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Introduction
The escalating power and domination of supermarkets in the contemporary service economy has been subject to increasing academic attention. The associated low-road employment strategies of low-paid, low-skilled and part-time work have been well-documented in current research (Baret et al., 2000; Lichtenstein, 2006; Lichtenstein and Johansson, 2011). Within this context, the strong competitive pressures evidenced in the industry bring the management of labour costs, including absence, to the forefront. This paper explores the role of line managers in managing attendance in the lean regime of grocery retailing. Despite the growing research on employment relationship in this sector, there has been limited research focus on the management of attendance, whereas little is also known of the day-to-day managerial practices on the line regarding this process. This paper highlights the importance of embedding our understanding of the line manager’s role in managing attendance within the dynamics of the labour process, especially within leaner working regimes. It provides a fresh sociological analysis on attendance management, discussing the impact of lean retailing on line managers’ authority and their responsibility in managing attendance, and offers insights into managerial practices on the UK food retail shop floor.
The reminder of the paper is organized as follows. First, an overview of the literature is presented, discussing the lean regime of food retailing and the necessity to manage attendance. This is followed by a discussion on line managers’ role in attendance management. Next, the methodology is outlined, whilst the findings are presented in the third section. Finally the paper discusses the theoretical and practical implications of the research.
Lean regime in food retailing: the issue of attendance management
Managing attendance at work is an area that has received a great deal of attention in the field of organizational research (Edwards and Scullion, 1982). Increasingly, scholars suggest that research should examine the business environment and absence behaviour in different occupational, organizational and industrial lines (Kaiser, 1998; Marcus and Smith, 1985, p. 264).
This research focuses on the lean regime of food retailing, within which strong competitive pressures, and the involvement of organizations in a retail war, make attendance a crucial element to secure competitiveness (Patton and Johns, 2012). Edwards and Whitston (1993) suggest that in times of (price) war, a “moral panic” surrounding...