There is currently a phenomenon of young people changing jobs in our country. This research looks at the reasons why mechanics leave the workshop environment to pursue a career as a technical advisor in the call centre. The technical advisors all make the transition at a particular stage in their lives and this will be looked at in terms of Super’s (1980) developmental theory, with a particular focus on the stage of establishment. The dissertation takes the reader on a journey through the lives of five technical advisors at a particular organisation, and compares and contrasts the two work environments and the quality of work life associated with both. The study will also focus on stress that they experience while making the transition from mechanic to technical advisor and how this impacts on their work and personal lives. The study was exploratory in nature and was investigated through the qualitative method of interviewing.

Student Number : 9910820A - MA research report - School of Human and Community Development - Faculty of Humanities / The literature review presents a discussion of the various aspects within organisational climate as it relates to a call centre environment. It also examines past research on the notions of job satisfaction, life satisfaction and self-esteem pertaining to call centre agents. The literature review places particular emphasis on the affect organisational climate has on call centre agents. The present research takes the form of a quantitative, non-experimental, cross-sectional, ex-post facto design, on a sample of two-hundred and nineteen (N=219) call centre agents from four South African call centres. The Job Content Questionnaire was used to measure the organisational climate (Karasek, 1985), Taylor and Bowers (1972) General Satisfaction scale measured call centre agent’s job satisfaction, the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) assessed the global cognitive beliefs of call centre agent’s life (Pavot and Diener, 1993), and Rosenberg’s (1989) Self-Esteem Scale was used to measure call centre agent’s self-esteem. Descriptive statistics and correlations were used to analyse the data and answer the research questions. Results from the analytical procedures suggested that call centre agents were given more decision latitude, there was a perception of general social support within the organisation, work roles were clearly defined and self-esteem was not significantly associated to the work environment. Thus, implying that the organisational climate of call centres may not be as bleak as past literature has suggested.

Call centres are typically characteristic of a highly repetitive, monotonous, and low skilled nature of work, which has resulted in low levels of job satisfaction, dissatisfaction or no satisfaction for call centre representatives. This has been the motivating factor in determining if a relationship exists between call centre representatives’ job satisfaction and their locus of control orientation. A sample of 103 call centre representatives from a call centre in KwaZulu-Natal participated in this research. The results of the research suggest that there is no significant relationship between call centre representatives’ job satisfaction and their locus of control orientation. The findings suggest that irrespective of a call centre representative’s locus of control orientation, the nature of work in a call centre itself is such that it leads low levels of job satisfaction, dissatisfaction and no satisfaction. The results further suggest that there is no relationship between call centre representatives’ job satisfaction, gender, qualifications and tenure. Similarly, no relationship has been found between call centre representatives’ locus of control orientation, gender, qualifications and tenure. These findings indicate that further research is required to understand job satisfaction within the call centre, as there is limited research within the South African context. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2008.

This is a study conducted in a telecommunications call centre called the Greater Brand Company; located in KwaZulu Natal, in a suburb North of Durban. I conducted fieldwork for a complete year whilst working full time in the call centre. Although the call centre had over 400 call centre agents employed at the Durban branch, I had access to 121 agents who worked a similar shift as me. The experiences of these agents are brought to life through this piece of research. The Great Branding Company (pseudonym) is an inbound call centre, which means it handles incoming calls and offers customer service to these callers. It has been argued that “since their appearance on the scene in the early 1990s, call centres have become the most important single source of customer contact in the developed information economies. They have also become huge employment generators, with jobs numbering in the millions” (Rusell, 2008: 01). The call centre industry is growing globally and South Africa is in line with this growth. The nature of the work is also very fast paced and challenging, yet monotonous, for the faceless employees who are working in this environment. The research aims to bring an understanding of these challenges and offer insight into the activities that agents engage in as ways to cope with their jobs. I carefully chose research methodologies that I believed were going to add value to the research. Writing from the emic perspective offers an opportunity to be able to be part of the study and share my views with very little inhibitions and thus offering a richer ethnography. My research was conducted using purely qualitative research tools because it examines the lives of the call centre agents and there is no better way to showcase this than through qualitative research. Participant observation being the key tool that I used to gain information in true Anthropology style. Being a participating observer did not mean I was devoid of barriers to entry; it did however put me at an advantage to gain better rapport amongst the research participants who considered me to be one of their own. In supplementing participant observation I also used focused groups, unstructured interviews and semi structured interviews for those questions that required greater probing. The combination of all these research methodologies allowed me an opportunity to gain a greater understanding into the lives of agents and thus write some detailed ethnographic chapters. The study adds to the field of Industrial Anthropology and hopes to spark a greater interest into this field thereby creating a platform for more researchers to conduct studies on call centre employment in the South African context. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2013.

