Is the work conducted in a single location, with workers in close proximity to one another, or is the work conducted at isolated locations? This is potentially important in at least two ways: First, work conducted in isolation will be harder to monitor and harder to direct. Consider far-flung service-oriented companies. It is not surprising that such companies typically combine information technology (e.g., on-board devices that transmit data to central mainframes) with strong in cultivation of their workforce in order to ensure compliance with company policies and quality standards. In contrast, when work is conducted in an environment with many (similar) workers present, peer pressure can more readily be employed (for good or, in the case of peer-induced output restrictions, for bad). Second, when workers are in close proximity and technically interdependent, it also becomes harder to treat differently workers who see themselves as similar (in social science jargon, forces of social comparison are stronger and the worker dissent is more easily mobilized.
What skills are required? Are those skills acquired externally or on the job? Are those skills firm-specific or are they transportable? When workers' skills are acquired on the job, new hires are usually less productive than workers with longer job tenures, because the new hires invest a fraction of their time learning what to do and how. Even when skills can be acquired off the job, the firm often pays for their acquisition. In either case, the costs of turnover can be high and the firm will take steps to retain its already-trained workers and attract workers it will want to keep. When skills are acquired on the job and skill requirements increase with rank, promotion-from-within systems acquire substantial advantages. When workers acquire skills on the job, they often do so from co-workers, which have implications for how rewards are distributed. In particular, seniority-based pay and promotion systems are often employed under these circumstances, so that senior workers are willing to share their knowledge with their junior colleagues. leia todo o artigo
