Workplace Organization Research Articles

Work, Locality and Social Control

This paper attempts to develop the argument that non-work issues influence social control in the workplace. Evidence is presented from a study of social relations in a Northern Ireland telecommunications plant. It is suggested that the locality in which a factory is situated has an important influence on internal plant relations. It is argued that in the context of Northern Ireland the replication of locality social relations in the workplace had the effect of weakening collective resistance in the plant. Large scale job losses and the introduction of new work practices, a consequence of technological change in the telecommunications industry, exposed these important weaknesses in the structure of workplace organisation.

Workers' collectivity at the workplace as an independent organisational mechanism

A distinctive feature of some manufacturing workplaces has been that the negotiated order of day-to-day operations is dependent on the consent of a workplace-level collectivity of workers. Despite Lysgaard's (1961) stimulating contribution very little empirical research exists on this topic. This article discusses potential criteria which could be used in the identification of workers' workplace organisations. Instead of overt institutional mechanisms the differentia specifica of a workers' workplace organisation is linked 1. (1) to the existence of leadership over and above lower-level collectivities, 2. (2) to the existence of a factory consciousness which distinguishes workers' workplace organisations from other local collectivities and 3. (3) to the ability to mobilise the resources of the members to joint action which serves as an ultimate power base of the collectivity. It is suggested that these criteria bridge the gap between the theoretical notion and holistic empirical research, which must draw on ideas from a variety of research traditions.

Health and safety and trade union workplace organization—a case study in the printing industry

Here the author looks at the implementation of the Safety Representatives and Safety Committees Regulations in the printing industry. In discussing the relationship between trade union organisation and the joint regulation of health and safety at work, he concludes that leaving health and safety to joint regulation was based on an assumption of trade union power. Wim this power diminished the Regulations have had only limited effect.

Workplace organization in flexible automated assembly systems†

Flexible automated assembly has new and unknown consequences for the environment of the assembly worker. This paper deals with the viewpoints of leaders/production engineers and workers in companies who have or intend to introduce flexible assembly systems in their factories. The subjects to be discussed are technical solutions and their consequences for work environment. work organization and the necessary training to meet the challenge of the new technology.

Workers' Earnings and Corporate Economic Structure.

Workers' Earnings and Corporate Economic Structure investigates the role of economic structure in determining employees' earnings and how workplace organization contributes to social inequality. The study focuses on the characteristics of the organization of capital rather than on different management styles or systems. Earnings as a key labor force outcome are examined at both the industry and company levels of economic organization. Comprised of nine chapters, this volume begins with an overview of economic explanations for the diversity of wage labor in advanced capitalist countries, and whether the labor market in the United States is structured by the organizational characteristics of capital. The discussion then turns to the dual economy model of industrial structure; an alternative resource approach to the study of organizational structure and labor segmentation; and enterprise- and industry-level sectoral models of economic structure. Subsequent chapters explore the relationship between the sectoral models and poverty, class position, and racial and gender groups; the ability of the sectoral models to explain workers' earnings and select continuous-variable models of the impact of economic structure on workers' earnings; earnings determination within economic sectors; and the impact of economic structure across class, occupational, and status groups. The final chapter offers concluding thoughts and reflections and integrates the insights derived from the study of industrial structure with themes from the broader field of social stratification. This book will be of interest to economists, sociologists, and workers and industry officials.

Major Theories of the Labour Market and Women's Place Within It

Within the labour market, female employees are over-represented in particular industries and occupations. They tend to receive lower pay than male workers and tend to occupy lower positions of status and power. Four major theoretical schools that attempt to explain these patterns are critically examined. These are the neo classical economists in the human capital school; dual labour market theorists; labour market segmentation theorists; and feminists who use the term 'reserve army'. It is argued that the sexual division of labour is best understood by seeing the labour market as a structure of power where buyers and sellers of labour come to agreements over wages and work place organisation. Because of the unequal domestic division of labour, gender is a highly significant determinant of bargaining power. So is education. More empirical and historical studies of the state and service sectors need to be undertaken and would undoubtedly shed more light on the distor tions in existing labour market theories.