This research thesis analyzes the characteristics of communication work in a call centre, by examining the communication work at a Swedish call centre which is outsourced to Latvia. The thesis studies the ways in which communication with the customers is organized, carried out and assigned meaning. Theoretically, the thesis draws on both critical and management-oriented perspectives of work. The empirical investigation combines participant observations at the call centre with individual interviews, mainly conducted with operators and management staff. The communication work is analyzed both as labour and as communicative activity. The concept of labour focuses upon the relation between employer and employee. Therefore, the analysis is placed within the framework of a capitalistic production system, through a survey of the economic and the organisational working conditions. The communicative activity deals with how the telephone conversations with the customers are enacted. In that part of the analyses, the working routines and the meaning making practices are illuminated. As examined in the current research, the communication work is indeed constructed in an alienated manner, through high levels of standardization, immobility, and estrangement from both customers and the customers’ culture. Nonetheless, merely being employed has meant significant economic security for the operators of the Latvian call centre. The operators are incumbents of a society affected by deep economic crises with high unemployment rates. In relation to their broader society, the employees have found meaning within their immediate social situation. This may explain why they endure the monotonous work with few opportunities for development.

MSc (Occupational Therapy), Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand / Ergonomic interventions, addressing work and lifestyle factors, seem more effective in reducing computer related upper limb repetitive strain injury (RSI).This study considered the efficacy of such a programme on the resolution of RSI symptoms. A cross sectional survey, of 325 computer workers in a medical aid company call centres, in Gauteng, South Africa was used to establish a point prevalence of 30.23% for RSI symptoms, which correlates with those found elsewhere. An occupational therapy ergonomic intervention was then designed and piloted for efficacy. A randomised control trial conducted on 37 participants with RSI used the programme and computer generated “Break Software”. The six week intervention included the assessment of: three physical outcome measures and lifestyle factors for, the experimental and control groups. Results indicated positive effects on pain, grip strength, and lifestyle factors including feelings of inefficiency, pressure at the end of the day, depression and work capacity, but little extrapolation of ergonomic knowledge to the workplace.

In this paper we deal with employee turnover of call centre operators in one particular company. To understand various causes of call centre operators turnover we have executed a qualitative as well as quantitative research. In the qualitative research we have interviewed 16 call centre operators focusing on the turnover causes from the view of the operators. Furthermore we have also interviewed all 3 members of the human resources department. These interviews concerned the functionong of that department as a whole. Finally, we have interviewed a former HR manager of this company, who have shared with us his views about the work, aim and future of the HR department. All these interviews have enabled us to understand what the causes of employee turnover are, and what the members of HR department deal with. In addition, we have executed quantitative research, in which we examined the relation between the rate of employee turnover and age, gender, reaching financial performance goals and work performance. The results of our studies show that there is no statistically significant relationship between age and the operator's termination of employment; length of employment and gender; the time before the termination of the employment relationship on the financial performance goals; nor time effect before...

Thesis (M.Comm. (Industrial Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

Thesis (M.Comm. (Industrial Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

Thesis (M.Comm. (Industrial Psychology))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.