Learning Outcomes
• To explain in own words the concept of employee relations
• Able to discuss some key influencing factor related to employee
relations
• Suggest how these influencing factors can be controlled
• State key employment facts relating to the UK Employee Relations
Act
Gallup research shows that
only 13% of employees
around the world are actively
engaged at work, and more
than twice that number are
so disengaged they are likely
to spread negativity to
others.
What is Employees Relations
Task – students create own definition
Generally, employee relations is a term used to describe a company's
efforts to prevent and resolve problems arising from situations at work
(here).
Is the legal link between employers and employees. It exists when a
person performs work or services under certain conditions in return for
remuneration (here).
Is a process that companies use to effectively manage all interactions
with employees, ultimately to achieve the goals of the organization
(here).
Pay-Work Bargain
Employees Relations Policies - Approach
1) Adversarial
• Employer tells employee what to do
• Follow the rules or leave
2) Traditional
• Employees follows the directive of their managers who maintain a
good day-to-day working relationship
• Employee has some negotiating power
Employees Relations Policies - Approach
3) Partnership
• Employees are apart of the policy making process but the
employer retains the right to manage
4) Power Sharing
• Employees are involve in all aspect of decision making and day-to-day
operations of the company.
Task - Think about week one and the three videos which we watched:
• Which approach do each of the companies take?
• Which approach does the university take?
Developing Employee Relationships
1) During recruitment
2) During the induction process
3) Encouraging maximum contact and communication between
employee and employers
4) Adopting a general policy of transparency.
Building Trust
Maintaining Employee Relationships
Task –
• How would you define trust?
• Firm belief in the reliability, truth, or ability of someone or
something
• A relationship built on mutual trust and respect
• How would you build trust in your company?
• Tell the truth
• Admit mistakes
• Share information openly
• Support transparency
• Listen to all views and information sources (not just your own)
• Be interested in the person (not their job and performance)
Employee Participation
Employee Participation
• Employees have responsibilities at the workplace and are involved in the decisionmaking process.
• participation increase the levels of motivation and job satisfaction amongst the
staff
• Trade unions often try to increase the amount of worker participation in the
workplace to increase bargaining power.
• For main approaches:
Employee Participation
Employee Shareholders
• These are a common form of payment in many PLCs and are often termed 'share
options'.
• Involves each employee receiving a part of each month's salary in the form of
shares (usually at a discounted price).
• This forms a profitable savings-plan for the employee, which can be sold them after
a given period of time.
• This should motivate the employees to work harder and increase their efforts,
since the share price will rise as the company becomes more profitable, therefore
increasing the capital gain on their shares.
Employee Participation
Empowerment
This involves a manager giving his subordinates a degree of power over their work (i.e.
it enables the subordinates to be fairly autonomous and to decide for themselves the
best way to approach a problem).
Kaizen
This is a Japanese word meaning 'continuous improvement'. It is widely held that any
aspect of the business can be improved, not just the production processes.
Quality circles
This is a group of workers that meets at regular intervals to:
• Identify any problems with quality within production
• Consider alternative solutions to these problems
• and then recommend to management the solution
Employee Participation
Team-working
Team-working involves a number of employees combining to produce a product, with
each employee specialising in a few tasks and the whole team taking the responsibility
for production.
Works council
This is a type of worker participation and it consists of regular discussions between
managers and representatives of the workforce to table about issues, like how the
business can improve its processes and procedures.
Worker-directors
These are workforce representatives who participate in the meetings held by the
board of directors. Worker-directors are not very common in the UK, since employers
often believe that they can slow down the decision-making process, as well as 'leaking'
confidential information to employees.
Mini Plenary
• How can we define employee relations?
• Company's efforts to prevent and resolve problems
• Effective management of all interactions with employees
• What are the four policy approaches to employee relation?
• Adversarial
• Traditional
• Partnership
• Power Sharing
Mini Plenary
•
What is Adversarial
• Employer tells employee what to do
• Follow the rules or leave
•
What is Traditional
• Employees follows the directive of their managers who maintain a
good day-to-day working relationship
• Employee has some negotiating power
Mini Plenary
•
What is Partnership
• Employees are apart of the policy making process but the
employer retains the right to manage
•
What is Power Sharing
• Employees are involve in all aspect of decision making and day-to-day
operations of the company.
•
How can you build trust?
•
•
•
•
•
•
Tell the truth
Admit mistakes
Share information openly
Support transparency
Listen to all views and information sources (not just your own)
Be interested in the person (not their job and performance)
Mini Plenary
•
Name the different way in which employees can get involve with
business decisions and processes?
• Employee shareholders,
• Empowerment, Kaizen,
• Quality circles,
• Team-working,
• Works council,
• Worker-directors
Trade Unions
A trade union is a group of workers who join together in order to protect
their own interests and to be more powerful when negotiating with
their employers.
Each employee who wishes to join a trade union must pay an annual
fee, which contributes towards the costs and expenses that the trade
union incurs when it provides services to its members, and supports
industrial action by the workers.
Developed during the Industrial Revolution (1760 to 1830 )
Trade Unions
Trade unions have a number of aims:(video)
• To improve the pay of its members.
• To improve the working conditions and the working practices of its
members.
• To support the training and the professional development of its
members.
• To ensure that their members' interests are considered by the
employers when any decision is made which will affect the workforce.
• Watch these videos and identify common themes
• (Interview, Fast Food Workers, Coal Mine, (C4, C4))
• Think about Maslow theory
• Think about the aims of trade unions
Trade Unions – By Types (UK)
1.General Unions.
These are for skilled and unskilled workers performing different jobs in different
industries (e.g. cleaners, clerical staff, transport workers).
2.Industrial unions.
These are for different workers in the same industry (e.g. the National Union of
Miners (N.U.M), covering workers at all levels in the hierarchy).
