Management and Organizational Studies on Blue- and Gray-collar Workers: Diversity of Collars: Volume 8

The main purpose of the study is to examine the intellectual structure of academic studies on blue-collar workers. In this context, (1) productivity and evolution of the field, (2) conceptual dimensions, (3) citation density and (4) structure of academic networks related to blue-collar workers were analyzed. The findings of the study produced results covering all fields of science, not just management and organization. As a result of the study, blue-collar studies by years, the most cited blue-collar studies, the researchers who published the most frequently about blue-collar workers, the researchers who conducted the longest research on blue-collar workers, the most frequently used keywords and academic networks in blue-collar studies are determined. The most important finding is that the blue-collar issue is the common intersection point of different fields of science such as health, medicine, finance, management and organization, marketing, psychology and sociology.

The purpose of this study is to determine the effect of two types of negative ties, namely perceived negative ties and intended negative ties, on the two types of employee work outcomes, namely job performance and ethical voice. In addition, the chapter discusses the role of personal reputation as a mediator in explaining the relationship between negative ties and work outcomes. The study sample comprised of 103 blue-collar workers and their direct supervisors in a large cement factory in southern Iraq. The study used survey method as a mean to collect the data. Data analysis showed that perceived negative ties and intended negative ties influence participants’ job performance and ethical voice. The result also indicates that personal reputation mediates the relationship between negative ties and work outcomes. In light of the results, theoretical and practical implications are presented.

Psychosocial risks in the workplace include occupational risks such as stress, harassment, burnout, and workplace violence that affect the physical integrity and mental health of employees (Bunker et al., 2003). Work-related psychosocial risks are relevant to the design and management of the job and its social and organizational contexts (Leka, Griffiths, & Cox, 2003). In this study, it was investigated which factors are effective in the psychosocial risk assessments of blue-collar workers in Turkey and whether there is a significant effect of gender in these assessments. The sample of the research consists of 663 employees working in a production facility in Tekirdag. The results showed that cognitive demands, the meaning of work, and development opportunity variables differed by gender from psychosocial risks. Women evaluate lower scores than men in expressions related to cognitive demands, the meaning of work, and development opportunities. Quantitative demands, emotional demands, burnout, and job satisfaction did not differ significantly by gender. The findings provide an understanding of the potential risks in the working conditions of blue workers in Turkey and provide the basis for future research.

Research on the relationship between high job satisfaction human resources (HR) practices and work-related outcomes at the individual level rarely focuses on job crafting and levels of job passion. To fill this knowledge gap, we show how the relationships between perceived job passion by employees and the availability of HR practices and job satisfaction can vary in job crafting. Based on the job demands–resources (JD-R) perspective, this study was conducted primarily to test the effect of job crafting on the relationship between job passion and job satisfaction. Within the scope of the study, the mediator and moderator role of job crafting between these variables was investigated. The study was collected from 790 people working as blue collars in companies operating in the field of industry in Turkey by survey method. According to the findings of the study, it was observed that job crafting affects job satisfaction in the same direction. In addition to these, the partial mediator and moderator role of job crafting has been observed in the effect of job passion on job satisfaction. Considering these results, it has been observed that the passion for work of blue-collar employees affects job satisfaction. When job crafting is added to this effect, the intensity, strength, and direction of the effect between two variables can change. As a result of the study findings, it has been shown that managers and especially HR managers will strengthen the effect between job crafting and job satisfaction by ensuring the passion of blue-collar individuals.

Relying on Social Identity Theory (SIT), Relative Deprivation Theory (RDT) and System Justification Theory (SJT), this study aims at examining identity enhancement strategies of blue-collar workers who might be described as members of low-status groups having negative social identity. In the scope of this study, individual and collective strategies for identity enhancement of blue-collar workers have been proposed with the support of above mentioned theories. First of all, factors determining identity enhancement strategies have been described. Then, individual mobility conditions were explained and informal workplace learning was suggested as an individual mobility strategy for blue-collar workers to enhance social identity. In addition, it was argued that high self-monitoring blue collars are more likely than low self-monitoring blue collars to use individual mobility strategy. It was also emphasized that through union membership, high identifier blue collars will adopt a collective identity enhancement strategy. Finally, acceptance of low-status strategy was proposed for blue-collar workers in case they perceive their group’s low status as stable and legitimate.

