Work and Technological Change - Essay Example

INTRODUCTION I disagree with the above statement. The entire paper provides substantiation to this aspect. The disadvantages of the contract process are discussed. Then the discussion shifts to individualism, collectivism and contribution of F.W. Taylor on employee relations. Then the issues between core workers and periphery workers are elaborated in detail. Finally, the paper concludes stating that a sophisticated employee relation is necessary for efficient running of any firm. THE FLEXIBLE FIRM It is not feasible to discuss conceptual approaches to flexible working without reference to the work of Atkinson (1984), who developed the concept of "the flexible firm" in the recognition of changes which had taken place in the nature and composition of the workforce at that time. In the model of the "flexible firm" (see Figure overleaf), Atkinson propounded the concept of "core" versus "peripheral" workers. Core workers are a permanent component of a firm's workforce who deliver functional flexibility through their capacity to undertake a wide range of tasks. In contrast, peripheral workers provide a firm with numerical flexibility, with their numbers increasing or reducing with changing labour market conditions. The flexible firm approach involves a reorganisation of a firms' internal labour markets and their division into separate components, wherein workers' experiences and employer's expectations are increasingly differentiated (see Atkinson and Gregory 1986).   Figure: The Flexible Firm  Source: Atkinson (1984) Bryson (1999) argues that training/development and the involvement of employees are more likely to be directed at core workers, while 'peripheral' workers will be exposed more and more to 'raw' market forces. In times of recession, peripheral or non full-time workers are much more susceptible to lay-offs and redundancies. It is not insignificant that atypical workers, including those job-sharing, working part-time or on short-term contracts, are very clearly located on the periphery of the workforce under this approach. There is little doubt that the flexible firm model was influential in the development of employment policy in UK private and public sector organizations in recent years (see Lawton and Rose 1994). The extent to which this placement of atypical workers as peripheral workers truly reflects the reality of life in Irish organizations remains to be seen. There is certainly evidence to show that, in the Civil Service, opting for flexible, family friendly working arrangements, such as job-sharing, is perceived as unlikely to enhance longer-term career prospects (see Humphreys, Drew and Murphy 1999). However, what is clear is that, given the frequent gender differentiation between core and periphery workers, it is absolutely vital from both the equality and 'family-friendly' viewpoints that flexible working arrangements move in from the periphery to the core of organizational activity and thinking. - http://www.welfare.ie/publications/work_fam/chapter3.html INDIVIDUALISM AND COLLECTIVISM Individualism and collectivism are conflicting views of the nature of humans, society and the relationship between them. Individualism holds that the individual is the primary unit of reality and the ultimate standard of value. This view does not deny that societies exist or that people benefit from living in them, but it sees society as a collection of individuals, not something over and above them. Collectivism holds that the group---the nation, the community, the proletariat, the race, etc.---is the primary unit of reality and the ultimate standard of value. This view does not deny the reality of the individual. But ultimately, collectivism holds that one's identity is determined by the groups one interacts with, that one's identity is constituted essentially of relationships with others. Individualists see people dealing primarily with reality; other people are just one aspect of reality. Collectivists see people dealing primarily with other people; reality is dealt with through the mediator of the group; the group, not the individual, is what directly confronts reality. Individualism holds that every person is an end in him and that no person should be sacrificed for the sake of another. Collectivism holds that the needs and goals of the individual are subordinate to those of the larger group and should be sacrificed when the collective good so requires. Individualism holds that the individual is the unit of achievement. While not denying that one person can build on the achievements of others, individualism points out that achievement goes beyond what has already been done; it is something new that is created by the individual. Collectivism, on the other hand, holds that achievement is a product of society. In this view, an individual is a temporary spokesman for the underlying, collective process of progress. A good mix of individuality and teamwork is imperative for most workplaces. But some function best with an emphasis on one or the other. Here are a few questions to help assess where your workplace stands. This is another situation where there is no right or wrong answers—whatever works best for your business is acceptable. But with a clear idea of how your organization operates, you can attract people with a proclivity toward your atmosphere. What is Individualism, by Raymie Stata (raymie@larch.lcs.mit.edu) Copyright (C) 1992, Raymie Stata, All Rights Reserved FREDERICK TAYLOR’S INFLUENCE ON CURRENT EMPLOYEE RELATIONS Taylor's 4 Principles of Scientific Management After years of various experiments to determine optimal work methods, Taylor proposed the following four principles of scientific management: 1. Replace rule-of-thumb work methods with methods based on a scientific study of the tasks. 