British Workplaces Research Articles

Employee empowerment, equality plans and job satisfaction: an empirical analysis of the demand-control model

PurposeThe paper investigates the effects of individual employees' empowerment on different forms of job satisfaction in British workplaces while controlling for the presence of job demands and whether these effects depend on the presence of an equality plan in the workplace. The demand-control model that the authors test proposes that imbalances between the demands placed on employees and the control they have in their job negatively affect employee well-being and health. Control may also be strengthened, and demands mitigated, by effective equality policies. This study looks at nine forms of job satisfaction and examines the individual effects of job demands, job control, the interaction of control and demands and their joint effects with equality plans.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses matched employee–employer British data from the 2011 Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS). The authors conduct principal component analysis (PCA) and logit estimations and estimate a recursive simultaneous bivariate probit model.FindingsEmployee empowerment, or job control, is a key predictor of job satisfaction, and job demands are negatively associated with various aspects of job satisfaction. The presence of equality plans strengthens the positive effects of job control and mitigates the detrimental effects of job demands. Consistent with the demand-control model, employees are more likely to be satisfied in low strain jobs (jobs with low demands and high control) than in high strain jobs (jobs with high demands and low control). Employees in passive jobs (jobs with low demand and low control) on the other hand are less likely to be satisfied with achievement and influence than employees in low strain job.Originality/valueMuch of the empirical literature has focused on collective empowerment practices and none has tested the demand-control model. This paper adds to the literature on employee empowerment practices with a focus on individualised job control and the way its effects interact with equality plans. In the process, the authors provide novel and rigorous empirical evidence on an extended version of the demand-control model.

Vegan YouTubers Performing Ethical Beliefs

In Great Britain, “religion or belief” is one of nine “protected characteristics” under the Equality Act 2010, which protects citizens from discrimination in the workplace and in wider society. This paper begins with a discussion about a 2020 ruling, “Jordi Casamitjana vs. LACS”, which concluded that ethical vegans are entitled to similar legal protections in British workplaces as those who hold philosophical religious beliefs. While not all vegans hold a philosophical belief to the same extent as Casamitjana, the ruling is significant and will be of interest to scholars investigating non-religious ethical beliefs. To explore this, we have analysed a sample of YouTube videos on the theme of “my vegan story”, showing how vloggers circulate narratives about ethical veganism and the process of their conversion to vegan beliefs and practices. The story format can be understood as what Abby Day has described as a performative “belief narrative”, offering a greater opportunity to understand research participants’ beliefs and related identities than, for example, findings from a closed-question survey. We suggest that through performative acts, YouTubers create “ethical beliefs” through the social, mediatised, transformative, performative and relational practice of their digital content. In doing so, we incorporate a digital perspective to enrich academic discussions of non-religious beliefs.

Information Technology, Business Strategy and the Reassignment of Work from In‐House Employees to Agency Temps

AbstractThough we now understand how information technology (IT) influences work, we know much less about how it reshapes the actual relationship between workers and their employers. That is, to what extent do employers deploy new technologies towards the erosion of traditional employment relationships? This study relies on a cross section of British workplaces to provide statistical evidence that IT actually facilitates managers’ reassignment of work once done by in‐house employees to those working instead for a staffing agency, an effect that trebles in magnitude where managers have simultaneously cut employment. Furthermore, IT differentially serves opposing business strategies. While employers electing to compete on price rather than quality are more likely to reassign work, managers enacting quality‐centred strategies are more likely to rely on IT to avert work reassignment. The findings demonstrate that new technologies may facilitate this form of externalization, but they do not unilaterally drive it. The estimates also illuminate IT's indirect impact on workers via managers’ use of it as a tool for restructuring employment.

Can Human Resource Management Improve Schools' Performance?

AbstractUsing data for British workplaces, we compare the associations between human resource management (HRM) practices and schools' performance, comparing those effects to the effects of HRM among private sector workplaces. We do so using measures of workplace performance that are common across all workplaces. We find intensive use of HRM practices is correlated with substantial improvement in workplace performance, both among schools and other workplaces. Results are robust to panel estimates of the correlation between changes in performance and changes in HRM.

Exploring possible trade‐offs between organisational performance and employee well‐being: The role of teamwork practices

AbstractThere is growing evidence linking teamwork practices to performance outcomes. However, critics have raised concerns that such outcomes are achieved at the expense of increased job demands and stress among workers. Using large data from a representative sample of British workplaces (N = 4,311 workers in 664 workplaces), this study explores the pattern of relationships between teamwork practices, organisational performance, and employee well‐being. The study draws on a mutual gains model linking teamwork practices to organisational performance via affective commitment, and a conflicting outcomes model associated with high job demands and job‐related anxiety. The study also examines an interactive outcomes model that integrates the mutual gains and conflicting outcomes models. The study reports evidence that the performance gains of teamwork practices may actually come at the cost of increased job demands and job‐related anxiety. Nevertheless, these adverse outcomes tend to weaken at higher levels of affective commitment.

