To What Extent Is Employees Trust in Management the Key to the Effectiveness of High Performance Work Practices - Essay Example

To what extent is employees’ trust in management the key to the effectiveness of High Performance Work Practices Contents Contents 2 Introduction 3 The employees’ trust in management is the key to the effectiveness of High Performance Work Practices 4 Conclusion 11 References 13 Introduction The success of an organization depends on many vital elements and one of them is human resource management. The effective management of human resources yields better productivity and hence enhances the service level to the customers. A highly motivated employee performs his / her task more efficiently compared to those who are not satisfied with the organization. An organization that has build trust amongst its employees tends to be more successful than the organizations that do not have trust amongst its employees. Trustfulness and trustworthiness are two concepts that depend on the top level management of an organization. It is they who sets an example and then incorporates it in all other departments in the organization. The employee’s trust in management increases their job performance and hence the overall performance of the organization, whereas if the trust level is low it decreases the performance level and increases the percentage of employees leaving the organization. It is observed that the trust factor that the management shows towards their employees result in the same positive behaviour compared to the employees trust on the management. Establishing and maintaining integrity is the basis of building trust in an organization. Integrity is a factor that should start at the top level and then be incorporated at all levels. It refers to the ability of telling the truth no matter what the scenario may be. An organization can only be believed if the people working there have integrity. The management needs to communicate to its team the vision of the organisation. This will help the employees to be informed where the organization tends to go in future and the methods to be followed to reach their. Communication is the best tool for the transfer of truth and information. Trust amongst the employees is only built when even the lowest paid worker feels that he/she is part of the organisation. The employees need to be given the ownership feeling for the work they do. The management should be well aware about the details of every employee regarding their family background etc so that they can communicate well with them, and even should try and incorporate the ideas and opinions of the employees into their decision making. At times giving credit to the employees for performing well helps in building trust between the two parties. A high performance in the work practice requires focus on shared goals rather than on personal goals. When the employees feels that they are all striving towards a common agenda rather than any personal one the trust factor is build between the employees and the management. The management should always aim at doing what is right rather than thinking about their personal risk. If the management starts doing what their intuition says than it would result into more of respect from the employees. This respect would result into an increase in the trust level. Comparatively if the management shuts down the top-down or bottom-up communication approach, withholds information, remains more focused on personal gain rather than shared gain, tells half truths or even lie to the workforce, or remain close minded towards the ideas and suggestions of others will result into breaking the bond of trust between the employees and management. Thus it is very important for the management to be cautious towards their activities. As their one wrong move could break the bond of trust between the employees and management and hinder their work performance by being dissatisfied with the organization. The high performance work practices involves effective design of the work culture which enhances the trust level of the employees and in turn makes the bond between the employees and the management strong enough to yield productive results. This paper will try to analyse the effectiveness of the high performance work practices and the level of trust associated with it. The communication between the hierarchies and the grass root level workers will serve to be the steps. The roles of them cannot never be ignored in maintaining the trust of the employees upon the management. The employees’ trust in management is the key to the effectiveness of High Performance Work Practices Trust is an important factor as it supports mutual gains. It helps in participations of the employees, information sharing and securing other stakeholder’s commitment. Trust can be build by effective communication and information sharing, by following a top down communication approach related to strategies and opportunities, and by ensuring a bottom up approach regarding the ideas and opinions from the employees. Moreover team meetings, feedback sessions, director’s visit, newsletters helps in strengthening the trust level. The social exchange theory states that trust can only emerge when there is a repeated exchange of benefits amongst the two parties. This trust factor can help the management increase the performance level of the organization by keeping its employees motivated (Michie, Conway and Sheehan, 2003, pp. 291-314). The high performance work practice gives a win-win situation to both the employer and the employee by simply modifying the traditional procedure. It helps in developing the employee performance, implements incentives and helps in establishing a positive organisational practice. Such an effective practice is only possible when the employee believes in the employer. This trust can be build by those leaders who follows a trustworthy leadership by giving the employees the chance to share their ideas and opinions in all the management meetings (Yukl, 1994, pp.78-81). Trust is that motivational tool that results in high level of employee performance and gives some surprising results to the employer. Employees working in an organization always want to be recognised. This relevancy towards their skill and potential if viewed seriously by the management can result into some trustworthy employees. If the leaders try and help their employees to enhance their skill it will in turn increase the productivity of the employees, will improve on the turnover