Algorithmic Management

From Technology to Politics and Theory

Abstract

This article provides an overview of the concept of ‘algorithmic management’. This concept has played an important role as an organizing frame for empirical research seeking to demystify the role of labor platforms in intermediating paid work. More recently, this concept has helped shed light on the increasing use of computer algorithms to automate managerial tasks in conventional work settings. However, beyond platform work, most research is confined to warehousing, with only a few notable studies in manufacturing and retail. Moreover, most empirical investigations highlight the conditional nature of algorithmic management, with human managers retaining important functions. Only recently have studies begun to go beyond technical functions and consider how human elements (worker, manager, and technologist) shape such systems. Relatedly, the contingencies, moderations, and variations in algorithmic management have received insufficient consideration. These weaknesses result from a tendency to generalize from single case studies without adequately extending out from the case to theory, history, and geography, and not situating empirical research within a broader theoretically motivated research program. Workplace regime theory, with its focus on technology, power, and embeddedness, is presented as a remedy that enables algorithmic management research to account for variations while explaining regularities.