2. Scientifically select, train, and develop each worker rather than passively leaving them to train themselves. 3. Cooperate with the workers to ensure that the scientifically developed methods are being followed. 4. Divide work nearly equally between managers and workers, so that the managers apply scientific management principles to planning the work and the workers actually perform the tasks. These principles were implemented in many factories, often increasing productivity by a factor of three or more. Henry Ford applied Taylor's principles in his automobile factories, and families even began to perform their household tasks based on the results of time and motion studies. Drawbacks of Scientific Management While scientific management principles improved productivity and had a substantial impact on industry, they also increased the monotony of work. The core job dimensions of skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy, and feedback all were missing from the picture of scientific management. While in many cases the new ways of working were accepted by the workers, in some cases they were not. The use of stopwatches often was a protested issue and led to a strike at one factory where "Taylorism" was being tested. Complaints that Taylorism was dehumanizing led to an investigation by the United States Congress. Despite its controversy, scientific management changed the way that work was done, and forms of it continue to be used today. - http://www.netmba.com/mgmt/scientific/ CORE AND PERIPHERY WORKERS The British economist John Aitkinson has developed a theory of the flexible firm. He argues that the recession of the 1970s and 1980s made flexibility more desirable. It takes two forms: (1) Functional flexibility means that managers can transfer multi-skilled workers between different tasks within the firm. Such workers form the core of the company's workforce, and comprises, usually, managers, designers, technical sales staff, quality control staff, technicians and craftsmen. (2) Numerical flexibility refers to the ability of management to recruit non-core, peripheral workers as and when required. Peripheral workers are also divided into two groups - those with full-time jobs, but less job security than core workers; and those with part-time jobs and temporary contracts. According to Aitkinson, core workers do enjoy more autonomy in the work place and are less alienated. He does not agree with Braverman that work has been deskilled. Anna Pollert is very critical of Aitkinson's theory. She does not agree that there ever was a period in which Fordist production methods predominated, and flexibility has always run alongside mass production. The cost of new technology limits the rate at which post-Fordist methods can be introduced. Once new technology is introduced there is no one deterministic outcome, and either side "can wrest gains and suffer costs in the negotiation of change." She regards the theory of flexibility as oversimplified. She disagrees that companies are making greater use of a peripheral workforce, and argues that the amount of temporary work has not increased significantly; in fact, she claims that part-time working declined in British manufacturing during 1979 to 1986. Companies have always employed peripheral workers. Maryellen Kelly in an attempt to evaluate the claims about post-Fordism studied industries in the US that use computer-controlled machinery. Her study was based on questionnaires conducted in 1986-7. She claimed that there were three types of company: (1) factories using strict Taylorist control; (2) factories where there was worker-centred control; and (3) factories where there was shared control. - Robert Blauner, Work and Technological Change, Blacksacademy. IMPORTANCE OF CORE WORKERS IN AN ORGANISATION The development of mass production techniques, with a moving assembly line, in which the tasks are broken down into simple routines that require little training or skill, is associated with the car manufacturer, Henry Ford, and is called “Fordism”. According to Braverman the deskilling of production methods makes it easier for management to control labour. However, Michael J. Piore argues that we have entered a post-Fordist era, in which work is organized on principles of flexible specialization. This development is associated with changes in production and management techniques in Japan. The change is said to be in response to changes in consumer demands – with consumers increasingly demanding more specialized products. This in turn means that companies require a more specialized and flexible work force. The organizational