rate, and hence increase the loyalty of these employees towards the organization (Zand, 1972, pp.229-39).To increase the productivity of the employees the most important factor is the employee job performance. The job performance of the employees is the degree to which an individual completes the task given to him/her in the most efficient way possible. The employee job performance greatly depends on the relationship of the employee and the employer. A strong relation between the employer and the employee would result into effective work practices in the organization, which in turn would result into an increase in the productivity of the organisation. These interactions can be built on four different models such as the trust in the supervisor (TS), perceived organizational support (POS), reward systems (RS), and leader-member exchange (LMX). An organisation is a complex system which does not have a physical presence but it is represented by its leader’s or the management. The employee through this perceived organizational support feels that he/she has a significant contribution in the organization and that they are valuable (Stewart, 1986, pp.54-55). The POS forms an important factor in the bond of trust between the employer and the employees. When the employees are appreciated for their work, and given rewards and incentives for their performance the employees feel more motivated and tends to work harder for the organisation. The perceived organisational support acts an effective emotional tool to strengthen the interactions of the management with the employees by giving them a feeling that their work is being acknowledged. When there is high perceived organisational support people tend to become more productive and it results into a high level of established trust. Trust is the most important tool to improve the HRM practices. An employee’s job competition level will be decreased if they feel that the information provided to them by their leaders for a specific task is incorrect (Terpstra and Rozell, 1993, pp.27-48). This lack of trust lowers the productivity of the employees and hence results in losses for the company due to wastage of employee’s time. The management can establish the trust amongst its employees by showing competence. In this context the employees are given responsibility to perform the tasks that is important with the best interest of the company in mind. They are even allowed to acquire the roles within the social network of the organization. The management needs to be sure that the task their employee performs is correct and implements the necessary changes if required. Job enlargement by the management is a method of increasing the level of trust in the employees. When the employees perform more number of tasks it acts as a method of appreciation for their level of performance. This increase in task helps to improve the self esteem and motivation level of the employees (Zefanne and Connell, 2003, pp.3-11). If a level of authority and control is given to the employees within the organization it increases both the motivation of the employees as well as the productivity of the organization. The employees should be well communicated by the management on the information that is needed for performing their task. This kind of sharing of information is essential because it helps in improving the transparency within the organisation. A transparent system is more effective system as the performance level of each and every individual is high. The employees who have active behaviours of communicating well with its management about the problems and issues they are facing gain more trust on their management. The employee who has faith on their management tends to add more value to the organization. An organizational performance is greatly affected by the behaviour of the employee. The trust factor will help the employees to be performance oriented and avoid any other distracting forces. The trust level in the top management helps in reducing the time and energy that is spend by the employees on thinking about the future of the company and their future in the company. A high performance work practice within an organisation is very different from those of the traditional approach of HRM practices that as only concerned with the compensation, hiring, training, rewards, and incentives of the employees (Boxall and Mack, 2009, pp. 3-23). The high performance work practice incorporates strong coordination from the upper management. It initiates job flexibility where the employees are trained to perform multi tasks. The skilled employees are more trustworthy towards the organization as more responsibility makes them believe that they are capable enough for performing various tasks. It even involves apprising those who perform well and developing the required skills who are not performing so well in the organization. This kind of practice requires more concentration on retention techniques, survival of the fittest, sharing of knowledge and information, having self managed teams, cross functional teams who can perform several tasks at the same time, link the reward, recognition and feedback of the employees, to follow a proactive style of listening, to retain the talented people and downsize the organisation. Such kind of organisational practice is very important in order to increase the productivity of the organisation but at the same time it is essential to have strong support from the employees to implement such a practice. The implementation of such a practice often requires change in the work systems and even to some extent re organising various workforces to achieve a common goal. This kind of practice aims at selecting the best people for the organisation and retaining only the talented ones. Thus this kind of approach required high degree of trust from the employees on the management (Stajkovic and Luthans, 2011, pp.580-90). This can only be achieved when the management does not work on personal agenda but on common goal. This makes the employees believe that whatever decision the management will take will be for the benefit of the employees. If the trust level is high than the employees will not be rigid toward a change in the work practice and will neither waste their time on thinking about the results of adopting such a practice. High performance work practice also incorporates various new technologies that would be essential for developing high productivity in the organisation. The employee should have positive approach towards