Clerks, Cashiers, Customer Carers: Women’s Work in European Services

  • Juliet Webster
Chapter

Abstract

In many contemporary discussions of service employment, considerable emphasis is placed on services with a high knowledge content. Immaterial, ‘weightless’, knowledge-intensive services, particularly services which can be provided and consumed using information and communications, have for the past decade been seen as central to the health and continuing development of European economies. These high-end ‘knowledge-intensive services’ have been treated in social, economic and regional policies as the drivers of economic development, the means by which countries, regions and organizations can grow, create wealth and secure competitive advantage (Hauknes 1996). Human capital is one of the key resources in the creation and development of these services, the element which adds value to specialized activities in design, marketing, programming, engineering, management, consultancy, and that which drives innovation in all these and other service areas.

Keywords

Labour Market Financial Service Product Knowledge Customer Service Call Centre 
These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.
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© Juliet Webster 2010

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  • Juliet Webster

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