1. In what ways is gender relevant to the performance and management of emotional labour at Girlie Glitter Co.?

2. How might the concepts of ‘surface acting’ and ‘deep acting’ (Hochschild, 1983) be applied to the experiences of sales assistants? 

3. What HRM techniques have the management team devised to encourage sales assistants to perform emotional labour? 

4. What coping strategies do staff implement to alleviate the negative consequences of the emotional labour aspects of their work? 

5. Draft a recruitment advertisement for sales assistants at Girlie Glitter Co. What key issues might you need to consider in recruiting, selecting and training new staff? 

The case study questions are designed to enhance students’ critical and reflexive understanding of emotion at work, and particularly of emotional labour and its management. The aim is to provide students with an opportunity to reflect on some of the key theories, concepts and practices and to apply these to a particular case study, and also to their own lives and work experiences. The short case study questions are designed to encourage students to think about why organisations might seek to manage emotion, and also the potential benefits and problems this might involve, about the types of work that require the performance of emotional labour, about the skills involved and also ‘emotional dissonance’ (Hochschild, 1983) that emotional labour might result in, and about the role of body language in the management of emotional labour, as well as the conflicts that might be experienced between the performance of emotional labour and other aspects of service roles, as well as some of the coping strategies that emotional labourers might develop. In Case study 20.1 on ‘Girlie Glitter’, students are encouraged to reflect on a number of themes introduced in the chapter, and to make connections between theoretical concepts and their application to management practice. These include: the relationship between gender and emotional labour, different types of emotional labour and the skills they involve, techniques used to manage and monitor emotional labour, emotional dissonance and coping strategies developed by emotional labourers. The final Discussion Question (requiring students to draft a recruitment advertisement) is designed to encourage critical reflection on the recruitment, selection and training issues raised by emotional labour, and to encourage further reading around these issues.