Power, corruption and lies: Mis-selling and the production of culture in financial services

Abstract

The extent of recent misconduct in retail financial services questions assumptions that mis-selling is perpetrated by rogue traders dealing in sub-prime markets. Yet we know little about the organizational dimensions of mis-selling and specifically how new employees are introduced to and subsequently enact mis-selling behaviour when not explicitly encouraged to do so. This article seeks to understand the mechanics of mis-selling through an ethnographic account of the opening of a new retail financial services call centre, and analysis of the ritual nature of the sales interaction. The study documents the training, induction and initial work of direct sales agents to better understand the complexity, social relations and organization of mis-selling, together with the way in which regulation and management regimes shape sales practice and consequent employee behaviour. The critical analysis of sales rituals allows us to explain how mis-selling becomes embedded in organizational practice and contributes to our understanding of the everydayness of mis-selling in contrast to approaches that focus either on individual decision-making or on cultural explanations.

Lies, defeasibility and morality-in-action: The interactional architecture of false claims in sales, telemarketing and debt collection work

“…To broaden out the implications of our findings, we propose that defeasibility is important not only for advancing the understanding lying as a practical action but also more (Brannan, 2017). Our explanation from the study of work practice extends this work further by providing evidence that the morality of work arrangements, even those thought to be underpinned by deceit, has to be preserved ritualistically through daily work practices (Goffman, 1973;Brannan, 2017) and that these practices are best understood as fluid, contingent, on-going accomplishments (Garfinkel, 1967).…”

“…These studies have identified the role of organizational factors such as training, socialisation, organizational culture, organizational identification and power relations that serve to perpetuate and sustain systems of deceit in organizations (Fleming & Zyglidopoulos, 2008;Lindsay, Dunbar & Russell, 2011;Weiskopf & Willmott, 2013;Rhodes, 2016;Jenkins & Delbridge, 2016;Brannan, 2017;Kenny, 2017).…”

“…There is the problem of access and finding organizations willing to let researchers study lying as it happens. Brannan (2017) has arguably got the closest to the practice of lying, studying the act of deception ethnographically from within an organization where he was an insider. We build on and advance this work adopting an ethnomethodological approach, which we will now outline.…”

“…We recover practices through which false claims are transformed, with varying degrees of success, from nefarious to innocent accountings. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for wider questions about the reproduction of work cultures that rely upon deceit.Lying is 'woven into the daily fabric of business life' (Grover, 2005: 149; see also Grover, 1995; Ashforth and Anand, 2003; Hansen et al, 2006;Shalvi et al, 2011;Brannan, 2017; Jenkins and Delbridge, 2016). Many recent corporate scandals have revealed institutionalized systems of deceit (Markham, 2006;Rhodes, 2016).…”

Are call centers sweatshops?

“…The topics covered in these 14 papers can be generally classified into customer contact, human resources, administration, work meaningfulness, and technology, as shown in Table 1 (Rothbard & Wilk, 2011), and mis-selling (Brannan, 2017).…”