platform provided multiple tools client managers could use for control, including in response to unexpected events. We found that, when managers used the tools to exert coercive control over contractors acting unexpectedly, it backfired and contributed to uncompleted project outcomes. In contrast, when they refrained from using the tools for coercive control in such circumstances and instead engaged in what we call collaborative repair, their actions contributed to completed project outcomes. Collaborative repair refers to interactions that surface misaligned interpretations of a situation and help parties negotiate new, reciprocal expectations that restore trust and willingness to continue an exchange. Client managers’ attempts at collaborative repair yielded fuller understanding of project-related breakdowns and shared investment in new expectations, facilitating effective control and completed projects. This study extends prior theories of control by characterizing the new client manager role created by platforms and demonstrating how initiating repair is integral for managers’ capacity to accomplish control in these comparatively brittle work relationships.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1847091
- PAR ID:
- 10540525
- Publisher / Repository:
- Melissa Valentine's Publications - Stanford WTO
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Organization Science
- Volume:
- 32
- Issue:
- 5
- ISSN:
- 1047-7039
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 1300 to 1326
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Data work is often completed by crowdworkers, who are routinely dehumanized, disempowered, and sidelined. We turn to citizen science to reimagine data work, highlighting collaborative relationships between citizen science project managers and volunteers. Though citizen science and traditional crowd work entail similar forms of data work, such as classifying or transcribing large data sets, citizen science relies on volunteer contributions rather than paid data work. We detail the work citizen science project managers did to shape volunteer experiences: aligning science goals, minimizing barriers to participation, engaging communities, communicating with volunteers, providing training and education, rewarding contributions, and reflecting on volunteer work. These management strategies created opportunities for meaningful work by cultivating intrinsic motivation and fostering collaborative work relationships but ultimately limited participation to specific data-related tasks. We recommend management tactics and task design strategies for creating meaningful work for invisible collar workers, an understudied class of labor in CSCW.more » « less
-
Residential damage from major disasters often displaces local residents out of their homes and into temporary housing. Out-of-town contractors assisting in post-disaster housing reconstruction also need housing, creating additional pressure on the local housing stock. Communities should thus prepare for a surge in temporary housing demand to minimize the impact on the local residents and to expedite housing recovery efforts. Computational models can support recovery planning. This article introduces an agent-based simulation framework to estimate the workforce demand and the joint temporary housing needs of contractors and displaced households. The main agents are households seeking to repair their homes, local contractors, and out-of-town contractors. Out-of-town contractor agents come into the community if the labor and housing markets are favorable. The framework can be used to evaluate the resulting challenges and benefits of interventions aimed at attracting out-of-town contractors to expedite housing recovery. We present a case study on the housing recovery of the city of San Francisco after hypothetical M 6.5, M 7.2, and M 7.9 earthquakes. A shortage of contractors is shown to bottleneck the reconstruction if no out-of-town contractors are recruited. Conversely, out-of-town contractors increase the likelihood of temporary housing shortages. These results highlight the need to plan for shortages of reconstruction labor and temporary housing during recovery.more » « less
-
null (Ed.)Flexible, contingent, or 'agile,' working arrangements provide workers with greater autonomy over when, where, or how to fulfill their responsibilities. In search of increased productivity and reduced absenteeism, organizations have increasingly turned to flexible work arrangements. Although access to flexible work arrangements is more prevalent among high-skilled workers, in the form of flextime or co-working, the past decade has also witnessed growth of independent contractors, digital nomadism, digitally enabled crowdwork, online freelancing, and on-demand platform labor. Flexible work arrangements reduce commutes and can enable workers with care-responsibilities to stay in the workforce. Younger workers also see flexibility as a top priority when considering career opportunities. Flexible working arrangements can also be mutually beneficial, enabling organizations to scale dynamically. Specific skill sets can be immediately accessed by turning to freelancers to fill organizational gaps. A growing number of organizations and workers rely on short-term and project-based relationships, using online platforms such as Upwork or Fiverr to connect. However, flexible work arrangements often come entwined with precarity cloaked in emancipatory narratives. Fixed salaries and benefits have given way to hourly rates and quantified ratings. Flexible workers often face unpredictability and uncertainty as they carry more risk and responsibility, and are burdened with a great portion of administrative costs (that is, overhead) associated with organizational support systems. Flexible workers at Google, for instance, outnumber full time workers but face far more unpredictability. Current formulations consider organizations as relatively fixed 'containers', which encapsulate the work performed and the information and communications technology (ICT) systems used to perform it.12 However, flexible work arrangements take place outside of organizational containers. In this new sociotechnical dynamic, flexible workers interact with a diversity of digital tools that defy centralized, top-down standardization or governance. We capture this diversity of digital tools through the concept of Personal Digital Infrastructures (PDIs), which denote an individualized assemblage of tools and technologies, such as personal laptops, smartphones, cloud services, and applications brought together by workers to perform their work tasks. Yet, flexible workers constantly reconfigure their PDIs as the technology landscape, client-relationship, and task requirements shift. For flexible work arrangements to be mutually beneficial, PDI integration in ICT systems for work is increasingly necessary, beyond a narrow focus on enterprise systems supporting standard work. Our collective research on flexible work arrangements indicates that PDIs present non-trivial challenges, but a more effective design of ICT systems for work can facilitate the integration of these bottom-up infrastructures. The nuanced understanding of PDIs presented here highlights their interplay with flexible work arrangements across key dimensions (spatial, temporal, organizational, and technological) and suggests key priorities for technology and platform developers.more » « less
-
Given that roofing contractors in the construction industry have the highest fatality rate among specialty contractors, understanding the root cause of incidents among roofers is critical for improving safety outcomes. This study applied frequency analysis and decision tree data-mining techniques to analyze roofers’ fatal and non-fatal accident reports. The frequency analysis yielded insights into the leading cause of accidents, with fall to a lower level (83%) being the highest, followed by incidence sources relating to structures and surfaces (56%). The most common injuries experienced by roofing contractors were fractures (49%) and concussions (15%), especially for events occurring in residential buildings, maintenance and repair works, small projects (i.e., $50,000 or less), and on Mondays. According to the decision tree analysis, the most important factor for determining the nature of the injury is the nonfragile injured body part, followed by injury caused by coating works. The decision tree also produced decision rules that provide an easy interpretation of the underlying association between the factors leading to incidents. The decision tree models developed in this study can be used to predict the nature of potential injuries for strategically selecting the most effective injury-prevention strategies.more » « less
- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
-
Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2021.1428
