Traditional Approaches to Industrial Relations - Research Proposal Example

 To what extent does the literature on knowledge management and high performance HRM Practices challenge more traditional approaches to industrial relations? By There is a difference between ‘Human Resource’ practices and ‘Modern Human Resource’ practices, which is highlighted by the twenty first century requirements. According to ESRC (UK fact Sheets) human resource in the traditional sense refers to the workforce employed to meet an organisation’s goals. However, in modern human resource management practice, the concern is not meeting the objective but to be a part of an organisation, thereby proving oneself as an organisational asset. To be an important asset of organisation, where on one hand requires non-stop diligent work, on the other hand in order to achieve the best from its employees, it expects from its human resource to come up with effective recruitment, retention and workforce development strategies. (ESRC, 2006) If modern human resource is more equipped, then the fact that today’s employees have not remained like their predecessors in following up the traditional managerial authority can also not ignored. Employees are more educated along with the qualities of more likely to question than to accept managerial authority, more focused on their own career development than on the organisation’s interests, more mobile and are less loyal to their workplaces. Many managers see these characteristics in a negative light, and advance them as yet more reasons why performance planning and review won’t work. In fact, these characteristics of employees make today’s employees ‘knowledge’ workers and today’s human resource ‘knowledge management’. The jobs of these ‘new’ employees present new challenges for managers but, handled effectively, these challenges are a key to better individual and organisational performance. For example, knowledge based jobs might involve high levels of non-repetitive work, with frequent changes in demand and direction making prediction and planning much more difficult and uncertain. Other features of knowledge work also have an impact on the management of performance. (Rudman, 2003, p. 17) Among most researchers working in the context of Human Resource paradigm, it is the explanations that matter any link to firm performance is secondary. It is assumed that societies, governments or regions can have HRM practices and policies as well as firms. At the level of the organisation, the organisation’s objectives and the strategy adopted are not necessarily assumed to be ‘good’ either for the organisation or for society. (Millward, 2000, p. 5) A second potentially important source of change in the UK Human Resource practices the work, which is derived from various developments in managerial thinking about employee relations. Very broadly this is characterised as it is shifted from an ‘industrial relations’ to a modern ‘human resource management’ perspective. The traditional model of employment relations in the large firm sector has always been based on collective bargaining and the joint regulation of the conditions of employment. The distinctive feature of the British pattern of industrial relations, at least in the private sector, was the significance of local workplace bargaining. The assumption behind this bargaining used to be the individual’s relationship to management, mediated through the representatives of the workforce, in particular through the shop stewards. (Millward, 2000, p. 6) Knowledge management has changed this scenario of collective bargaining into a considerable discussion of how to manage good employment relationship. Quite apart from the residual power of local trade union organisation, which made any full-scale implementation of such policies difficult to achieve (Stewart and Garrahan, 1995), a number of commentators have emphasised the relatively short-term nature of British managers’ perspectives whether with respect to investment, labour relations, or workforce policies (Hakim 1990). The introduction of thorough going policies of individual evaluation and merit pay requires a very substantial commitment of organisational resources to administer the system in a way that is likely to be seen as impartial. Today, the objective of individualisation is to increase the commitment of employees to their organisations. However, if there is little confidence in procedures, it may be seen to involve little more than favouritism, creating a sense of injustice and greater distrust of management. Even where there is a will to introduce change, there may be substantial problems in achieving a coherent relationship between different human resource management policies (Storey 1992). For instance, individualised pay systems may make it less likely that employees will happily participate in collective activities. (Cheng et al, 1998, p. 6) In order to get the employees more motivated, such policies are likely to be successful primarily where there is a relatively stable environment in which longer-term career planning is feasible and there is a reasonable assurance that assessed merit will be rewarded in terms of enhanced promotion opportunities. Cheng et al (1998) writes about the historical Industrial relation, which reveal that the economic environment in Britain in the 1980s and early 1990s was not favourable in this respect. The rapid alternation of recession, spectacular growth, and renewed recession could only generate a high degree of volatility in organisational plans. It was a period marked by