This chapter aims to investigate sentiments of blue-collar workers, specifically couriers, during Covid-19 pandemic. Data are collected from the online review posting platform, where employees and previous employees of a Turkish delivery company posted their comments on the company as an employer. The results reveal that there are mainly four topics on which the reviewers discuss: work environment, compensation, salary and working hours, and lay-off procedures. The analyses indicate that the most discussed topic is compensation, while the most negative sentiments appear to be on lay-off procedures.

Some fuzzy definitions such as gray collar workers (GCW) needs to be constructed by academic research in management and organization field. The authors propose a framework for researchers who are interested in studying gray collar workforce after the fourth industrial revolution (I4.0) with network perspectives and methods. Hence, understanding different classes of workforce in the new industrial era needs better understandings of fuzzy concepts and well collected data for decision-making processes. Since literature of management studies are not sufficient to identify and study those new classes, the authors begin with the definition of collar colors in management studies. Following that section, referring to the importance of GCW research, a new literature construction via different types of network analyses is discussed. Three different methods of network concepts are matched with three main social science paradigms. The authors believe that the three perspectives are in the same importance about constructing a literature of future workforce in organizations in particular the GCW who are more exposed in technological developments and organizational changes.

Leadership is a social phenomenon. Therefore, it has to be examined according to its social context. The point to be underlined by the social context is the social network in which the leader emerges. Considering the studies, the social network side of leadership is relatively ignored comparing with sociometric studies. In that sense, the aim of this study is to reveal whether there is a relationship between the positions of the military personnel, who are defined as one of the gray-collar working groups in the literature, within the social network mechanisms of which they are members, and their self-leadership perceptions. To answer the question, a self-leadership scale was applied to 69 gray-collar employees working in a military unit and network analyses were performed. According to results, there is a strong, positive and significant relationship between the network mechanism centrality criteria indegree, reach centrality and closeness and the self-leadership perceptions of individuals. In addition, there was no significant relationship between eigenvector centrality and honest brokerage, which are among the network mechanism criteria, and the actors’ self-leadership perceptions. The study has aimed at accenting and adding different perspectives to the leadership studies and gray-collar literature.

Understanding disabled people as gray-collar workers who are under-paid, under-valued and under-employed is recognized as in urgent need of attention but remains unaddressed. Based on 30 semi-structured interviews with disabled people, observations and document analysis, the authors argue that the disabled gray-collar workers in the performing arts provide a context and socio-cultural perspective on how gray-collar workers can attain dignity through social inclusion. Building on a novel framework of four dimensions of social inclusion theory – access, participation, representation and empowerment – the authors identify social interactions portrayed in the performing arts in order to deconstruct the processes that normalize and reinforce exclusion and inequality. The authors demonstrate how social inclusion can be “enabled” which has implications for theory, policy and practice.

The question of the nature of the collar is pursued drawing on results generated in the field of social ontology as well as on observations from history. In this chapter, it can be tried to seek what the nature of collar is, this is a central question for social theory, not least economics and human resources. Tony Lawson (2019, p. 1, 2021) has recently developed a theory of social positioning “… which is the social phenomena are everywhere constituted by or within process through which social totalities are formed or emerge.” The central idea of the theory of social positioning is that social relations are ultimately power relationships, which structure how social phenomena are organized. This chapter further explores this idea by conceptualizing power drawing on the theory of social positioning. Collar is a social phenomenon and associated with certain kind of structure which is social classes in this chapter. This structure will be taken as a class relation in Marxist approach as it is known, this relation is about power. In this framework, the question of the nature of collar needs to be explained with social positioning theory.

