Dirty bank work: Exploring organisational sources of taint

While researchers have to date mainly focused on the coping strategies employed by dirty workers to normalize taint and maintain a positive sense of self, the organisational and managerial roots of dirty work have been little explored. The article contributes to fill this gap through a single case study conducted in a big Italian banking company. In the research context investigated, branch-level bank employees felt themselves tainted from the moral (as ‘vendors’) and social (as ‘servants of customers’) points of view. These perceptions were directly associated with organisational strategies and managerial practices intended, for example, to pursue demanding sales targets or to create more space and freedom for customers. Although the dirty work literature assumes that occupational taint is normally generated by external societal attributions, the study thus shows that the dirtying of an occupation is a process that can be fostered by internal organisational strategies and managerial practices