it much from day to day or room to room. They do make some small choices, such as whether to replace a bedsheet when they notice a tiny hole or a stain. And guest behavior, which determines the time housekeepers can enter the room as well as the effort necessary to clean it, does introduce variation into their work. But in general these workers exercise very little discretion.
As a consequence of this tangibility and quantifiable “output,” room cleaners are also easily monitored. Although room cleaners generally work alone, supervisors examine the rooms they have cleaned, holding glasses up to the light to look for spots or running a finger along the windowsills checking for dust. Supervisors are inconsistent about this task, because the amount of time they have to inspect rooms varies daily. However, room cleaners do not know when their rooms will be checked, and clear standards make measurement of performance very simple.
Furthermore, tangibility makes back of house workers vulnerable to guest complaints. Guests frequently call the housekeeping office or the front desk to complain about problems in the room or services they have failed to receive. Housekeepers (and even supervisors) in my sites lived in fear of guest dissatisfaction and remembered seemingly small incidents for years afterward. Socorro, a room cleaner with whom I worked at the Royal Court, was especially anxious about guest complaints. She worried about acquiring a “bad reputation” when there was a mark on the wall in one room, though she had reported it to the supervisor. She put extra soap in one room, even though there was some in the shower, because she said it was the kind of thing guests might complain about. Workers sometimes feared misunderstanding guests because of the language barrier.58 It is notable that these housekeeping workers, who had least contact with guests, were most afraid of their complaints.
In addition to their highly regulated work, these workers were especially dependent on their employment at the hotel, because they had few labor market options. Housekeeping workers spoke little English, usually lacked higher education, and frequently told me they had “no choice” when I asked them if they enjoyed their jobs. They primarily liked working at the hotel, not for the content of the work, but because they had good benefits and consistent days off, which was crucial to organizing their child care. Some of them had also suffered much worse in their home countries or as recent immigrants.59 For all of these reasons, these workers were fairly easily controlled by managers.
Semivisible Workers
Some work is neither exactly visible nor invisible. Room reservationists, telephone operators, room service workers, and housekeeping runners have frequent guest contact, but it is either fleeting (for runners and room service delivery people) or telephonic (for telephone operators, room reservationists, and room service order takers). In my sites, these workers were housed in different departments and not generally thought of as all belonging to the same category. Room reservationists and telephone operators have more in common with front of house workers in terms of their race (they are primarily white) and the intangibility of their work.60 Runners and room service workers in both hotels were more akin to housekeepers, in that their work involved a tangible product and they were almost all immigrants of color. However, the labor processes of all these workers share some common elements and differ from either “pure” front of house or back of house work. Hence I call them semi-visible workers.
These jobs are most similar to those Leidner discusses in her study of fast food.61 Although the McDonald's employees she focuses on worked in the “front of the house” at the counter, their jobs were similarly routine and involved only brief contact with clients. Also, both semivisible hotel workers and fast food workers are constrained by the technology that supports them: computers in the case of reservationists, telephone operators, and room service order takers and computerized cash registers in the case of counter workers at McDonald's.
Thanks to the brevity and routine nature of their contact with guests, semivisible hotel workers must observe the interactive elements of luxury service more than housekeepers but less than front of house workers. They must, of course, appear deferential and sincere; Royal Court managers counseled telephone operators to answer the phone “with a smile,” for example. Workers customize interactions by using the guest's name and title of address as they appear on the computer screen. Reservationists and telephone operators are sometimes expected to anticipate guests’ needs on the basis of information they glean in conversation. Runners and room service workers provide speedy physical labor as well as some interactive customization, such as using the guest's name. They must take cues from guests about how much interaction they want, lingering in the room to chat if the guest desires it or responding to unpredictable guest requests.
Semivisible jobs can also be routinized (though not as thoroughly as housekeeping work, as a result of customers’ unpredictability). Room service servers at the Royal Court, for instance, had a prescribed way of setting up the tray or table. They had been trained very specifically on details of the presentation (and they vigorously defended putting the knife to the right of the plate if I unwittingly moved it to the left, for example). They did have some discretion over charging guests for extras or giving them special treats. Telephonic encounters are also fairly routine. The telephone operator's contact with the caller is short and varies little; rarely does she exchange more than a sentence or two with the person calling. The questions the reservation agent asks the caller never vary, and she types the answers into prescribed spaces on her screen. After many shifts in reservations, I wrote in my notes, “It is starting to feel kind of like a factory.”
Semivisible workers in my sites used scripts to some extent, some of which were imposed by managers. Royal Court management posted exactly what the telephone operator was supposed to say to callers, which differed according to whether they were inside or outside the hotel. In reservations, I was trained to say “fully committed” instead of “sold out” or “booked.” Instead of saying “no” to callers, I was supposed to say “I can put you on the waitlist” or “I can check other dates for you.” Yet interactions were rarely fully scripted and usually involved some spontaneous conversation; management certainly made no attempt to eliminate improvisation, as it made the interaction seem more genuine. Workers were expected to respond to cues from guests in customizing their interactions. Routinization, however, sometimes serves to insulate hotel workers, because it controls the client, just as it does for McDonald's employees in Leidner's argument. Scripts protect reservationists from insistent callers, for example, allowing workers simply to repeat “May I check another date for you?”
Supervision of semivisible jobs varies but in general is minimal. Reservationists, telephone operators, and room service order takers are subject to the de facto supervision of coworkers and managers who can hear their interactions with callers, and of course the callers themselves can complain about these workers’ behavior. These checks may prevent them from being overtly rude, but they do not give these workers particular incentives to go out of their way to offer extra care or labor to guests; these extra elements of service are by definition unexpected, so guests are likely to be impressed when they are forthcoming but not notice when they are not. Runners and room service servers interacted with guests completely out of sight of managers, though housekeeping supervisors occasionally complained that runners did not respond to pages, and guests might grumble that room service delivery was not fast enough. The tangibility of the product in these cases ensures that guests know when they have (or have not) received it, so it is easier for them to complain.
The Front of the House
Front of house work contrasts strikingly with both invisible and semi-visible work. The workers in front of house positions provide the highest level of intangible, recognizing service. Workers at the desk and at the front door greet guests by name, anticipate their needs, chat with them, and provide deference and legitimation. Front desk workers and concierges especially remember guest preferences and offer emotional labor. Front door workers not only make conversation and personalize interactions but also carry bags, open doors, and retrieve cars, exerting physical labor on the guest's behalf. Managers in the front of the house also provide a fair amount of luxury service.62
Leidner argues that complex jobs in which customers resist routines and in which customization is a key element of the product are harder to routinize.63 These factors, plus unpredictable guest