the upheavals of large-scale mergers and by the slashing of traditional career routes as a result of the growing popularity of policies of ‘delayering’, which reduced the ranks of middle management. As the organisational pyramid flattened, it became decreasingly evident how management would be able to reward performance through promotion. (Cheng et al, 1998, p. 6) There is still a lack of satisfactory evidence about the growth and prevalence of human resource management policies in UK private sector. The studies available suggest that employers have shown a greater interest in some components than in others. There appears to have been a substantial increase in forms of internal communication, whereas there is less sign of any rapid growth in organisational innovations such as the quality circle (Wood and Albanese, 1995). Moreover, such studies have only examined the formal commitment of employers to such policies, and very much less is known about how they actually impact upon employees’ experience of work and the employment relationship. Of particular concern here is whether they are best viewed in their own terms as ways of increasing the dialogue between management and individual employees, improving the opportunities for employee involvement, and relating more adequately reward to individual performance or rather as an alternative mode of control of work performance that may be even more constraining in its effects than the systems it supplants. (Cheng et al, 1998, p. 10) Human Resource In context of Knowledge Management One of the characteristic features of the modern human resource management literature in the context of knowledge management is the essential role, which has been given to line managers as a delivery point for a variety of employment policies that are intended to raise the performance of the workforce. Guest’s (1987) initial reconstruction of the core tenets of traditional HRM within the British context identified the role of line managers as one of the central components of HRM. He stated that the attitudes of line managers, along with their behaviour and practices, were crucial if the importance of human resources was to be genuinely recognised and integrated into the organisation. Today, line managers are willing to accept their responsibility to practise human resource management although they may use specialist resources to assist in policy development, problem solving, training and the like (Guest 1987). Legge (1989), in her review of UK models of HRM, concluded that HRM is vested in line management as business managers responsible for coordinating and directing all resources in the business unit in pursuit of bottom line profits’ (1989). She argues that this approach differs from the classic personnel management model in which the line’s role simply reflected the view that all managers were responsible in a general sense for personnel management since they all managed people. It also meant, according to Legge, that most specialist personnel work still had to be implemented within various line management departments by a dedicated function. Managers under HRM, by contrast, handled such responsibilities themselves, which meant that the human resource dimension was an integral part of business strategy rather than something, which flowed from it. (Gratton et al, 1999, p. 343) In short, the overall argument is that if human resources are really so changing (from traditional to modern) and critical that it participates in policies reshapement, training and concerning about the motivation level of its employees, then HRM is too important to be left to personnel specialists (Storey 1992). In the British context, this has traditionally been depicted as devolution of certain personnel activities to line managers after a voluntary reallocation of responsibilities by the personnel specialists, possibly as part of a strategic review of their work (Storey 1992). Again, there is considerable ambiguity over how an organisation, or its personnel function, would devolve its activities in practice. (Gratton et al, 1999, p. 343) Human Resource In context of Performance Management Performance management is often claimed to be the area of human resource management, which can make the greatest impact on organisational performance. Performance management has also acquired a particular place in the human resource management literature, though less so in the strategy field, in spite of calls for increased scrutiny in the area (Simons 1994). The theoretical contributions can be categorised into three broad areas. (Gratton et al, 1999, p. 59) First, performance management is viewed as a key integrative mechanism, linking individuals’ goals and responsibilities to the objectives of the business, and integrating major interventions, appraisal, rewards, training, and development thereby facilitating strategic fit (Storey 1992). Second, performance management has been identified as a means of enhancing organisational control over employees, constructing a consistent statement of managerial expectations, and promoting a unitarist view of the firm. Third, performance management is held to be an important driver in determining valuable outputs, such as employee commitment. Identification by employees with the organisation in terms of adherence to its values, goals, and desired behaviours is assumed to bring about a strong culture and be conducive to organisational success (Gratton, 1999, p. 59). Performance management is influenced by the shifts in the UK industrial relations environment from the 1980s till today