Migrants and Low-Paid Employment in British Workplaces

Using nationally representative workplace data for Britain, we identify where migrants work and examine the partial correlation between workplace wages and whether migrants are employed at a workplace. Three-in-ten workplaces with five or more employees employ migrant workers, with the probability rising substantially with workplace size. We find the bottom quartile of the log earnings distribution is 4–5% lower in workplaces employing migrants, ceteris paribus. However, the effect is confined to workplaces set up before the introduction of the National Minimum Wage (NMW) in the late 1990s, consistent with the proposition that minimum wage regulation limits employers’ propensity to pay low wages in the presence of migrant workers.

Does demand for product quality increase worker training?

We uniquely examine the relationship between firm-organized training and the sensitivity of consumer demand to product quality. Cross section, panel fixed effect and instrumental variable estimates confirm that British workplaces provide more intensive training when their product demand is more sensitive to product quality. Robustness checks including using alternative key variable definitions and a counterfactual analysis examining the importance of competing on price support this confirmation.

The Nigerian Second Generation at Work in Britain: Ethnoracial Exclusion and Adaptive Strategies

This article examines the workplace experiences of upwardly mobile second generation Nigerians in Britain. It uses data from semi-structured in-depth interviews with 73 second generation Nigerian adults. The analysis distinguishes between incidents of discrimination and stigmatization (assaults on worth) and finds that incidents of stigmatization were more common than incidents of racial discrimination among the Nigerian second generation. Contextual factors, specifically Britain’s colonial history, national identity, and the cultural repertoire of the British class system shaped how individuals perceived, recognized, and interpreted incidents of ethnoracial exclusion. Strategies of non-response, social adaptability, and conciliation were used both to respond to these incidents of ethnoracial exclusion and facilitate economic mobility. The findings present a more complex story than one of simple racial discrimination for second generation Africans in British workplaces.

Votes at Work in Britain: Shareholder Monopolisation and the ‘Single Channel’

Abstract Why do shareholders monopolise voting rights in UK companies, and are trade unions the only way to get meaningful workplace representation? In 1967 a Labour Party policy document first coined the phrase that a ‘single channel’ for representation should ‘in the normal’ case mean trade unions. Since then, it has been said the labour movement embraced an ‘adversarial’ rather than a ‘constitutional’ conception of corporations, neglecting legal rights to worker voice in enterprise governance. This article shows that matters were not so simple. It explains the substantial history of legal rights to vote in British workplaces, and competition from the rival constitutional conception: employee share schemes. The UK has the oldest corporations – namely universities – which have consistently embedded worker participation rights in law. Britain has among the world’s most sophisticated ‘second channel’ participation rights in pension board governance. Developing with collective bargaining, it had the world’s first private corporations with legal participation rights. Although major plans in the 1920s for codetermination in rail and coal fell through, it maintained a ‘third channel’ of worker representatives on boards during the 20th century in numerous sectors, including ports, gas, post, steel, and buses. At different points every major political party had general proposals for votes at work. The narrative of the ‘single channel’ of workplace representation, and an ‘adversarial’ conception of the company contains some truth, but there has never been one size of regulation for all forms of enterprise.

The management of discipline and grievances in British workplaces: the evidence from 2011 WERS

AbstractThis study tests the assumptions and prescriptions of the Gibbons' Review of dispute resolution in the UK. Contrary to these, the formalisation of dispute resolution has continued and is not strongly related to the level of disputes or tribunal cases nor is the use of mediation which is complementing not replacing formalisation.

Are High-Performance Work Systems always a valuable retention tool? The roles of workforce feminization and flexible work arrangements

High-Performance Work Systems (HPWS) are commonly related to higher rates of employee retention. However, variations in such rates arising from differences in workforce gender composition have hardly been studied, so the aim here is to address these issues based on a sample of British workplaces. It is hypothesized that HPWS have reduced retention outcomes in highly feminized workplaces as compared to less feminized ones. An exploration is also made of how HPWS operate in conjunction with the provision of Flexible Work Arrangements (FWAs) to affect retention across both types of workplaces. The results suggest that workforce gender composition does indeed matter when it comes to the relationship between HPWS and retention. Contrary to expectations, the provision of FWAs alongside HPWS appears to be a less-than-optimal approach to retain employees, particularly in highly feminized workplaces.