adapting those new technologies for problem solving having trust that the management has introduced such a practice to increase their performance level. It is not just about implementing practices but communicating well to the employees the need of implementing such practices. The management needs to a top down approach of communication through which they can share information to its employees regarding the vision of the organisation, and what is the individual contribution towards achieving the vision. This sharing of information helps in motivating more of employees as the common goal of the company is being shared. The employees will become more responsible towards the work they perform and will trust the management (Waterman, Jr, Waterman and Collard, 1994, pp. 87-95). The leaders need to support the truth and build integrity in the system starting at the top level of the organisation. When such integrity is established it helps in establishing a platform where the workers trust their employers. On the other hand if the leaders do not possess integrity then the same cannot be incorporated in the employees, which in turn would result into a less transparent system. Rewards and recognition is an effective tool to build the trust level of the employees towards the system. This is because the employees than feel that their hard work will pay off and they start taking more initiative towards adapting the new practices and enhancing their performance level. These rewards, incentives and recognition should not be a result of any organisational policy but a voluntarily taken initiative by the management. If it is a voluntary approach it would make the employees feel that they are being recognised by their employers. To increase the effectiveness of the high performance work practice the interests and goal of the employees should be taken into consideration by the management. If the decision making of the management involves ideas and opinions taken from the employee it will initiate an ownership feeling within the employees. This ownership feeling will make the employees take full charge on the responsibilities they perform. If they take on the responsibility then they would have no obligations in accepting any changes in the organisation. To remain in the competitive world any organisation should be flexible enough to adapt to any changes as and when required. These changes can yield a positive result as well as at times give negative results. But the essential asset in such a changeable work environment is the element of trust. Trust is the only factor that keeps the understanding level between the employee and the management high and even results into effectiveness of the high performance work practices. The trust factor in an organisation is well established depending on the discrimination level in an organisation. The management should not discriminate amongst its employees and show fairness towards all. This is well achieved by designing standards methods of appreciating an employee. A standard method helps in avoiding any discrimination amongst its employees and gaining trust of its employees. An employee who trust their employer show more commitment towards their job, their job satisfaction level is high and they even perform more than what their job demands. Thus the high performance work practices are implemented in such organizations more effectively where there is a large number of job satisfied employees. The concept of change management which is a skill in high performance practice depends on how much the people believe in the organisational system (Tzafir and Dolan, 2004, pp.115-32). The practice on improving the performance and eradicate the negative performance can only be accepted by the employees when they feel that it is a positive decision by the management. This feeling can only be there when they have effective communication with their top management and their suggestions are taken seriously by them. The management needs to develop flexible job designs and communicate well to the bottom level the need for such a decision. Incorporating the employee’s decisions on major issues regarding organisational and employee’s policy will benefit the organisation to improve its performance by effective execution of the high performance work practice. Building up the trust of the employees on the management of an organization is likely to create positive benefits like increase in the sales of the business, better customer services, and lower rate of attrition and better performance of the employees as well as the organization as a whole. A belief of the employees that the decisions of the management are not solely aimed at profit reaping but the management is also concerned about the well-being and the betterment of their employees is likely to boost the performance of the employees (Williams, 2003, pp.50-54). The employees who can trust their management are generally more motivated and demonstrate an increased willingness to take on additional responsibilities. The trust among the employees of an organization is likely to build self-regulated norms of high responsibility and high performance within the business. The employees become more positive towards their work, try to take up additional functions in their job roles and are often willing to be accountable for their individual performance as well as the performance of their teams and the organization as a whole (Mayer, Davis and Schoorman, 2001, pp.709-710). Trust on the part of the employees is not to ignore the risks but being willing to take on additional responsibilities and required risks in the scope of their work. Thus, trust of the employees on the management can be recognized as a continuous process that is involved in improving the relationships between the management and the employees and in reducing the risk perception involved in the functionalities of the organization (Bing – Sheng, 2004, pp.85-116). Collectively felt trust denotes the shared belief of the extent of trust felt by the employees working in an organization. The human resource department of the organizations use best practices and approaches to establish individual as well as collectively felt trust to improve the performance of the individual employees, departments and the business. The management of different organizations across the world is focusing on increasing the trust of the employees to retail skilled employees within the business and also develop and motivate the employees. The high involvement of the