On the Front Line: Organization of Work in the Information Economy

The importance of customer service is widely emphasized in business. This text offers an analysis of the organization and dynamics of front-line work, based on a five-year study of over 1000 employees and eight leading companies in the USA, Australia and Japan. The book reveals similarities and differences found in work environments - such as variance in authority relations and division of labour - as well as significant contrasts between management approaches used in Japan and those used in the USA and Australia. By examining how work differs among service, sales and knowledge-based settings, it also shows how bureaucratic, entrepreneurial and network forms of organization co-exist in the informational economy.