Residents in under-resourced/high-Medicaid (85% or higher) nursing homes on average receive care from relatively lower quality providers and have worse health outcomes, which may increase the risk of higher COVID-19 incidence. This study aims to evaluate if having a culture that encourages employee empowerment results in better quality (lower COVID-19 deaths) in times of crisis, such as the current pandemic. The study combined primary survey data from 391 Directors of Nursing (response rate of 37%), with Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Nursing Home COVID-19 Public File, LTCFocus, Area Health Resource File, and Nursing Home Compare. The dependent variable consisted of the number of COVID-19 death as of November 25, 2021. The independent variables consisted of Likert scale for employee empowerment (Cronbach alpha= 0.82). Control variables consisted of organizational factors (e.g., size, location, and ownership), as well as community factors (e.g., poverty, unemployment, and competition). The results indicated that one unit increase in employee empowerment was associated with 6% lower likelihood of having COVID-19 deaths. Nursing homes, particularly those under-resourced, face difficulty improving the quality of care due to financial constraints. However, the results suggest that adopting a culture that fosters employee empowerment may give nursing homes an edge in improving quality outcomes in crises.

Nursing homes experience high nursing staff turnover. Nursing staff in nursing homes is comprised of gray and blue collar workers that include registered nurses (RNs), licensed practical nurses (LPNs), and certified nurse assistants (CNAs). The relationship between human resource management (HRM)practices, organizational culture, and nursing staff turnover is examined in underresourced (high Medicaid) nursing homes. Survey data from 348 nursing home administrators (NHAs) of USA high Medicaid (85% or higher) facilities were merged with secondary data sources for 2017–2018. The dependent variables (nursing staff turnover rates) consisted of the percentages of RNs, LPNs, and CNAs that had voluntarily quit the organization during the past year. The independent variables were: (1) HRM practices (employee-centered and high involvement practices); and (2) organizational culture: clan, market, hierarchical, and non-dominant. Organizational and market variables were controlled for. Data were modeled using Poisson log-linear regression, and propensity score weights were used to adjust for potential survey non-response bias. Results show high involvement HRM practices and having a clan culture are associated with lower RN, LPN, and CNA staffing turnover. Study findings suggest that organizational culture and HRM practices may be instrumental in reducing nursing turnover in underresourced nursing homes.

The role and contributions of blue and gray collar employees in strategy making in practice are generally ignored, and left out of scientific inquiry. However, the authors argue that they are “hidden actors” in the strategy making process, and “silent heroes” of the strategy. Their participative role is generally seen limited to operational phases of strategy. Nevertheless, recent literatures have fruitful implications on blue and gray collars workers’ contributions in formulation phase. Upper echelon (Hambrick, 1987; Hambrick & Mason, 1984) and strategy as practice (SAP) literatures (Jarzabkowski & Spee, 2009; Whittington, 2006) are suggested to be closely scrutinized since the former has incorporated the middle- and low-level teams of management in the explanation (Carpenter, Geletkancz, & Sanders, 2004), and the latter takes “practice” as a prominent research perspective, and thus enable us to approach strategy phenomena from a wider context of practitioners, practices, and praxis (Jarzabkowski, Balogun, & Seidl, 2007; Jarzabkowski & Wilson, 2002). Overall, this chapter suggests that future studies could question the hidden assumptions behind strategy approaches to trace the assumed image and role of blue and gray collars in strategy making, and go further to integrate their deserved role in strategy process, content, context, and cognition.

