Reading "Client contact and emotional labour"

By Kathryn Lively

Key points from this research work:-

Emotional labour, refers to the conscious attempts of workers to bring aspects of their emotional display, or their emotional reactions, in line with corporately mandated emotion or display rules to created feeling states in others (Hochschild, 1983)

The purpose of this study is to examine and determine the difference of the emotional labour performed by paralegals working in small consume-oriented law firm vs. large commercial-oriented law firms.

Conclusion:-

1. The paralegals in consumer-oriented firms have greater levels of involvement and authority, higher emotional labour and the interpersonal relationship than those from commercial-oriented law firms;


2. Though as matter of facts, the paralegals from consumer-oriented firms have less prestigious, lower salaries. But they enjoy the great substantive involvement in controlling clients, have the ability to both undermine and strengthen manager's attempts at regulation of employee's lever or productivity, quality of service, behaviour, emotional display etc.


3. In consume-oriented law firms, paralegals seems to performed less emotional labour in the courser of their interaction with their own attorneys, than their counterparts.


4. The leveling of status difference among workers and management and condition under which lower status workers and management may be released by their obligation to provide bosses with showers of deference, in otherwise hierarchically ordered setting.
   
   

Therefore, the difference in the emotional labour in office, in countermanding request, and commercial-oriented paralegals is not really matter of more or less but a matter of who and why.