The 21st Century Sweat Shops
Blood Sweat and Tears
The 21st Century Sweat Shops
By definition, a sweatshop is: Any workplace where the wages are inadequate, the hours too long, and the working conditions endanger safety or health - whether or not any laws are violated.
The call center and customer service environment of today is well defined as an “Electronic Sweat Shop.” Every breath, keystroke, word, screen shot and every minute spent in the restroom is monitored by the Company. This behavior is in effort to make sure they can get every second of the day to become more productive than it was yesterday. By establishing metrics, requirements, goals, talk time, customer handling, scripting, product count (the list goes on) they have taken over the employee’s right to be human. The Company has bypassed the option for it employees to have a life. The Company has no regard for the health and well being of its employees. In the Company’s vision, STRESS has become a food group and they are more than willing to make sure it is fed to the employees on a daily basis. Absolutely no concept of a life outside of the work place. The bottom line has become the only line.
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Replies to This Post
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Permalink Reply by 1stewardofmany on -
I need to appologize and clarify a couple of things on my last post..... and say THANK YOU! The points I was trying to make (and did so quite miserably) was that back then the "company" would somewhat try to make it look like it cared about the employee and until the Mother Jones artical was fairly successful in keeping up that appearance. Now, as Lois pointed out, the greenies have been replaced by personal medication, trips to the mental health professionals to deal with the direct application of pressure to perform as you are expected, and if you dont, you will be replaced quickly and cheaply as customer service is a dime a dozen. and new sales numbers, and therefore the profits are the ONLY factor that is important, employees are just part of the bottom line.
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Permalink Reply by Lois J. Grimes-Patow on
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No apology necessary. I completely understood where you were coming from. Now the question becomes with our members fearful because of the economy how do we empower them to begin changing the workplace back to a livable environment. Perhaps the 99%ers have spurred me on to thinking about change. Does anyone have suggestions?
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Permalink Reply by MonEinOKC on -
The sad reality is that many go WITHOUT meds because their prescription coverage is sub-standard, which forces the worker to pick between paying bills to keep a roof over their heads or fill the scrpit and fall behind on other financial obligations. We used to have great script coverage, but now if I'm given more than one I have to decide which one I need the most....thus only dealing with one issue vs. the entire problem. I'd guess that there is at least 25-30% of workers in my office alone that are on some type of anti-depressant to get them to the end of the work day.
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Permalink Reply by csearick@hotmail.com on
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Companies can't understand why their insurance cost are always increasing. Perhaps they should look at ways to prevent the need for employees to be on medication just to make it through the day. It's a shame that so many customer service professionals must live in a state of numbness to survive the workplace. I suggest that we all try to make time for some fun in our life.
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Permalink Reply by 1stewardofmany on
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I'm gonna use another food analogy..... "the Company" is the equvalent of the fast food burger and fries,the stress they induce is the "supersized" and the heart attack is the realization that that the more you eat (work) the more money they make, and, oh yea, they are paying the cardiac surgeon you see for the bypass because youe arteries are so full of cholesteral from all the stress and fat you have consumed. and he has instructions to keep you just healthy enough that you can work more overtime and just sick enough to keep you from leaving
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Permalink Reply by Val on
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That analogy is spot on! Now we the workers, have to become the FDA. Throught contract language, taking a stand together and making our voices heard!
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Permalink Reply by JDog6 on
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I agree> The company also is forgetting the customer. I have seen their CREDO or that the vision the company outlines as treating the customer well and giving them the best experience. However the question remains how can the customer receive the best experience in such a short time? How can the company keep customers when issues are more abundant than the time allotted to solve them? I remeber when customer service regardless if you are in collections or sales was that customer service. Where did the insight go or vision on this? Did someone do survey and say hey we can gets these calls doen with quickness but somewhere lost sight because that person has never done the job before?
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Permalink Reply by 1stewardofmany on
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One word....BEANCOUNTER!!!!!!!
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Permalink Reply by Hopemac17 on
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Very true and with all of that we have to deal with the customer is the one who suffers as well we have no customers we have no job customer service has never been farther way from service than it is now. Truly sad
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Permalink Reply by Val on
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Wikipedia defines service as helpful activity….An act of helpful….an intangible equivalent of an economic good. The Company asks for us to give excellent customer service, we should be asking for the same in return.
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Permalink Reply by 1stewardofmany on
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NO ABSOLUTELY NO!!!!! I do not want to be "serviced" by the company any more than I already am!!!! OHH WAIT .. you were using the wikipedia definition..... I thought you were using the company definition.. as described by George Carlin... NEVERMIND!!
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Permalink Reply by Hopemac17 on
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Omg all 4 people that sit beside me are on xanix it is crazy the drugs we are on maybe if I did not work days one week and nights the next my body could adjust and help my stress a little
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