ABSTRACT
Much of contemporary interactive service work is structured to promote the consumption of the sign value of the enchanting myth of customer sovereignty. After outlining this concept, the chapter examines the key problems that face call centre management in its attempts to ensure that customers are able to consume this sign value. Management seeks to promote this sign-value through its symbolic representation of call centres in its advertising and marketing, through the overall organisation of call centre operations, and through the structuring of individual interactions between customers and call centre workers. The following section argues that despite these attempts, important factors exist which will lead systematically to some customers' enchantment turning to disillusionment. The call centre worker's job then, often, can revolve as much around the management of disillusionment as around the promotion of the enchanting myth of sovereignty.