management and the human resource departments is expected in the employee centred organizations. Empowering the employees to take some of the decisions related to their daily jobs and encouraging them to take an active part in the decision making systems of the departments are key strategies used by the business to increase the trust and involvement of the employees. The employees who have established trust on the management would be more active in adding value to their functionalities in the organization and more focused on their job roles and are likely to display an active behaviour in participating in the value creation functionalities involved in the business. Both the active and the passive behaviours of the employees would increase the level of their performance once they do not feel vulnerable to the decisions of the management and have a basic trust on the mutually benefits derived from the decisions taken by the management (Tzafrir, 2005, pp.1600-1622). The goal setting theory of management highlights the importance of focus on the performance of the employees. The theory suggests that the goals would improve the persistence and motivation of the employees and help the employee to decide on the priority of the activities. But to belief in the goals set by the supervisors for the individual employees, they have to have belief in the workings of the management of the company. An employee with a higher level of trust on the management is likely to perform much better than an employee who has a lower level of trust on the management (Hillgren and Cheatham, 2000, p.180). Maintaining direct contact with the employees and establishing an open door policy in the business would have far reaching effects on the assurance provided to the employees. This would ensure that the employees feel adequately supported by the management and can immediately discuss any job related issues or concerns that they are facing with the relevant supervisors or managers. This would also ensure the establishment of a positive work environment in the workplace which would increase the trust and confidence of the employees and they would come forward to take up new responsibilities and roles for the benefit of the organization. Maintaining transparency in communication about the job roles and a certain level of corporate strategies used by the business would instigate assurance among the employees and motivate empower them to take decisions and risks related to the job roles designated to them. The strategic decisions taken by the management influence the overall success and the culture of the organization. Therefore, the management should take effective steps in communicating important facts related to the changes in compensation packages, the financial position of the business, the changes in policies and the impending strategies and moves and the personnel policies to build more trust among the employees (Pulakos and O’Leary, 2011, pp.146-164). The lack of trust of the employees on the management may create a drop in the performance levels because the employees would lose their mental energy and focus by speculating on the behaviour of the management and on the insecurity of their future in the organization (Davis, Schoorman and Donaldson, 2007, pp.22-26). On contrary, an increased level of trust on the management would support the employees to give more attention to the designated functions and to become more enthusiastic about contributing to the performance of the organization. Conclusion The roles of the management and the human resource practitioners in the organization are critical in building up the trust of the employees. Giving proper attention to the safety and security of the employees, providing them with different benefits and implementing corporate strategies to make the employees part owners of the company by allocating shares and a part of the profit to them are other beneficial approaches to ensure trust and faith of the employees on the management. The four major practices used to build the trust of the employees on the management i.e. the reward system (RS), the leader member exchange (LMX), the Supervisor (TS) and the performance organizational support (POS) are highly dependent on the way the employees perceive the actions of the management and the human resource personnel. The POS practice can be identifies as a key driver of performance among the employees. The support and involvement of the higher management is identified as a critical element for boosting the performance levels of the employees. For this, the senior management should display sufficient integrity and responsible behaviour which would motivate and assure the employees of the organization. High performance work relates to high productivity and efficiency which can be achieved through the combined efforts of the senior management and the employees. Non-discrimination, empowerment of the employees, flexibility in job role designing, responsible behaviour of the management, rewards and appraisals can thus be considered as the most critical factors in increasing the performance of the employees through trust and assurance building. If the employees perceive that the decisions of the management are made by keeping in mind the best interests of the employees along with the interests of the organization, then the employees are likely to support the systems and functions properly. The success of an organization is highly dependent on the employees of the organization. The people asset is considered to be the most useful and valuable asset of a business. Thus it is critical for the business to take good care of their employees and take steps to develop and support the employees. It is understood that instilling a high level of trust among the employees would work in the favour of the management and the organization. Therefore, the managers should focus on improving the trust level of the employees by employing proper human resource practices and corporate decisions to benefit the employees. References Bing – Sheng, T. 2004. The risk based view of trust: A conceptual framework. Journal of Business and Psychology. Vol.19 (1), pp.85-116. Boxall, P., Mack, K. 2009. ‘Research and Theory on High Performance Work Systems:Progressing the High Involvement Stream Human Resource Management Journal . Vol. 19(1), pp. 3-23. Davis, J., Schoorman, F. D. & Donaldson, L. 2007. Toward a Stewardship Theory of Management. Academy of Management Review. 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