Vous êtes sur la page 1sur 22

Employee

Participation,
Involvement
Implications for Employee Relations
Employee Participation
 Long history in Personnel/HRM

 Distinguish
Direct v Indirect
Formal v Informal
Scope – limited/broad
Level – team/department/company
Focus – task/team/individual

 Changing emphasis – Employee Involvement v


Participation
Distinctions

Salamon (1998)
 Industrial Democracy –
Worker control
 Employee Participation -

Influencing decision-making
 Employee Involvement -

Engage support, understanding,


commitment and contribution
Continuum of Employee Participation

No Receive Joint Joint Employee


Involvement Information Consultation Decision- Control
Making

Source: Blyton and Turnbull


1998
Phases and Influence of Forms
of Participation in UK

Marxist Worker
Control

Collective Bargaining
Pluralist
Joint Consultation
Employee
Involvement

Downward Communications Task-Based


Unitarist
Participation

1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000


Levels of Participation
Worker Directors

Collective Bargaining

Works Councils

Joint Consultative Committees

Task-Based Participation
Theoretical Contributions
 Unitarist - Human Relations/HRM
 Mayo – communications/consultation
influence in Britain post 1930s
 HRM – EI alternative to unions or provide
dual channel (Willman 2007)
 Marxist – Cycles of control (Ramsay 1977)
– participation as response to challenges to
management authority and changes in
power within capital-labour relations
 Pluralist – Wave theory (Marchington1992)
Employee Involvement and
Participation
Recent interest from two main sources:

 Rise of HRM
Focus on EI means to securing commitment and high
performance - HPWS
‘Mutual gains enterprise’ (Kochan and Osterman 2000)
Co-operation, mutual interest v conflict in employment
relationship
High involvement – ‘mining the gold in people’s heads’ to
secure improved performance
 European Initiatives
European Works Councils (1990s) Information and
Consultation Directive (2002)
Tensions between HRM and EU Agendas
Employee Involvement
 HRM influence seen through claimed links between EI
and performance

 Performance a function of
Ability
Motivation
Opportunity (AMO)

‘More rigorous selection and better training systems to


increase ability levels, more comprehensive incentives
to enhance motivation , and participative structures that
improve opportunity to contribute’ (Applebaum et al.
2000, in Boxall and Purcell p. 20).
Linkages within High Performance Work Systems
Expanded Improved
HR Practices and
employee
operating systems company
potential and
designed and
increased
performance
‘bundled’ to enhance
discretionary
• Ability effort
• Motivation
• Opportunity

Improved
Improved
systemic worker
response to outcomes
employee
effort

Supportive company,
industry and societal
context
Employee Involvement
 EI major area of growth in Britain since early
1980s
 Particular configuration of;
- Level
- Scope
- Direct involvement
- Focus
 Complex reasons for growth – see Marchington
work, often dual-channel (exists alongside
indirect communications)
Employee Involvement
 Employee Involvement includes:

Teamworking (including self-managing teams)


Team Briefing
Downward communications
Two-way communications
Suggestion schemes
Problem-solving groups
Financial participation (includes profit sharing
schemes and ESOPs)
And Engagement?
 ‘Engagement is an idea whose time has come….it
represents an aspiration that employees should
understand, identify and commit themselves to the
objectives of the organisation they work for…..
(however)….HR professionals need to recognise
that engagement is a strategic issues that cannot
simply be left to manage itself’ (CIPD 2005, 2006)

 An illustration of the assumed links between


engagement and other factors is contained on the
next slide
Employee Engagement (CIPD 2007)
Opps for upward
feedback

Feeling informed Engagement

Mgt commitment to
organisation Performance

Manager’s fairness
re: issues
Intention to Stay
Treating employees
With respect
Participation in EU
 In EU model of legally constituted forms of
indirect involvement via Works Councils (or
equivalent) and (in some countries) employee
representation at senior levels in organisations –
board level
 Works councils/works committees at
establishment or organisational level: Austria,
Belgium, France, Greece, Luxembourg, the
Netherlands, Portugal and Spain, similar
structures in Denmark, Norway
 Representative system - Key role for trade
unions and worker representatives
European Union Traditions
 Model of participation in EU normally a dual system
of industry-wide collective bargaining and company-
based works councils

 Some countries (Germany) gone further in formal


systems of co-determination at company level

 EU tried to extend this to other countries with Draft


5th Directive (1972) and recently with European
Works Council Directive and Information and
Consultation Directive (2002)

 Tensions EU v UK models of involvement


European Union Traditions
 EWCs – covers undertakings with 1000 +
employees within EU countries and with
150 + employees in two or more of the
countries

 Latter covers companies such as M&S,


McDonalds

 There are currently over 600 EWCs in


multinationals within the EU, 100+ of which
are UK firms
Involvement and Participation
Europe
 The Information and Consultation Directive –
UK law introduced 2005 – 2008
 Brings UK more closely in-line with other EU
countries – ‘Works Councils’
 Legally constituted forum for information and
consultation contrasts with voluntary tradition in
UK cover all organisations with 50+ employees
 Represents a shift back to indirect participation
at a level above the workgroup
Involvement and Participation

 In UK considerable hostility to Directive


from Government and employers
 Many see as ‘alien’ to traditions of
involvement and participation in UK
encroachment into managerial prerogative
 Led to a ‘Watering down’ of Directive to
cover direct forms of involvement in UK
legislation
 DTI/BERR work links EU developments with
HPWS
Evidence on Involvement and
Participation in UK
Latest WERS 2004 indicates that:

 72% of workplaces had some form of teamworking


for core employees
 83% used some form of downward communication
 63% had regular meetings with feedback
 71% used team-briefing for communication
 30% had problem-solving groups
 30% used suggestion schemes

More common in Public than Private sector


Evidence from the UK
 According to WERS (2004)

 91% of workplaces have meetings with entire


workforce or team briefings
 38% use e-mail (48% in public sector), 34% the
intranet (48% in public sector)
 42% use employee surveys (66% public sector)
 45% use regular newsletters
 74% use noticeboards

Limited change in use of these since 1998 survey


What Does Evidence Tell Us?

 Management control – involvement on


management’s terms?
 Emphasis on ‘top-down’ communications –
unitarist
 More communication and consultation far
less negotiation
 Is management listening?
 Management cultures – ‘is knowledge still
power’?

Vous aimerez peut-être aussi