Article: Quality of work life of women workers: role of trade unions.

Article from: Indian Journal of Industrial Relations Article date: January 1, 2007 Author: Joshi, Rama J. Copyright
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See Your Ad On Google Advertise Your Business On Google. Get A Free Rs. 1,500 Trial Coupon! www.google.com/adwords Ultra Miniature Connector Manuf. of Nano & Micro Miniature Interconnects & Custom Connectors www.omnetics.com IT Jobs for Women with a Global Tech Leader. A Preferred Employer for Women. www.accenture.com The present study was designed to explore the issue of representation of legitimate interests of women workers in its entirety and make suggestions to help the policy makers to improve the quality of work life of women workers. The study was carried out in the services and manufacturing (public) sectors, more specifically in Banking, Insurance, PSUs and Hospitals. The study findings reveal that the level of satisfaction of women employees with QWL in their respective organisations was quite high in spite of the overall work life conditions as provided by the company/management being only average (as perceived by them). While the wider issues having implications for the entire workforce were taken care of in their negotiations by the existing union of which they were members the women specific issues were generally ignored (except for in hospitals where the dominant gender was female). Implications of the findings for employers, trade unions, the Government and the women themselves are also discussed. INTRODUCTION Beginning in the seventies and during the next two decades a constellation of principles and methods had evolved into a movement called Quality of Work Life (QWL). The quality of work life is a "broad expression covering a vast variety of programmes, techniques, theories, and management styles through which organisations and jobs are designed so as to grant workers more autonomy, responsibility, and authority than is usually done. To simplify somewhat, the general objective is to arrange organisations, management procedures, and jobs for maximum

utilisation of individual talents and skills, in order to create more challenging and satisfying work and improve organisation effectiveness" (Jenkins, 1981: p.7). Emergence of concern for QWL can be traced to the revival of interest in the larger area of 'quality of life' in most of the countries of the world. This is so because the two terms are closely related to each other. Life at work is an integral part of total life space (Lawler III et. al, 1980). The QWL may therefore be conceptualised as a sub-set of the quality of life, which is all-inclusive notion of life and living conditions (Mukherjee, 1980; Szalai and Andrews, 1980). To quote Beinum (1974), it is the quality of the content of relationship between human beings and their work. Women today form an important constituent of the labour force in India. As the labour force participation of women increased over the years, especially in professions and services, so has the social scientists' and policy makers' concern with the linkages between QWL and gender issues. Walker's (1975) QWL involved the task, physical work environment and the social environment within the organisation, the administrative system of the establishment and the relationship between life and job. Sayeed and Sinha (1981) focussed upon economic benefits, physical working conditions, mental state, career orientations, advancement, job stress, effect on personal life, union management relations, self respect, etc. The sex composition of the workplace determines the extent and type of 'work life' that women and men experience at work. Gutek (1985) examined socio-sexual interaction in work settings in terms of sex-role spillover, which means the carryover into the workplace of gender based expectations for behaviour. The physical and social environment at the place of work affects the QWL. The effects on women are different in female dominated, male dominated, or in integrated workplaces. Thus not only does the term QWL have different connotations to different persons the factors contributing to QWL are also varied. To a worker on the assembly line it may simply mean a fair day's work, safe working" conditions, and a supervisor who treats him/her with dignity. To the young professional it may mean opportunity for advancement, career growth, being able to utilise one's talents, etc. To an academician it may mean being able to satisfy important personal needs, etc. Thus, many factors contribute to QWL such as (a) Adequate and fair remuneration (b) Safe and healthy working conditions (c) Security of employment (d) Opportunity for growth and advancement (e) Promotion prospects (f) Nature of supervision (g) Application of principles of natural justice and equity (h) Respect at work

A review of the above factors reveals that often the conditions that contribute to motivation will also contribute to QWL. In the case of women employees special measures for their protection, availability of child care facilities like creche, no discrimination in recruitment and equal treatment on the job, etc. assume additional importance. Most research studies in the field focus on two sets of factors having a bearing on job satisfaction and motivation and ultimately on quality of work life: organisation driven factors and individual driven factors. Under the first category such policies and procedures that deal with retaining the employees such as training and education advancement opportunities, grievance handling, monetary benefits, participative management, safety and security, welfare measures and recognition and appreciation may be highlighted. To a large extent QWL in the organisation becomes conducive if policies on the above mentioned issues are designed and implemented in a proactive manner leading to high degree of satisfaction with them. The second set of factors having a bearing on QWL may be termed individual driven factors. Individual driven factors are those that are very much governed by individual idiosyncrasies, likes and dislikes. These generally include managerial style, delegation, communication and interpersonal relations. The quality of work culture, to a large extent is influenced by these variables as they directly deal with people management. By and large the studies in this area show the effect of organisation and individual driven factors on satisfaction and commitment of employees to their jobs/organisation. Indirectly the emphasis has been on the QWL conditions and feelings. Direct studies on QWL have been few and far between specially with respect to women workers. Most studies focus on the linkage of QWL with some of the outcome variables such as performance, productivity, job satisfaction, etc. QWL has been found to be important for job performance, job satisfaction, labour turnover, labour management relations and such other factors which play a crucial role in determining the overall well being of any industrial organisation (Hoque and Rahman, 1999). Several researches have been conducted in the field. Haque (1992) examined the relationship between QWL and job satisfaction and found that QWL led to greater job satisfaction. Hossain and Islam (1999) found that there existed a positive relationship between QWL and job satisfaction among government hospital nurses in Bangladesh. In another study Hussain (2000) found that public sector bank employees were in a better position in terms of their job satisfaction than private sector bank employees. Wadud (1996) found that QWL was significantly higher among the private sector women employees than their counterparts in the public sector. THE STUDY AND ITS OBJECTIVES Women's employment in the organised sector has been growing over the years. The growth in women's employment has been more marked in the public sector. Though the proportion of women to total employment has been small, women do constitute an important segment of the labour market and their contribution is considered valuable in many sectors and jobs. It is, therefore important for the employers to take steps to enhance the QWL of women employees along with that of male employees. In similar vain trade unions have a special responsibility to take up the specific women's issues with the management along with the issues common to all. This will help in enhancing the QWL of women employees. What is the extent to which trade

unions have been able to articulate the interests of women workers and with what impact? How different are their efforts and impact as compared to the male representatives? Answers to these questions are not available, as no systematic attempt has been