Windows on the Workplace: Computers, Jobs, and the Organization of Office Work

Greenbaum (computer information systems, LaGuardia Junior College; and environmental psychology, City U. of New York) debunks technological determinism by looking closely at work and the organization and meaning of work and jobs, finding that workers are enduring insecurity, increased competition, demands for more and more specialization, and management's inability to organize work properly. In this edition, which she has updated to include current conditions in the workplace, she describes the changes wrought by the computer in the office environment in the past 50 years, the reasons why the office of the future has remained in the future, and the clots of conventional wisdom that workers in the "knowledge industry" must confront collectively if they want to do meaningful work and avoid being absorbed into the milling millions of the downsized. Annotation ©2005 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR