Donna Brown

Job satisfaction in the low wage service sector

The stylized facts associated with workers satisfaction are tested using a distinctive data set. Using principal components analysis five distinct measures of workers satisfaction, and the factors that determine each one are examined. The data set, covering three low-wage service sectors, enables control for workplace characteristics to be made. It is shown that characteristics previously identified as important by the job satisfaction literature, in fact have differing effects according to the type of satisfaction being considered. Then is examined which of the satisfaction components has the greatest impact on overall satisfaction. Satisfaction with short-term rewards and long-term prospects are found to be far more influential in determining overall satisfaction, than contentment with social relationships or work intensity.

Employer strategies in the face of a national minimum wage: an analysis of the hotel sector

The introduction of the National Minimum Wage provides an opportunity to examine whether hotel managers act strategically. Most of our sample are affected by this wage floor, and their managers have selected clear response strategies. The majority, 55 per cent, planned to adopt cost minimisation techniques and one third the quality enhancement route.

Labour turnover and management retention strategies in new manufacturing plants

This paper draws from on-going research on labour-management relations in transnational companies within a new town in the English Midlands, Telford (Elger and Smith, 1998a, 1998b; Smith and Elger, 1998). The paper examines the issue of labour turnover and the management of labour retention using two contrasting case examples from Japanese TNCs. The paper seeks to contextualize management decision-making with regard to labour turnover through a political economy and firm-level analysis. At the macro-level we highlight a shift from using wages (Fordism) and strong internal labour markets (bureaucracy) as labour retention mechanisms, towards an inter-firm collusion on wages, non-poaching and union-avoidance. At the micro-level these strategies are matched with firm-level HRM policies of careful labour selection, company paternalism, segmentation of the labour force into temporary and permanent group and accommodation to higher levels of labour turnover to balance product demand and labour supply. TNCs in our research site, Telford, dominate manufacturing employment, representing 60 per cent of all manufacturing jobs. This is similar to other sites of new jobs growth in the UK, for example Swindon where 66 per cent of manufacturing jobs are with TNCs and other new sites of TNC manufacturing investment. The findings are therefore applicable to other areas in which TNC employment has been dominant in manufacturing.

Free to choose? Dimensions of private-sector wage determination, 1979-1994

Deregulation of the system of pay determination in Britain was started in 1979 with the removal of incomes policy. The objective was to give employers the freedom to determine wage increases without the restrictions of pay norms or statutory limits. Instead, companies would be able to link changes in pay to the fortunes of the individual enterprise or establishment. By the mid-1990s, had these attempts to decentralize wage negotiations changed the determinants of wage settlement outcomes in Britain? We address the influence of industrial relations institutions and labour market pressures on wage increases between 1979 and 1994 using evidence from the CBI’s Pay Databank. Despite the direction of the Conservative Government’s policy, the external institutional forces of the labour market, particularly the rate of inflation and comparability, appear to exert an enduring influence, both qualitatively and quantitatively, on pay determination.

Claiming too much, delivering too little: testing some of Hofstede’s generalisations

Abstract This paper considers Geert Hofstede’s claim that his national cultural ‘dimension scores’ and related rankings of countries enable effective prediction by examining a causal generalisation he has repeatedly used to illustrate that capability. When tested against cross-sectional and longitudinal empirical data about conflicts in industrial relations, the generalisation is shown not to have predictive power. A second generalisation is then tested, which also fails to demonstrate predictive capability. This paper discusses some characteristics of valid cross-national research in the light of these predictive failures.

Absenteeism in a Low-Wage Setting

This study uses a unique data set, a low paying manufacturing plant, to test many stylised facts of absenteeism. Analysis of both the demographic characteristics of employees, and external factors shows that female staff are more “reliable” and those who are promoted less so. The plant exhibited poor performance across many indicators and so managers introduced several improvements to pay and conditions. The reaction of different grades of employees to the discrete improvements in conditions showed limited variation, with pay rises proving to be the least critical factor in curbing absence