structure is also less hierarchical and more flexible. Work is said to be more varied and workers enjoy more job security. Management adopts a more participative approach, which is linked to the Japanese concept of quality circles, in which workers and managers meet together to improve company performance. Workers may also be included on company boards, and there are profit sharing schemes as well. Job satisfaction is said to improve, and conflict is said to decrease. There is also a movement away from large companies to smaller businesses. C. Sabel regards the north of Italy (known as “Third Italy”) as a region that particularly exemplifies post-Fordist production, with a network of small and medium sized businesses working together. Core workers are extremely essential to manage a diverse workforce, manage change, maintain culture, Reliability of top management etc. CONTINGENT WORKERS As a category, contingent workers may include temporary employees, part-time employees, independent contract workers, employees of the temporary help industry ("temps"), consultants, seasonal employees, and interns. In contrast, full-time, permanent employees frequently are referred to as core employees. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) defines contingent workers in a more selective way. The BLS differentiates between workers with what it calls "alternative work arrangements" and contingent workers, who have no explicit or implicit contract and expect their jobs to last no more than a year. TYPES OF CONTINGENT WORKERS There is much discussion in the literature about just how the term contingent worker should be defined. Following are descriptions of common contingent worker categories. TEMPS. Temporary employees, or temps, generally work for temporary employment agencies that place workers in companies for short-term assignments. While most temporary employees earn less than their full-time counterparts and do not receive benefits, that has changed for some job specialties, particularly in the computer and information systems areas. Milwaukee-based Manpower Inc. and Kelly Services Inc. of Troy, Michigan, are two of the largest temporary agencies. PART-TIME EMPLOYEES. Part-time employees work fewer than 35 hours a week. They often receive fewer or no benefits from their employer, which results in a cost savings for the company. Additionally, these employees may be scheduled to meet particular peak needs of the organization. For example, clothing stores have higher night and weekend demand for staff than during the week daytime hours. CONTRACT WORKERS. Contract workers are employees who negotiate a relationship directly with an employer for a particular piece of work or for a specific time period. Contract workers generally are self-employed and determine their own work hours. These employees may be more productive than in-house employees because they avoid much of the bureaucracy of day-to-day organizational life. COLLEGE INTERNS. College interns are students who work for a company for either no salary or a reduced salary to gain work experience. These interns may work full-time or part-time, but they are likely to work for only a short time period, usually a semester or a summer. Interns are contingent workers because they provide a company with staffing flexibility. In addition, the company may choose to offer the intern full-time employment at the end of the internship. TRENDS After the fallout from downsizing during the 1980s, organizations have increasingly looked to various strategies for building more flexible workforces. Additionally, because of increasing and rapid changes in the world economy, including both competitive and regulatory forces, the ability to make low-cost staffing adjustments has become imperative. Factoring in the desire of many employees to have more flexible work arrangements, this has caused the contingent workforce to experience considerable growth during the 1990s and 2000s. These variations in part-time, temporary, and/or contractual work arrangements certainly form a growing segment of the U.S. labor force. In 2001 the BLS estimated that contingent workers made up 24 percent of the American workforce. Approximately 22 million people worked part-time, 9 million were contract workers, and 1.2 million were temporary employees. This is a significant increase from BLS data in 1995, which estimated that between 2.7 and 6 million employees held contingent jobs. To some degree, contingent employment levels change due to unemployment levels. In a tight labor market, many employees find full-time core employment, but in times of higher unemployment there may be increases in contingent work. ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES Two of the major advantages of using contingent workers are staffing flexibility for the firm and reduced costs. Staffing becomes more flexible for a firm if it uses contingent workers because it can hire and fire new staff quickly, with few repercussions. For example, since temporary workers do not expect a long-term relationship with any one employer, the company can terminate employment at any time without causing harm to that employee, as the firm would if it were to lay off a core worker. Additionally, having contingent workers provides the company with a buffer zone that protects its core workers. That is, in times of economic difficulty the firm always may have a group of contingent workers that it can lay off before reducing the ranks of its core employees. Another issue with improved staffing flexibility is that contingent work allows the company to hire employees who have skills that are not present in their core workforce. This is particularly likely to occur with contract or subcontract employees, who may be hired for a short-term project for which the company has no current staff. The second major advantage that a firm has when using contingent workers is reduced costs. Contingent workers often are less expensive in terms of salary and benefits (most contingent workers receive no benefits). Additionally, many contingent workers are already trained, and therefore the company does not need to spend money on additional training. Furthermore, because the company only employs these workers when they are needed, there are fewer costs associated with carrying a large labor surplus. There also are disadvantages associated with using contingent workers. First, many contingent workers lack commitment to the organization when compared to core workers. Contingent workers have a higher turnover rate and also may pose a security risk. Second, while some contingent employees have specialized skills, many are lacking in this regard. Thus, even when hiring from temporary agencies, a company may want to carefully screen temporary employees for needed job skills. A third problem associated with contingent workers is that they are likely to find it difficult to integrate into the company and may suffer from lower morale. Core workers may feel threatened by the presence of contingent employees, resent any lack of skill that they may have, or even overlook them due to their short employment. Thus, core and contingent workers may have more difficulty collaborating. Historically, temporary employees have been used to substitute for employees who are on leave, to fill in for a short time while the company screens applicants to hire a new core employee, and to expand a company's short-term ability to handle an increased volume in jobs that are peripheral to core activities. This picture is changing in that, more often, contingent employees are being used in what previously were core organizational jobs. This can have an impact on morale because both contingent and core employees may be working side by side on the same job, but under different compensation and benefits terms. In addition, contingent workers may not get the same training, thereby affecting the risk level in some jobs, such as mining or petrochemical positions. CONCLUSION A less critical view is offered by Paul Thompson, who accepts that "the modern worker does frequently have to be more flexible" but claims that the degree of flexibility has been over-exaggerated. His research at the Leyland Volvo plant showed some evidence of multi-skilling and multi-tasking, but he also claims that new methods of control have been introduced - for example, at Nissan UK workers monitor each other, and companies also use more intensive recruitment processes, such as psychological testing. Japanese companies have succeeded in making workers work harder, and production targets are regularly increased. It is possible that the experience of work is not developing in any one direction; it may be that some occupations are being deskilled, whilst others are becoming more flexible and skilled. It is possible that no one pattern predominates. A Combination of core and peripheral workers will lead to the success of the firm. A recent example being the great success of Sri Krishna Sweets, an Indian based company, which has used the labour, very effectively and has now become an MNC. REFERENCES: Dvora Yanow (2004) Translating Local Knowledge at Organizational Peripheries* British Journal of Management 15 (s1) , 9–25 doi:10.1111/j.1467-8551.2004.t01-1-00403.x Robert Blauner, Work and Technological Change, Blacksacademy. de Gilder, Dick. "Commitment, Trust, and Work Behaviour: The Case of Contingent Workers." Personnel Review 32, no. 5 (2003): 588–605. Gómez-Mejía, Luis R., David B. Balkin, and Robert L. Cardy. Managing Human Resources. 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2004. Lachnit, Carroll. "HR Takes Charge of Contingent Staffing." Workforce 81, no. 3 (2002): 50–54. McKie, W. Gilmore, and Laurence Lipsett. The Contingent Worker: A Human Resources Perspective. Alexandria, VA: Society for Human Resource Management, 1995. Rice, Elizabeth M. "Capitalizing on the Contingent Workforce—Outsourcing Benefits Programs for Non-Core Workers Improves Companies' Bottom Line." Employee Benefit Plan Review 58, no. 8 (2004): 16–18. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. "Contingent and Alternative Employment Arrangements, February 2001." Available from http://www.bls.gov/news.release/conemp.nr0.htm. http://www.netmba.com/mgmt/scientific/ http://www.welfare.ie/publications/work_fam/chapter3.html What is Individualism, by Raymie Stata (raymie@larch.lcs.mit.edu) Copyright (C) 1992, Raymie Stata, All Rights Reserved Read More