正文
经济学人下载:巴托比职场专栏--评级制度对工人的影响(1)
Business
来源于《商业》版块
Bartleby
巴托比职场专栏
I am Number 0.6
我是0.6个工人
How modern workers are at the mercy of ratings
现代工人是如何受评级影响的
A close friend of Bartleby’s just got the news that their department was shedding 2.6 workers. At first sight, the concept of 0.6 of a worker sounds pretty odd. But workers who are freelance, on temporary contracts, or in part-time employment register in the headcount as less than a whole number.
巴托比的一个好朋友刚刚得到消息,他们部门要裁员2.6人。乍一看,0.6个工人的概念听起来很奇怪。但自由职业者、临时合同工或兼职登记在册的工人都按小于1计算的。
Being classed as 0.6 of a worker seems dehumanising. Few people want to be thought of as just a number, let alone a fraction. In “The Prisoner”, a cult British television series from the 1960s, the hero, played by Patrick McGoohan, resigns from his job as a secret agent only to be abducted and taken to a village. He is only referred to as “Number 6” and his frequent escape attempts are frustrated.
被归为0.6个工人似乎是不人道的。很少有人愿意只被看成一个数字,更别说是一个分数了。在上世纪60年代风靡英国的电视连续剧《囚徒》中,帕特里克•麦谷汉扮演的主人公辞去了特工的工作,却被绑架并带到一个村庄。他只被称为“6号”,而且频繁的逃跑尝试都失败了。
Although he insists that “I am not a number, I am a free man”, the audience never learns his name. The programme has a very 1960s vibe—it focuses on the individual’s efforts to assert himself in the face of a repressive, conformist society. At one point, the title character declares: “I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.”
虽然他坚称“我不是一个数字,我是一个自由的人”,但观众永远不会知道他的名字。这个项目有一种非常60年代的感觉——它关注的是个人在面对一个压抑、墨守成规的社会时,努力坚持自己的立场。“以后我不要被逼迫、归档、贴上标签;被归为索引、简报、报告或编号。我的生活我做主。”
These days many workers would sympathise. They feel pushed, filed, indexed and numbered. When they apply for a job, they may be assessed by artificial intelligence, which parses résumés for key words without which an applicant’s odds of an interview lengthen. Based on works like “Evidence-Based Recruiting” by Atta Tarki, who claims that scores in general-mental-ability tests have a strong 65% correlation with job performance, firms may ask candidates to take an intelligence test.
如今,许多工人会对此表示感同身受。他们感到被逼迫、被归档、被索引、被编号。申请工作时,可能会接受人工智能的评估,人工智能会分析简历中的关键词,如果没有这些关键词,那么求职者的面试机会就会减少。阿塔·塔尔基在著作《循证招聘》中称,总体心理能力测试的分数与工作表现有高达65%的相关性。
When they get a job, employees find the indexing and numbering continues. Workers at warehouses have to pick a certain number of items per hour; those at call-centres are assessed by software that monitors their hourly number of calls, and the amount of time spent on each one. Fall behind the target and you may feel unable to take a break. When their task is completed, employees are often rated again, this time by the customers.
当找到一份工作时,员工发现索引和编号仍在继续。仓库的工人必须每小时拾取一定数量的物品;呼叫中心的工作人员通过软件进行评估,软件会监控他们每小时的通话次数和每次通话的时长。落后于目标,你可能会觉得连觉都睡不着。当任务完成后,员工通常会被再次评估,这次是由客户进行评估。