Fitting the bill? (Dis)embodied disclosure of sexual identities in the workplace

The disclosure of lesbian, gay or bisexual identity is generally presented as a conscious act of leaving heterosexuality. Such interpretation fails to take into account the dynamic processes involved in constructing non-heterosexual identities and to what degree such identities are embodied or disembodied. Supported by interview data among lesbian and gay employees in six British workplaces, this article explores how non-heterosexual identities become known in organizational settings by arguing that lesbians and gay men continue to collide with social expectations and stereotypical ideas of how sexual identities should be ‘worn’ and performed. These expectations and ideas both shape colleagues’ assumptions about their non-heterosexual identities and can expose lesbians and gay men to negative behaviour at work in highly gendered ways.

Widening the ‘representation gap'? The implications of the ‘lobbying act’ for worker representation in the UK

The Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Act 2014 (the ‘Lobbying Act’) imposes tight restrictions on the campaigning and lobbying activities of civil society organisations in the UK, diminishing their capacity to represent the interests of working people and thus likely compounding the ‘representation gap’ within British workplaces. Along with austerity measures and employment law reforms, the legislation exemplifies the UK government's attempts to shift the balance of power further towards employers.

Workforce nationality composition and workplace flexibility in Britain

Purpose– The purpose of this paper, with an organisational focus, is to offer a novel examination of the association between workforce nationality composition and workplace flexibility practices (WFPs), an under-researched topic with high potential benefits at microeconomic and macroeconomic level.Design/methodology/approach– British data are used, as the UK has experienced significant immigrant flows and has a relatively high level of labour market flexibility. The Workplace Employee Relations Survey 2011, sampling 2,500 British workplaces, offers for the first time data on workforce nationality. Via zero-inflated regressions, the number of non-UK nationals employed in a workplace is assessed against a wide range of numerical, functional and cost WFPs.Findings– There are significant links between WFPs and the employment of non-UK nationals, and these are distinct for non-UK nationals from the European Economic Area (EEA) when compared to non-UK nationals from outside the EEA. The former are more likely to be in “good” employment, with job security, working from home, job autonomy and training. Yet, both types of non-UK nationals are more likely to be employed in workplaces making high use of causal contracts. The implications of these results are discussed.Originality/value– The paper addresses the need to research migration from a relatively new perspective of WFPs while also taking into account the diversity of non-UK nationals. The topic is of importance to organisations, as well as to labour market and migration policymakers. Timely results are of value in view of heightened interest in migration.

British Codetermination and the Churchillian Circle

Why do shareholders monopolise voting rights in UK companies, and are trade unions the only way to get meaningful workplace representation? In 1967 a Labour Party policy document first coined the phrase that collective bargaining was – and should be – the ‘single channel’ of representation. Since then, it has been said the labour movement embraced an ‘adversarial’ rather than a ‘constitutional’ conception of corporations, neglecting legal rights to worker voice in enterprise governance. This article shows that matters were not so simple. It explains the substantial history of legal rights to vote in British workplaces, and the competition from the rival constitutional conception: employee share schemes. The UK has the oldest corporations – namely universities – which have consistently embedded worker participation rights in law. Britain has among the world’s most sophisticated ‘second channel’ participation rights in pension board governance. Developing with collective bargaining, it had the world’s first private corporations with legal participation rights. Although major plans in the 1920s for codetermination in rail and coal fell through, it maintained a ‘third channel’ of worker representatives on boards during the 20th century in numerous sectors, including ports, gas, post, steel, and buses. At different points every major political party had general proposals for votes at work. The narrative of the ‘single channel’ of workplace representation, and an ‘adversarial’ conception of the company contains some truth, but there has never been one size of regulation for all forms of enterprise.

Unions, joint regulation and workplace equality policy and practice in Britain: evidence from the 2004 Workplace Employment Relations Survey

This article provides an empirical assessment of the relationship between unionization and the adoption of equal opportunities (EO) policies and practices in British workplaces, using data from the 2004 Workplace Employment Relations Survey. The results demonstrate an association between union recognition and the adoption of a range of EO practices. However, this association largely only holds where unions are able to influence EO decision-making via negotiation or consultation. There is little evidence that the equality practices adopted in unionized workplaces where negotiation and consultation does not occur are any different from those adopted in non-unionized workplaces.

