Current developments in employee relations - Discussion Videos

Video 01: Current developments in employee relations

(Source : Ellis and Taylor, 2017)

In this video, CIPD Chief Examiner Stephen Taylor talks Employee Relations with Cecillia Ellis the Senior Human Resource Management Lecturer from Manchester Metropolitan University. They discuss the 3 most important current developments in employee relations. The first one they identify as employee voice. They have identified this as one of the key drivers in employee relations. As the second point, they are highlighting the area of conflict. Here they talk about both collective and individual conflicts and how they can affect. The third key area they talk about is around trust. They talk about the implications that could occur around attitude and behavior changes on employees and organizations. One of the challenges they highlight would be for organizations is to regain trust.

Video 02: Employment Relations in the USA: Current Trends

(Source : Bamber and Colvin, 2018)

In this video, Professor Greg Bamber and Professor Alex Colvin here talks about the latest trends in employee relations in the USA. They talk about the decline of the labor movement in America and its current influence. Also, they talk about how other countries try to revitalize the labor movement. They highlight the fact that the rise of individual rights in United States and its impact in these modern days. Interesting thoughts shared about the new development of radical movements in USA market. Finally, they do a comparison with USA and other countries about what’s happening in terms of employee relations which is quite interesting. 

Reference

Ellis, C. and Taylor, S. (2017). CIPD - Current developments in employee relations | Cecillia Ellis & Stephen Taylor. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGWIqDglqvE [Accessed 02 September 2019].

Bamber, G. and Colvin, A. (2018). Employment Relations in the USA: Current Trends. [video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bvlz_MfGBRU [Accessed 01 September 2019].

Modern situation of employee relations

The role of industrial relations and their significance in the political, economic and cultural framework has not been questioned throughout most of the 20th century. But, factors such as enhanced globalization, technological progress, decreases in trade union size and the decentralization of collective bargaining, however, began to have a major effect on the structures of industrial relations from the 1980s onward (Caprile et al., 2017). Deogaonkar (2013) explains that the trend in staff relations also led to standardized processes and mechanization of the job duties being done by the staff with the growing development in technological trends in Industry. This has improved the quality of the job and also enhanced efficiency at the organizational level.

In the latest years, changes in some EU Member States have accelerated some of these long-term trends as a result of the economic and financial crisis, resulting in fresh developments: declining collective bargaining coverage; de-standardizing employment relationships; reducing the size of the workforce in the public sector; and changes in welfare schemes in many nations (Caprile et al., 2017). Deogaonkar (2013) describes the recent developments in technology that have enhanced analyzability, fast exchange of data. Accordingly, employees are becoming more system-oriented and the scope for the growth of individual staff levels is also increasing. According to Ravi (2011) in his article explains that in contrast, the multiplicity of trade unions and trade union rivalry in Sri Lanka resulted in opposing labour relations. Although there have been some changes over the past two decades in labour relations between employers and trade unions, these developments have been confined to individual workplaces. Further, nothing significant has been achieved at the macro level that has modified the structure of labour relations to fit business requirements.

A mixture of technology and strategy has an effect on the relationship between employees. So, the main drawback of the evolving technological development is that employees may have very little scope of personal interaction on official issues (Deogaonkar, 2013). Evolving technologies have a profound effect on employee relations and the effect is both positive and negative. Employee relationships become clearer and more system dependent on sophisticated software systems applications. The disadvantages of technological development also affect employee relationships and can be regulated by regularly involving staff in the cross-functional communication forum and evaluating employee satisfaction. The Human Resource segment has a significant part to play in handling the effect of technology on employee relationships (Deogaonkar, 2013).

Developing the skills of employees’ in dispute resolution, participatory leadership and other soft skills generate a better environment for employee participation. Training also plays a significant role in assisting employees with the greatest possible use of collective bargaining systems involving the trade union. The trade union and the Employees' councils can coexist friendly where the management deals with both without undermining either and on an equal footing (Ranaraja, 2019). The early growth of industrial relations was linked to trade union growth itself and trade unions are largely a result of the system of factories that developed during the industrial revolution. Also, trade union development in the UK was slowed by the Combination Acts of 1799 and 1800, and most trade union actions were illegal until these Acts were replaced with the Combination Laws in 1825 (Rose, 2004). The volatile modern business environment has had a major impact on the traditional connection between employee and employer. The psychological contract is being redefined, and this change from the' old' to a new type of partnership is a major challenge for organizations and those involved in handling the organizational workforce (Akinyemi, 2009). The company I work for is more keen on satisfying individual needs rather than collective bargaining and this has worked well for them in the recent past.

References

Akinyemi, B. (2009). Managing the New Psychological Contract. Information Science Reference, [online] 2, p.645. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/325060099 [Accessed 25 August 2019].

Caprile, M., Sanz, P., Riobóo, I., Welz, C. and Rodriguez, R. (2017). Mapping varieties of industrial relations. Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, pp.2,5.

Deogaonkar, A. (2013). Emerging Technologies and Impact on Employee Relations. International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, [online] 3(9), pp.1, 2. Available at: http://www.ijsrp.org/research-paper-0913/ijsrp-p2176.pdf  [Accessed 26 August 2019].

Ranaraja, S. (2019). Emerging trends in employee participation in Sri Lanka. Industrial and Employment Relations Department, [online] p.41. Available at: https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---ed_dialogue/---dialogue/documents/publication/wcms_206005.pdf [Accessed 25 August 2019].

