Invisible work at work and the reproduction of gendered social service organizations

Einat Lavee and Amit Kaplan

Gender, Work and Organization, 2022, vol. 29, issue 5, 1463-1480

Abstract: Studies demonstrate that the convergence of neoliberalism and New Public Management imperatives creates conditions wherein social service providers undertake various types of unpaid work, reemphasizing the role of gender in service provision. Drawing on these arguments, this study explores the process through which unpaid practices restructure gender in social service organizations, using the concept of “invisible work.” Applying the institutional ethnography method of inquiry, we examine experiences of social service workers in the Israeli public sector and operationalize unpaid work as informal personal resources that workers provide to clients. Analysis of 185 in‐depth interviews revealed three main discursive frames workers use to justify provision of personal resources. Through these frames, informal practices become invisible as work in multiple layers—to the self, the organization, and the society. Similar to invisible work in the household, its invisibility in the workplace constitutes a main force in the reproduction of gendered social service organizations.

Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12839

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:gender:v:29:y:2022:i:5:p:1463-1480

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0968-6673

Access Statistics for this article

Gender, Work and Organization is currently edited by David Knights, Deborah Kerfoot and Ida Sabelis

More articles in Gender, Work and Organization from Wiley Blackwell
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().