The ill-treatment of employees with disabilities in British workplaces

There are few quantitative studies that show the workplace is experienced in a different way by employees with disabilities. This article fills this gap using data from the British Workplace Behaviour Survey, which found that employees with disabilities and long-term illnesses were more likely to suffer ill-treatment in the workplace and experienced a broader range of ill-treatment. Different types of disability were associated with different types of ill-treatment. The survey also showed who employees with disabilities blamed for their ill-treatment and why they believed the ill-treatment had occurred. Drawing on the existing literature, four possible explanations for ill-treatment are considered: negative affect raises perceptions of ill-treatment; ill-treatment leads to health effects; ill-treatment results from stigma or discrimination; ill-treatment is a consequence of workplace social relations. Although some of these explanations are stronger than others, the discussion shows that more research is required in order to decide between them.

Occupational cancer in Britain

To estimate the current occupational cancer burden due to past exposures in Britain, estimates of the number of exposed workers at different levels are required, as well as risk estimates of cancer due to the exposures. This paper describes the methods and results for estimating the historical exposures. All occupational carcinogens or exposure circumstances classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer as definite or probable human carcinogens and potentially to be found in British workplaces over the past 20–40 years were included in this study. Estimates of the number of people exposed by industrial sector were based predominantly on two sources of data, the CARcinogen EXposure (CAREX) database and the UK Labour Force Survey. Where possible, multiple and overlapping exposures were taken into account. Dose–response risk estimates were generally not available in the epidemiological literature for the cancer–exposure pairs in this study, and none of the sources available for obtaining the numbers exposed provided data by different levels of exposure. Industrial sectors were therefore assigned using expert judgement to ‘higher’- and ‘lower’-exposure groups based on the similarity of exposure to the population in the key epidemiological studies from which risk estimates had been selected. Estimates of historical exposure prevalence were obtained for 41 carcinogens or occupational circumstances. These include exposures to chemicals and metals, combustion products, other mixtures or groups of chemicals, mineral and biological dusts, physical agents and work patterns, as well as occupations and industries that have been associated with increased risk of cancer, but for which the causative agents are unknown. There were more than half a million workers exposed to each of six carcinogens (radon, solar radiation, crystalline silica, mineral oils, non-arsenical insecticides and 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin); other agents to which a large number of workers are exposed included benzene, diesel engine exhaust and environmental tobacco smoke. The study has highlighted several industrial sectors with large proportions of workers potentially exposed to multiple carcinogens. The relevant available data have been used to generate estimates of the prevalence of past exposure to occupational carcinogens to enable the occupational cancer burden in Britain to be estimated. These data are considered adequate for the present purpose, but new data on the prevalence and intensity of current occupational exposure to carcinogens should be collected to ensure that future policy decisions be based on reliable evidence.

Job satisfaction and quality management: an empirical analysis

PurposeQuality management requires increasing employee involvement that could empower employees, leading to employee and customer satisfaction. Although the literature describes a picture of increasing job demands and work intensification, the evidence of an association between employee job satisfaction and quality management remains mixed and narrow. The purpose of this paper is to investigate this link in the wider economy, and address the roles of human resource management practices that target direct employee participation (job enrichment and high involvement management) in this relationship.Design/methodology/approachThe Workplace Employment Relations Survey of 2004 (WERS2004) provides information on British workplaces including the use of specific quality and human resource management practices, employees' job satisfaction and other outcomes. Latent variable analysis identifies employers' approaches to quality management, job enrichment and high involvement management. Workplace‐level regression analyses illustrate the link between job satisfaction and various desired organizational outcomes. Hierarchical two‐level regression models are used to assess the link between quality management at workplaces and employee job satisfaction.FindingsAlthough job satisfaction is positively associated with desired workplace outcomes (organizational commitment, productivity and quality), no significant link between quality management and employee job satisfaction is found. By contrast, a positive association between job enrichment and job satisfaction is confirmed, which may be weakened in the presence of quality management.Practical implicationsGiven the potential impact of job satisfaction on organizational outcomes, job enrichment features should not be neglected when designing jobs so that an effective quality management strategy can be in place. Some weak positive association between high involvement and quality managements with perceived job demands is also observed, and this should be further investigated in more detailed studies of employee well‐being.Originality/valueThis is a large empirical study on an economy‐wide sample of workplaces and their employees.

Technological learning environments and organizational practices--cross-sectoral evidence from Britain

This study explores the co-occurrence of technological and organizational learning processes by analyzing the adoption and use of four types of Human Resource Management (HRM) practices, rewarding, problem-solving, top-down management, and decentralization, in the 1990s, across different technological learning environments. Using a sample of British workplaces, we show that the level of use of diverse HRM practices, aimed at creating different learning incentives, is persistently heterogeneous across technological learning environments, suggesting that HRM forms an essential part of the technological learning structure of firms. Copyright 2011 The Author 2011. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Associazione ICC. All rights reserved., Oxford University Press.