Ravi, P. (2011) Managing Employer-employee relations in a competitive business environment. The employers’federation of ceylon. [Online] 20 December 2011, Available at:: http://employers.lk/efc-training/efc-training/497-managing-employer-employee-relations-in-a-competitive-business-environment-ravi-peiris?date=2019-03-01. [Accessed 24 August 2019].

Rose, E. (2004). Employment relations. 2nd ed. London: Pearson Education, p.19.

Important aspects of employee relations in summary

Employee relations covering more than industrial relations these days and it has given a new meaning for industrial relations (CIPD, 2019). Further, it's covering what’s happening between management, trade unions, and other officials while enabling collective agreements. Employee relations are basically intended to establish certain laws, regulations, and agreements that will govern the relationship. Employment and industrial relations are only one important management concern, and there are significant variations in how different organizations ' management interpret their roles in industrial relations (Rose, 2004). Modern classification of the relationship between workers speak of individual and collective relationships in the workplace, but it always indicates the growing individualization of the employment relationship due to increased individual rights and the weakening of the trade union and its effect on employees (Armstrong, 2014).

As Armstrong (2014) says, workers deserve primarily a ' good day's pay for a fair day's work, ' and they want to have a say on their terms and conditions of employment and how they organize their jobs. Also, it's noted that employees are always looking for the best monetary and non-monetary offer available on the market. Further, employers expect that they want workers to do what they are told to do without costing them too much.

Employee relationship policies define what kind of management-employee partnerships are required and how pay-work negotiations should be handled based on the organization's ideology (Armstrong, 2010). The main goal of employee relations policies should be to create and maintain a healthy, efficient, corporate and trusting environment of employee relationships. Four main approached to employee relations according to Armstrong (2014) are Adversarial, Traditional, Partnership and Power sharing as explained before.

According to Stephen and Timothy (2002), the psychological contract is an unwritten agreement that happens between employees and employer which will define mutual expectations as well as what both parties expect. The psychological contract is more than just a legal contract-regulated activity, it stresses that there is much more to the relationship between employers and employees (CIPD, 2019).

Trade unions could participate in the development of internal rules either separately or in conjunction with management as spokesmen for working groups in the company (Kelly, 2002). There are two main reasons why unions that struggle to attract members either because they do not deliver the goods and services that workers expect, or because they cannot maintain the standard or social practice (Visser, 2002). As Flanders (1970) clarified, collective bargaining would govern the structure of industrial relations as a social process that "continuously turns conflicts into compromises in an orderly fashion." The Commission of Donovan (1968:50) found that' collective bargaining is the only way to conduct industrial relations'.The move from collectivism to individualism was also supported by the wide-ranging legislative programs designed to erode perceived trade union ' monopoly power, ' while at the same time enhancing centralized management influence over the employment relationship (Rose, 2004).

According to Ellis and Taylor (2017) discussion, employee voice, area of conflict and trust are the 3 most important current developments in employee relations. Evolving innovations have a profound impact on the relationship between workers and the effect is both positive and negative. Relationships among employees become simpler and more system dependent on sophisticated implementation of software systems. Technological development drawbacks often impact workplace relationships and can be managed by routinely engaging workers in the cross-functional interaction forum and measuring employee satisfaction (Deogaonkar, 2013).

My final thoughts are that the goal of employee relations is all focused-on trust and visibility of everyone in an organization. Everyone is going to have a role to play and it is their shared responsibility. However, in order to get much closer and push towards that goal, everyone needs to work together. We will have to choose suitable approaches and techniques that best suit our own organizational culture while on this journey.

“By aligning the expectations of employees and employers, both can thrive, creating a workplace that meets the emotional and career needs of its occupants, as well as the business needs of the company” (Mullich, 2019).

References

Armstrong, M. (2010). Armstrong's essential human resource management practice. 1st ed. London: Kogan Page, pp.297,298,299,309.

Armstrong, M. (2014). Armstrong's handbook of human resource management practice. 13th ed. London: Kogan Page, p.406.

Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development 2019, 16 May 2019, London: Employee relations: an introduction [Online], Available at:https://www.cipd.co.uk/knowledge/fundamentals/relations/employees/factsheet#6053 [Accessed 22 August 2019].

Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development 2019, 12^th February 2019, London: The Psychological Contract [Online], Available https://www.cipd.co.uk/knowledge/fundamentals/relations/employees/psychological-factsheet#6110 [Accessed 21 August 2019].

Deogaonkar, A. (2013). Emerging Technologies and Impact on Employee Relations. International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, [online] 3(9), pp.1, 2. Available at: http://www.ijsrp.org/research-paper-0913/ijsrp-p2176.pdf  [Accessed 22 August 2019].

Kelly, J. (2002). Industrial relations. 1st ed. London: Routledge, p.46.

Mullich, J. (2019). ADP BrandVoice: How To Close The Gap Between Employer And Employee Expectations. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/adp/2018/03/27/how-to-close-the-gap-between-employer-and-employee-expectations/#6dec207f20cf [Accessed 02 October 2019].

Rose, E. (2004). Employment relations. 2nd ed. London: Pearson Education, pp.9-664.

Stephen, P. and Timothy, A. (2013). Organizational Behavior. 15th ed. Boston: Pearson, p.278.

Visser, J. (2002). Why Fewer Workers Join Unions in Europe: A Social Custom Explanation of Membership Trends. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 40(3), pp.403-430.