3: Voice and Blame

Discussion of power and control in the previous chapter focussed upon what people do in their organisational life. It is not surprising that managers are primarily interested in observable behaviour and the activity in which staff engage during their paid hours of work. However there is another dimension, equally important if harder to define, and that is the realm of what people say: do staff have a voice and, if so, how is it articulated; do employees speak out or are they constrained from doing so, and, if staff keep quiet, why do they do so and how is silence encouraged by the organisation?