As media texts, advertisements use representation practices to construct ideological meanings. This study traced the representation of the worker in advertisements with the help of content and thematic analysis. The study aimed to reveal the representation of the worker in the advertisements and to make the representations of the worker built through advertisements visible. The study was limited to ads that received an Effie Award in Turkey in 2020 and 2021. In the 2020 Effie Awards, 73 awards were given in 41 categories and in the 2021 Effie Awards, 68 awards were given in 42 categories. Content analysis was applied to 24 advertisements in 2020 and 31 advertisements in 2021. The quantitative data helped to determine the themes in the thematic analysis. Thematic analysis was carried out by regarding the worker as the (in)visible, the (un)voiced, and the bypassed. This study, which reveals that the worker is represented in advertisements through being invisible, unvoiced, and bypassed, claims that the labor of the worker in the production process is ignored through representation practices. In this context, it can be said that the worker is erased and omitted in TV ads on a symbolic level.

Creative labor in the perfume industry can be identified as perfumers or perfume designers who have spent years in the industry either with formal education or firsthand practice and have developed their skills. They are skilled in matching various fragrances and work with the client's framework to produce perfumes. This chapter analyzes the literature about creative labor's living conditions and aspirations, focusing on the perfume industry and its role in producing perfumes. Perfumery is looked at from a creative and artistic perspective, and the prerequisites of becoming a successful perfumer are analyzed. In an industry where talent plays a crucial role in one's success, perfumers are identified as those who work with large brands to produce perfumes for the masses or cater to specific individuals. Bespoke perfumers such as Sylvaine Delacourte and Jean-Claude Ellena have a lot more flexibility and autonomy in their work because of their superior level of skill. They can charge soaring prices for their work. Whereas other creative workers in creative projects have to undergo a long collaborative process where they are required to work within the framework provided by their clientele to launch a new perfume product. Previous literature by Richard Florida and Brian Moeran about the creative class has been used to identify the characteristics of creative labor in the perfume industry. The creative process in perfumery in terms of high-end luxury products and mass production products is discussed. Manufacturing of perfumes today is primarily industrial, and the role of perfumers in the high-end prestige market and mass market in terms of their creativity is analyzed. Additionally, the top perfumers’ style of work and the creative process involved in making perfumes are discussed.

This study aims at investigating creative labor and its production process in late capitalism. With technological convergence and digitalization, there emerged an information society and information economy. In the processes and procedures of this era, conditions and climate of working areas and labor processes directly based on innovation and creativity have undergone radical transformations. Also, it has become indispensable to scrutinize the concepts such as immaterial labor, autonomy, and subjectivity. So, this study focuses on Turkish freelance illustrators to highlight their production, autonomy, and value in transformed time and space. It aims to establish a better understanding of the Turkish freelancer illustrators’ valorization of labor and economic insecurity in the digital era of creative industries by using the techniques of open-ended questions and online semi-structured interviews with 12 freelance illustrators. Therefore, this study traces the question of how the working processes and work ethos of digital career fields in the creative industry are evaluated from the perspective of illustrators. It cannot be overlooked that this new working ethos allows them to work as self-employed, offering through non-contractual relationships, and non-standard contracts with the clients which give them more flexibility and autonomy as an artist to plan their own creative production processes. It is also clear that illustrators who adapted themselves to produce in a transformed time–space are aware of the difficulty in measuring and valorizing the value of the creative and emotional labor they put to work. In such a case, it can be said that illustrators, who see themselves as both an employer and employee at the same time, position themselves beyond the distinctions of blue collar and gray collar and blur the boundaries in organizational hierarchies.

In this chapter, sharing economy, also called the gig economy, is discussed as part of the digital economy. This research analyzes the main difficulties of gig workers, and their needs will be analyzed as one of the crucial issues. This research also seeks to examine the government's role in prior economies and the sharing economy of today. In addition, existing legislation and procedures for gig workers will be compared across nations. Furthermore, some of the most important initiatives to engage with the sharing economy are also investigated. Methods such as “word frequency query” and “exploration diagrams,” which are supported by NVivo qualitative research software, are utilized in order to accomplish this research. In this study, the interview method occurs with an expert that is considered in order to observe both the government's stance on the sharing economy and its practical effects. The research discloses that government engagement in the sharing economy is inevitable, and the adoption of existing policies is challenging.