From ride-hailing services to warehouses to hiring platforms, algorithms are increasingly taking on the role of manager. What does this mean for worker autonomy and meaningful engagement with work?

On this episode of The Culture Kit, hosts Jenny Chatman and Sameer Srivastava interview Lindsey Cameron, assistant professor of management at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, about the research insights she gained from getting behind the wheel as a ride-hailing driver. Cameron discusses the cultural aspects of gig work, the “good bad job” paradox, and strategies for fostering equity and worker dignity in an increasingly algorithm-driven world.

Main takeaway from Jenny & Sameer’s interview with Lindsey Cameron :

Keep humans at the center. Rather than optimizing solely for efficiency, use human-centered design to consider worker well-being throughout their lifecycle with the company.

For more information about this podcast and a full written transcript, please see http: haas.org/culture-kit.

*The Culture Kit with Jenny & Sameer is a production of Haas School of Business and is produced by University FM.*

Show Links:

View the full transcript of this episode.
Lindsey Cameron’s website
“The Making of the “Good Bad” Job: How Algorithmic Management Manufactures Consent Through Constant and Confined Choices.” By Lindsey D. Cameron, Administrative Science Quarterly, 2024.
“How Microchoices and Games Motivate Gig Workers,” By Lindsey D. Cameron, Harvard Business Review, 2024
“‘Making Out’ While Driving: Relational and Efficiency Games in the Gig Economy,” by Lindsey D. Cameron, Organization Science, 2021.
“Expanding the Locus of Resistance: The Constitution of Control and Resistance in the Gig Economy,” By Lindsey D. Cameron, & Hatim Rahman. Organization Science, 2022.
“Heroes from Above But Not (Always) From Within: Gig Workers Responses to the Public Moralization of their Work During the COVID-19 Pandemic,” By Lindsey D. Cameron, Curtis K. Chan, and Michel Anteby. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2022.
“Good Jobs, Bad Jobs: The Rise of Polarized and Precarious Employment Systems in the United States, 1970s-2000s.” By Arne L. Kalleberg, 2011.
“Manufacturing Consent: Changes in the Labor Process Under Monopoly Capitalism,” By Michael Burawoy, 1982.
“A Numbers Game: Quantification of Work, Auto-Gamification, and Worker Productivity,” by Aruna Ranganathan and Alan Benson, American Sociological Review, 2020
“Where Platform Capitalism and Racial Capitalism Meet: The Sociology of Race and Racism in the Digital Society”, by Tressie McMillan Cottom, Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, 2020.
Own This! How Platform Cooperatives Help Workers Build a Democratic Internet, by R. Trebor Scholz, Penguin Random House, 2023.
Hustle and Gig: Struggling and Surviving in the Sharing Economy, by Alexandrea J. Ravenelle, University of California Press, 2019.

Do you have a vexing question about work that you want Jenny and Sameer to answer? Submit your “Fixit Ticket!”

Learn more about the podcast and the Berkeley Center for Workplace Culture and Innovation at www.haas.org/culture-kit.

*The Culture Kit with Jenny & Sameer is a production of UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business and the Berkeley Center for Workplace Culture and Innovation. It is produced by University FM.*

Nodes of Design#2: Lean UX by Krishna Kishore Pande