John Goodman

Understanding the Meaning of Participation: Views from the Workplace

It is now generally agreed that there has been a growth in the extensiveness of employee involvement (El) in Britain in recent years. However, the value of this information is limited because many of the studies rely heavily on management viewpoints about the impact of El. Even when surveys of employee opinion are undertaken, however, the results are typically abstracted from the organizational context in which they are located. In this article, we present information from six organizations collected as part of a larger study on El in Britain. This illustrates that employee attitudes to El are dependent, inter alia, upon the prior experiences which employees have of El and work in general, managements approaches to employee relations, and the recent and projected corporate performance of the organization. This leads us to suggest that El is as much affected by the prevailing organizational culture and environment as it is a source of change. The authors call for more research studies of this kind to be undertaken.

Unfair dismissal cases, disciplinary procedures, recruitment methods and management style

Summarises some findings from recent empirical research into the factors influencing the incidence of claims of unfair dismissal to industrial tribunals. Using a paired comparison case study method it focuses, primarily, on small businesses and small establishments, seeking to explore significant variations. These include the presence or absence of written disciplinary procedures, their mode of operation, content and meaning, and management style and consistency. Qualitative insights include the prevalence of informal first approaches to perceived employee shortcomings and the influence of overall employee assessment in selective disciplinary action. Contrary to earlier research in small businesses it finds little principled management opposition or resentment to the introduction of written disciplinary procedures, with managers highlighting the assistance they give to them when taking disciplinary action.

Refashioning Industrial Relations: The Experience of a Chemical Company over the Last Decade

Uses a longitudinal case study approach to analyse changes in industrial relations in a chemical company over the last decade. The authors argue that the concept of “waves” can be used to help understand developments during this period. The first wave related to the crisis of the early 1980s and a “turnaround project”, while the second was part of a longer term and in a sense less urgent cultural change initiative. There was thus a shift in management thinking, from emphasizing compliance with short‐term imperatives, to an attempt to develop a more fully co‐operative relationship, where commitment was seen as central to the new way of working. However, underpinning this shift to a more co‐operative relationship was a considerable shift in the balance of workplace power, a fact which explains the new relationship more effectively than increased employee understanding or the growth of consensus at the workplace. At the same time, there remained ambiguity amongst the key actors in the process. Whilst senior ...

The Long and Winding Road: Tracking Employee Involvement at Brown's Woven Carpets

British industrial relations has changed greatly over the past decade. A central development has been management′s sponsorship of new, direct forms of employee involvement (EI) such as team briefing, quality circles and profit sharing. In many larger manufacturing firms new schemes now co‐exist with traditional union‐centred collective bargaining structures. In 1988 Employee Relations Vol. 10 No. 6 reported on a quality circle programme and a range of other EI initiatives at Brown′s Woven Carpets. Here returns to Brown′s several years on, as part of a wider, Department of Employment funded research project on “New Developments in Employee Involvement” carried out at Manchester School of Management, UMIST. The Brown′s case illustrates how employee participation develops in successive “waves” – a major theme of the larger study. The firm has now entered a period of consolidation. No new schemes have been introduced, but the early 1980s initiatives have gained a stable if not dominant place in company indust...

The hunt for the Red X: a case study in the use of Shainin design of experiement (DOE) in an industrial honing operation

Documents a case study in the use of Shainin Design of Experiments in an industrial honing operation. Provides an overview of the process which attempts to reduce process variability by isolating the most influential factor (Red X). Shows the details of the week‐long experiment and gives some analysis of the data. Uses multiple statistical techniques to identify Red X and discusses corrective action. Suggests that this methodology is very practical and easily executable in many settings, making it one of the most approachable quality techniques available.

ESOP's fables: a tale of a machine tool company

Employee Share Ownership Plans (ESOPs) have attracted considerable attention in the UK in recent years and have been seen by some writers as a potentially more advanced form of share ownership. Benefits are said to include improved economic performance and new channels for participation in management decision making. However existing evidence is by no means conclusive. The evidence is largely American and the research findings may not be directly transferable because of legal and historical differences. Moreover, much of the work is based on surveys which tend to abstract the findings from the organizational context. In this paper we argue that ESOPs should be seen in the context of the broader employee relations setting. In particular, we argue that the ESOP in our case study formed the second of three waves of Employee Involvement and its performance can only really be understood in this context. Moreover, despite its attractiveness in principle, the ESOP proved no more successful than any other EI sche...

Canadian Industrial Relations: An Introductory Overview

A brief summary of the Canadian industrial relations system is presented. Some of the main social, political and economic dimensions of the system are outlined.