Critical perspectives for business management and leadership

1.0 Introduction 

In the world of management, the concept of critical management studies is not new. When used in the context of organizations, this concept has traditionally been used to highlight situations in which employees are being intimidated, oppressed, and exploited. Critical management studies (CMS) derives largely from a plurality of intellectual traditions while at the same time adopting an anti-performance stance (Fournier & Grey, 2000). As a sub-discipline, CMS was the culmination of efforts during the 1990s to merge the terms “critical” and “management” in attempt to create a new academic identity that ultimately came to be referred to as critical management studies.

Given the plurality of the intellectual traditions that form the foundation of CMS, a wide range of perspectives exist through which this sub-discipline can be understood. To begin with, CMS would not have emerged without the concept of critical management. According to Fournier & Grey (2000), some of the main components of critical management included managerialization, New Labor, and New Right. Moreover, critical management studies embraces plurality, which encompasses the adoption of an anti-performative stance. It is on this basis that theoretical frameworks such as Marxism, post-structuralism, Taylorism, and bureaucratic theory are often analyzed and critiqued in the context of critical management studies. In this respect, the underlying factor is that efforts are being made to provide answers to the issues of whether and how CMS ought to engage with contemporary practices.

Against this backdrop, the present paper sets out to analyze theory and approaches from critical management theory (CMT). The paper also seeks to assess the application of these theories and approaches as analytical tools for resolving problems in a post-modern organization. The paper focuses on the case study of Indian call-centre agents operating in the country’s ITES-BPO (Information Technology Enabled Services – Business Process Outsourcing) sector. This sector constitutes an excellent example of a post-modern organizational setting because its activities constitute a major component of global off-shoring operations.

2.0 Introduction to the case

The case under analysis in this paper is that of Indian call-centre agents operating within the country’s ITES-BPO (Information Technology Enabled Services – Business Process Outsourcing) sector. The title of the case is “Experiencing Depersonalised bullying: A study of Indian call-centre agents”. In this case, D’Cruz & Noronha (2009) expound on the concept of depersonalized bullying as a way of explaining experiences of call-centre agents working in international call centres in Bangalore and Mumbai. Because of these experiences, the employees define their work simply as an oppressive regime.

The employees attribute the oppressive work regime to the service level agreement (SLA) entered into between…