Whether you are writing an autobiographical account of a job or an ethnographic description of a workplace, you will need to explore the topic before beginning to write. Answer the following questions in as much detail as you can. Your answers to these questions will generate details and arguments for use in your work critical essay.

Cultural Production

Use the following prompt to generate as many cultural values perpetuated in your workplace as possible: "The ideal X employee should Y." Substitute the company and job you occupy for X and the cultural effects your employers try to create in you for Y. The more cultural values you can generate, the better your selection will be when you begin writing your work critical essay.

Good cultural values are the key to a successful work critical essay. Cultural values answer the question "What kind of people do my employers want me and other employees to be?" Cultural values should be written from the perspective of the company, and they should always express qualities inherent in the ideal employee.

The following examples are several well-written cultural values: the ideal Wayerhaeuser factory worker is always thinking about safety first; the ideal Rayovac receptionist should always be pleasant regardless of the circumstances; the ideal Wal-Mart associate should always be busy. The following examples are poorly written cultural values: the ideal Hardee's cook should cook each hamburger for 2:35; KinderCare pre-school teachers and daycare workers should only be paid minimum wage; Nike employees think they should be promoted according to how long they have been with the company.

Contextual Distribution

Brainstorm methods your employers use to reinforce (i.e., distribute) each cultural value in the workplace: job descriptions, posted policies, orientation workshops, supervision, observation, training sessions, verbal reprimands, productivity awards, staff meetings, and so on. Several others should present themselves as you remember or observe your workplace.

Details regarding a company's product/service output, its employee relations and activities, and its geographical layout also contribute to the distribution of cultural values. Use the following prompts to explore how cultural values are distributed in the workplace you have chosen to critique.

Company Output: What products does the company produce and what services does it offer? What technologies are used in the company? What clientele does the company serve? Who are its target audiences? What geographical regions does the company serve?

Employee Relations: What is the power hierarchy in the company and what is your place in it? Try to draw as detailed a diagram of the company's power hierarchy as you can. What are the social relationships like among employees (workers, managers)? What kinds of interaction are allowed or encouraged among employees?

Employee Activities: What activities are assigned to your position in the company? Are your activities negotiable or strictly assigned? If negotiable, to what extent? What activities are assigned to other positions in the company? Are their activities negotiable or strictly assigned? If negotiable, to what extent?

Geographical Layout: What is the geographical layout of the company "space"? Try to draw a detailed diagram of the company's geographical layout. What "spaces" are better than others and why? Who occupies these better and worse spaces?

Critical Consumption

Describe ways that you and other employees accommodate, resist, and negotiate the cultural values perpetuated in your workplace. We accommodate work cultural values when we accept the ideal images the company places on us and we willingly complete the tasks the job requires. We resist work cultural values when we disagree with the ideal images the company places on us and we find ways to avoid or subvert the tasks the job requires. Most important, we negotiate work cultural values when our opinion of the ideal images the company places on us varies from situation to situation and we sometimes complete the tasks the job requires and other times avoid or subvert the same tasks.

Rhetorical Intervention

Write a letter to a member of the company that you think would be most likely (and best able) to change the workplace for the better.

What members of the company are in the best position to do something about the problems you point out? List two or three as potential audiences and answer the following questions for each of them: (1) How much does the audience know about the problems you describe? (2) What is the audience's attitude toward the problem (would they want to solve it)? (3) What is your rhetorical purpose in this intervention (inform, persuade, etc.)?