Social work on the whiteboard: governing by comparing performance.

Autor/in	Hjärpe, Teres
Titel	Social work on the whiteboard: governing by comparing performance.
Quelle	In: Social Inclusion, 7 (2019) 1, S. 185-195 PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei Link als defekt meldenVerfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	2183-2803
DOI	10.17645/si.v7i1.1829
Schlagwörter	Vergleich; Messung; Soziale Dienste; Sozialarbeit; Leistung
Abstract	This article explores a number-based comparative logic unfolding around a particular kind of meeting in a social work setting: a daily and short gathering referred to as a "pulse meeting". At such meetings, staff gather around a whiteboard visualizing individual statistics in terms of the number of client meetings performed or assistance decisions made. The statistics function as a basis for further division of work tasks. As such, it is a particular way of representing what social workers do at work. Ethnographic fieldwork conducted in the social services revealed how such openly exposed individual performance and the related number-based comparative logic can trump alternative logics ranging from the overall collective performance, competing views on clients' needs and efficiency, and the social worker's sense of professionalism. When participants of the study compared themselves to each other and in relation to standards and goals, certain conclusions were drawn about what should be done by whom and in what order. Such conclusions became embedded in an objectivity status difficult for anyone to argue against. Finally, the number-based logic also found its way into the counter-practices formulated by social workers unsatisfied with what was visualized on the whiteboard.
Erfasst von	GESIS - Leibniz-Institut für Sozialwissenschaften, Mannheim
Update	2020/1