Domination Metaphor (Lecture Notes)

The domination metaphor refers to how an organization tries to control its employees and the affects that this control has on employees. Organizations impose themselves on their employees by making the employee accessible at all times. There needs to be a medium between work and a person's personal life, but now organizations are crossing the line. Work place surveillance was the example given for organizations controlling their employees. Organizations have the technology to monitor their employees at all times and keep them on task. This is a good way of keeping employees on task, but at the same time it is reducing productivity. It decreases productivity because employees cannot focus on work for eight hours straight; they will become sloppy. Pagers and cell phones are intrusive. Once an employee goes home, they should not be bombarded by work.
When I was the manager of a swim lesson program I worked from 8 in the morning until 8 at night, five days a week. I had never worked so hard in my life and when I got home all I wanted to do was relax, eat dinner, and go to sleep. On average, I would get a call from my boss after I got home so that she could tell me how to do things the next day. Not only was I being micro-managed, but my down time away from work was being taken away. My boss wanted to control everything that was happening and in return she reduced my productivity. By the end of summer, I dreaded every single day of work.