Congruence work in stigmatized occupations: A managerial lens on employee fit with dirty work

Abstract

Summary Although research has established that it is often difficult for individuals engaged in dirty work to adjust to stigma and the attributes giving rise to stigma, little theory or empirical work addresses how managers may help workers adjust to dirty work. Interviews with managers across 18 dirty work occupations—physically tainted (e.g., animal control), socially tainted (e.g., corrections), and morally tainted (e.g., exotic entertainment)—indicate that managers engage in “congruence work”: behaviors, sensemaking, and sensegiving that they perceive as helping individuals adjust and develop a stronger sense of person–environment fit. Specifically, congruence work focuses on 3 phases of managerial practices that correspond to individuals' growing experience in the occupation. First, recruitment/selection involves overcoming individuals' aversion to dirty work by selecting individuals with an affinity for the work and providing a realistic stigma preview. Second, socialization involves helping newcomers adjust to distasteful tasks and to stigma by using targeted divestiture, developing perspective taking, helping newcomers manage external relationships, and utilizing desensitization or immersion. Third, ongoing management roles involve cementing individuals' fit by fostering social validation, protecting workers from dirty work hazards, and negotiating the frontstage/backstage boundary. The practices identified as congruence work highlight the important role that managers can play in facilitating adjustment for both “dirty workers” and presumably their less stigmatized counterparts.

Identity work in organizations and occupations: Definitions, theories, and pathways forward

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When does performance management foster team effectiveness? A mixed‐method field study on the influence of environmental extremity

“…Such coding approach has been used successfully in other management qualitative work and consists of an iterative process of simultaneously open and axial coding (Ashforth et al, 2017;Kreiner et al, 2009). We labeled and categorized units of text from the interviews with codes.…”

Dirty jobs and dehumanization of workers

“…More recently, starting from the original theorization proposed by Hughes (, ), social psychologists and anthropologists focused their research on occupational dirt and identity dynamics (e.g., Ashforth & Kreiner, ; Ashforth, Kreiner, Clark, & Fugate, , ; Bosmans et al ., ; Cassell & Bishop, ; Filteau, ; Johnston & Hodge, ; Kreiner, Ashforth, & Sluss, ; Meldgaard Hansen, ; Selmi, ). For example, Dick () explained that being branded as a ‘dirty worker’ may imply a significant threat to the identity goal of seeing themselves in a positive light.…”