3.Craft Unions.
These are fairly small unions for skilled workers, performing the same or similar
work in different industries (e.g. musicians).
4.White-collar Unions.
These are for 'white-collar' (or professional) workers who perform the same or
similar tasks in different industries (e.g. teachers, scientists).
Trade Unions
1. Find a trade unions for teachers (here)
2. Find a trade union for bus drivers
3. Find a trade union for hospital workers
4. Find a trade union for fireman
5. Find a trade union for bankers
6. Find a trade union for musicians
Trade Unions – Statistics
1. Public sector
Is the part of the economy that is controlled by the state
2. Private sector
The part of the national economy that is not under direct state
control.
3. Look at the graphs (do not read it) in this report and in your groups
write a paragraph describing what you have discovered.
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system
/uploads/attachment_data/file/313768/bis-14p77-trade-union-membership-statistical-bulletin2013.pdf
Trade Unions – Pay Bargaining
Negotiation with the employers of a business on behalf of their members over the
issue of pay. This is known as the 'pay-bargaining process', and it is an example of
collective bargaining.
Stage One: Objectives and Outcomes
• Both sides create own objectives and outcomes (pay raise)
• Both sides decide on how to deliver the outcomes (pay raise) to the employees
• Equally = Blanket pay raise (increase by %)
• Differentiated = different people get different amounts
• How will the outcome be implemented
• Immediately (lump sum or instant monthly wage)
• Instalments (spread lump sum over period or incremental wage increase)
Trade Unions – Pay Bargaining
Stage Two: present their case (pay-talk)
Trade union will put in a 'pay claim’
• An increase in the cost of living (i.e. inflation)
• An increase in labour productivity rates will mean more sales revenue and profits for
the business, profit shared with the workers pay raise
• A pay rise is required in order to recruit and retain the 'best' workers that the
business can find.
• If workers are using new machinery and working practices, then they need to be
compensated for this extra work by being given a pay rise.
Trade Unions – Pay Bargaining
The employer will put forward a 'pay offer‘
• Which they believe will reflect the current trends in the labour market (i.e. the rates
of pay which are being offered by rival businesses), as well as maintaining the
competitiveness of the business (i.e. not increasing their costs by a large
percentage).
Stage Three: negotiation process
• Negotiation process between the trade union and the employer. In order for this to
be a success, both sides will be required to compromise and be prepared to accept
less than their original objectives.
Trade Unions – Mediation (ACAS)
Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service (A.C.A.S.)
• Was set up by the government in 1975 as an independent body
• To help settle industrial disputes and claims of unfair dismissal by employees
• Does three things:
Advisory: Are invited into a business by the two feuding parties (employers and trade
unions) in order to offer their advice to both parties
Conciliation is an attempt to get the two sides in an industrial dispute to resolve their
differences.
• A conciliator listens to the arguments of both sides
• then tries to encourage the trade union and the employer to negotiate and
compromise
• so that they can reach a solution that is acceptable to both parties.
Trade Unions – Mediation (ACAS)
Arbitration is the process of resolving an industrial dispute by using an independent
person to decide the appropriate outcome.
• The arbitrator will look at the arguments put forward by both parties, and then
he will arrive at a decision.
• The decision can be legally binding on both parties if this was agreed prior to the
arbitrator's decision.
Pendulum Arbitration is a type of arbitration in which the arbitrator will decide
completely in favour of one party or the other, with NO compromise or negotiation
being allowed.
It is likely, therefore, that both parties (the employers and the trade union) will make
their demands more conservative and realistic than if the arbitrator was allowed to
choose an outcome which was somewhere between the two.
Trade Unions – Industrial Action
Industrial Action
If the negotiation process collapses employees can take further action:
These are using it in an attempt to get the employer to give-in to their demands by
reducing the profits which the company is making
Non co-operation. Refusing to attend meetings and use new machinery or processes.
Work to Rule or 'Go Slow'. Refusing to perform any tasks not in the contract of
employment and keeping the output of products to a minimum.
Overtime Ban. Refusing to work any hours over and above the required weekly
number of hours.
Trade Unions – Industrial Action
Picketing. Standing at the entrance to the workplace and not allowing any person or
vehicle to cross the 'picket line' and enter the workplace.
'Blacking‘ (blacklisting). Refusing to deal with certain employees or suppliers because
they have refused to participate in the industrial action.
Strikes.
This is often the last resort for a trade union.
• Employees stopping their work
• Leaving the workplace and refusing to return.
Link to strike videos
Mini Plenary
• What are trade unions?
• A group of workers who join together in order to protect their own interests
and to be more powerful when negotiating with their employers.
• What are the aims of a trade union?
• To improve wages, training, working conditions and represent the members
interest
• How many different types of trade unions are there?
• Four (general, industry, craft and white-collar)
• What is the public sector
• Is the part of the economy that is controlled by the state
• What is the private sector
• Is the part of the national economy that is not under direct state control.
• What is collative bargaining?
• Negotiation of wages and other conditions of employment by an organized
body of employees.
• Why might trade union and employer call in the mediators?
• Help settle the disagreement
Mini Plenary
• Name the six type of industrial action which employees can take?
• None-cooperation
• Work to rule
• Overtime ban
• Picketing
• Blacking
• Striking
Dinner Time (12noon)
Employees Relations Act
Task – Read the provide hand-out(s) and make notes
Handout from here
• Use your notes to create a brochure or set of flyers/ posters for your
employees:
• You need to explain the different requirements and how they
support the employee and employer
• They will be displayed on the wall
• http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1996/18/contents
• http://www.lawdonut.co.uk/law/employment-law/discipline-and-grievance
• http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/england/work_e/work_rights_at_work_e/basi
c_rights_at_work.htm