and is associated with changes in labour markets. The composition of employment shifted from traditionally highly unionised to non-union sectors and workers in the UK. This approach placed the emphasis on dealing with individual employees and included what are often termed HRM techniques such as elaborate communications mechanisms, career development, employee involvement initiatives and performance related pay. It was an approach in which employers sought new systems of work organisation, employment contracts and working time arrangements to provide the flexibility necessary to adjust to the competitive conditions of the 1980s (Brewster et al, 2000, p. 203) and to the fragmentation of mass markets. This holds regardless of whether a firm is competing on the basis of low costs or product or service innovation and quality: indeed, similar arguments can be advanced for the public service sector. With either strategy, labour flexibility is essential, although in different forms. Firms may also attempt to reduce their labour costs, or make their use of labour more cost-effective, through the increased use of peripheral employees; they may treat their HR as a potentially creative resource for adding value in the production process. Once again, very similar arguments can be advanced for the public sector, where restricted budgets are also putting similar pressures on managements. (2000, p. 203) With respect to the traditional and modern HRM practices Hyman (1994) sets out a set of common trends in the environment of European industrial relations, which have loosened the hold of established institutions and country differences. Among the trends he identifies particularly with respect to the UK Industrial environment are the sectoral and occupational restructuring of employment; a harsher labour market with the return of mass unemployment; intensified global competition; a fiscal crisis of public employment; and a political shift to the right in much of Western Europe. However, despite the shifts that have occurred in the context of industrial relations, it is widely recognised that industrial relations in Europe differs significantly from country to country and that the extent and nature of change varies considerably. Due et al. (1991), point out that ‘the trend towards convergence in European labour markets does not appear to have been very prevalent. Most of today’s member states have thus been members of the Community for 20-30 years, sharing in many fields the same market and technological base, without producing any general homogenisation of industrial relations’. (Brewster et al, 2000, p. 322) Hyman (1994) in response states that the onus is on the shoulders of national industrial relations systems, in the sense of institutional arrangements shaped by legislative frameworks, historical traditions, accumulated vested interests and learned patterns of behaviour’. While such systems ‘have appeared increasingly precarious as a result of the challenges emerging in the 1970s and intensifying in the 1980s there remains significant variations in experience between and within countries’ (Hyman, 1994, p. 5) Arising out of the inherent conflict of interests in the employment relationship and the indeterminate nature of labour effort, management constantly seeks to exert control over the labour process in the interests of the firm’s owners (Turner and Morley, 1995). HRM is often seen as a key contemporary feature of this attempt. Relevant to this discussion are the two interconnected aspects of concept that impose directly upon the relationship between managements and trade unions: whether HRM should be conceived of as inimitable to industrial relations; and whether HRM is essentially linked with the individualisation of the employment relationship in a way that threatens the existence of collective relationships. The distinction between the fields of study of HRM and industrial relations has been heightened, primarily because of their perceived incompatibility. HRM has variously been referred to as a subject which reflects an attempt to redefine both the meaning of work and the way individual employees relate to their employers, a subject which involves a synthesis of elements from international business, organisation behaviour, personnel management and industrial relations, or as an approach which refers to the policies, procedures and processes involved in the management of people (Legge, 1989). Above all, the focus of HRM on the individual, and its general unwillingness to acknowledge the existence of distinct interests within the workplace, has created a picture of simple common interest among managers and the managed, an interest supposedly centred solely on the organisation’s success in the marketplace (Storey and Sisson, 1993) Turner and Morley (1995) argue that the terms HRM and industrial relations, both being concerned with the management of labour in one form or another, can be taken together to mean the management of labour and that the differences are more a result of the perspective and hierarchical position of the observer than any inherent difference in the substance of the observed phenomena. Thus HRM and traditional industrial relations could potentially be regarded as ‘options within options’ which are not necessarily incompatible, but which may exist simply as two items in a very long shopping list. Indeed Storey and Sisson (1993) argue that more and more there is a contemporary blurring of the boundaries between the two. As Brewster (1995, p. 16) argues: ‘Developing the (HRM) concept to take account of the more limited autonomy (or greater support) of organisational managers in Europe, and including the external factors within a different model of the concept of HRM, has a value beyond the presentation of simple diagrams.’ (Brewster et al, 2000, p. 207) In support of this argument, Lansbury (1995) suggests that the experiences of European countries in regard to the relationship between bargaining and HRM appear to differ from that of the USA ‘Unions and collective bargaining are retained partly as a result of the legal framework, partly due to high levels of unionisation, and partly as a feature of the social democratic version of HRM at a macro level’ (Lansbury, 1995, p. 49). However, the standing of, and the prospects for, the HRM concept are arguably still uncertain, even though, as Storey (1995) points out, it seems to promise the set of UK guidelines which so many managers have been so desperately seeking. What is clear is that the successful integration of HRM with collective bargaining and more traditional approaches to industrial relations is ultimately dependent on employers co-operating with union representatives, and unions adopting a less adversarial approach, so that a type of mutual commitment can be worked out (Lansbury, 1995). Individualising the employment relationship is often seen as a key feature of HRM. The contemporary literature identifies an increased management emphasis on the development of an individualist orientation in management employee interactions as one of the most important developments in industrial relations in the past decade. (Bacon & Storey, 1993) There were grounds for doubt about whether any significant extension of individual participation was likely to have taken place. It was a decade in which public policy had placed a strong emphasis on the need to reinforce managerial prerogative and to cut back what was seen as the excessive influence that workplace representatives had acquired in British industry in the 1960s and 1970s. In considering these different scenarios, it is important to recognise that traditional approach has moulded employee’s participation in diverse ways. For some, it is a matter of direct individual involvement in decision-making, for others it is primarily a question of the growth of collective organizations that can defend employee interests at a higher level. There are also marked differences in the degree of employee control that is implied. The notion of participation covers procedures that at one end of the spectrum involve a willingness to consult the views of employees, with no commitment to acting upon them, to, at the other, processes of joint regulation where employee representatives have a right of veto. Whatever be the diversification in terms of HRM practices, the modern ways and policies of managing employee relationship requires devotion on managerial level. References & Bibliography Bacon, N. and Storey, J. (1993) ‘Individualization of the employment relationship and the implications for trade unions’, Employee Relations, 15(1): 5–17 Beardwell Ian, (1996) Contemporary Industrial Relations: A Critical Analysis: Oxford University Press: Oxford. Brewster Chris, Mayrhofer Wolfgang & Morley Michael, (2000) New Challenges for European Human Resource Management: Macmillan: Basingstoke, England. Cheng Yuan, Gallie Duncan, Tomlinson Mark & White Michael (1998) Restructuring the Employment Relationship: Clarendon Press: Oxford. Clark Ian, (2000) Governance, the State Regulation and Industrial Relations: Routledge: London. Due, J., Madsen, J. and Jensen, C. (1991) ‘The social dimension: convergence or diversification of industrial relations in the single European market?’, Industrial Relations Journal, 22(2): 85–103. Guest, D. E. (1987). Human Resource Management and Industrial Relations In: Journal of Management Studies, 24/ 5: 503-21 Gratton Lynda, Hope Hailey Veronica, Stiles Philip & Truss Catherine, (1999) Strategic Human Resource Management: Corporate Rhetoric and Human Reality: Oxford University Press: Oxford. Hakim, (1990), Core and Periphery in Employers Workforce Strategies: Evidence from the 1987 ELUS Survey. In: Work, Employment and Society, 4: 157-88 Hyman, R. (1994) ‘Industrial relations in Western Europe: an era of ambiguity?’, Industrial Relations, 33(1): 1–24. Lansbury, R. (1995) ‘Workplace Europe: new forms of bargaining and participation’, Technology, Work and Employment, 10(1): 47–55 Legge, K. (1989) ‘Human resource management: a critical analysis’, in Storey, J. (ed.), New Perspectives on Human Resource Management, London, Routledge Millward Neil, Forth John & Bryson Alex, (2000) All Change at Work? British Employment Relations 1980-1998, Portrayed by the Workplace Industrial Relations Survey Series: Routledge: London. Rudman Richard, (2003) Performance Planning and Review: Making Employee Appraisals Work: Allen & Unwin: Crows Nest, N.S.W. Stewart P., and Garrahan P. (1995), Employee responses to new management techniques in the auto industry. In: Work, Employment and Society, 9: 515-36 Storey, J. (1992) RM in Action: the truth is out at last In: Personnel Management April: 28-31 Storey, J. and Sisson, K. (1993) Managing Human Resources and Industrial Relations, Buckingham, Open University Press. Turner, T. and Morley, M. (1995) Industrial Relations and the New Order: Case Studies in Conflict and Co-Operation, Dublin, Oak Tree Press Wood and Albanese M. T. (1995), Can We Speak of High Commitment Management on the Shop Floor? In: Journal of Management Studies, 32(2): 215-47. ESRC, 2006 Accessed from Read More