Control Over the Organisation and Conduct of Work: Evidence from Some Australian Workplaces

Evidence is presented from two principal case studies and three minor case studies conducted in Australia on the extent of union involvement, strategies of employer control, and union responses in organisations. The fieldwork concentrated on the identification of management actions as issues for union concern and the way these are processed. The theoretical basis for the research was to consider ideology as a central resource in the struggle for control. Ideology underlies both employer strategies and the ability of leaders of the union in the workplace to mobilise any opposition. The paper draws attention to the diversity of industrial relations practice existing within the common institutional framework of compulsory arbitration and to the dynamic interaction between employer strategies for control and union workplace organisation and activity. It concludes that the different patterns of interaction observed are unlikely to be equally stable over time.

Workplace organisation for effective time management

More effective time management may ensue from an analysis and improvement of your working space. Organising workspace is often a personal matter that depends upon tastes and working habits, in addition to the task requirement. While your work place is a “home away from home”, there are a number of basic factors to bear in mind including:

Workplace Organization in the British Car Industry. A Critique of Jonathan Zeitlin

Workplace Organization in the British Car Industry. A Critique of Jonathan Zeitlin Get access Dave Lyddon Dave Lyddon Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar History Workshop Journal, Volume 15, Issue 1, Spring 1983, Pages 131–140, https://doi.org/10.1093/hwi/15.1.131 Published: 01 March 1983

Workplace Organization in the British Car Industry. A Critique of Jonathan Zeitlin

Workplace Organization in the British Car Industry. A Critique of Jonathan Zeitlin Get access Dave Lyddon Dave Lyddon Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar History Workshop Journal, Volume 15, Issue 1, Spring 1983, Pages 131–140, https://doi.org/10.1093/hwi/15.1.131 Published: 01 March 1983

Workplace Militancy: A Rejoinder

After many years of comparative neglect, the social history of British motor workers has now become the focus of extensive scholarly attention. The development of trade unions and shop steward organization, the evolution of management strategies, the formation of the labour force, the role of women, and family patterns have been examined in a spate of recent articles, theses and work in progress, much of it drawing on oral as well as documentary sources.' It was inevitable that this wealth of new research would modify in significant ways my account of the emergence of shop steward organization and job control based on the limited range of information available in the late 1970s (HWJ 10), and Dave Lyddon's critique (HWJ 15) does advance our understanding of these developments in a number of respects. But beyond purely factual questions lie substantive differences in interpretation which flow from contrasting methodological standpoints; and these differences in approach often lead Lyddon to misinterpret significantly the thrust of my arguments. In order to advance the debate and clarify the issues at stake, I will therefore attempt to disentangle empirical correction and interpretative disagreement in considering Lyddon's principal objections to my arguments, taking up in sequence the problems of periodization of union development, relations between unions and shop stewards, the role of migration, and the broader interpretation of the diffusion of job control and the distinctivejpess of workplace organization in the British motor industry. The area in which I am most prepared to accept Lyddon's critique is in his remarks on the periodization of unionism and the erosion of managerial control. It has become clear from his work, together with that of Tolliday, Croucher and others, that I exaggerated the strength of trade unionism and shop stewards during the late 1940s and early 50s and did not place sufficient emphasis on the gap between wartime gains and the achievement of high levels of unionization, which in most major firms came only in the late 50s or early 60s. In this respect, my argument followed too closely the account of Friedman's Industry and Labour (1977) which assigned a central role to the seller's market for cars in this period, and should have followed more closely the movement of union density and the outcome of strikes in these years. As Tolliday has shown, it was above all supplyside and reconversion problems (such as shortages of steel and fuel) which inhibited the industry's growth in the immediate postwar years, occasioning the periodic redundancies that weakened the hand of workplace organization.2 I would likewise agree that I was mistaken in following Friedman in generalizing from Standard Motors to the industry as a whole, or even to other Coventry firms, though this point remains less clear.3 But the distinctive managerial strategies adopted by British motor firms may nonetheless have contributed in more complex ways to the high level of job control achieved by shop stewards in the 1960s and early 70s. Wayne Lewchuk has argued convincingly that most British car firms were slower than their foreign counterparts in introducing capital-intensive production methods, preferring to rely on payment systems to maintain effort and output levels; and the weaker technical control over the organization of production which

Industrial organization, economic conditions, and the labor market success of young men: An overview and extension

The relationship between workplace organization and socioeconomic attainments of workers, although an issue of some currency in contemporary stratification research, is complex and as yet not well understood. In contrast to dual economic theory, this paper attempts to sort out the separate effects of various components of the social organization of production on job rewards by adopting an explicit multidimensional approach to the conceptualization and measurement of organizational structure. Moreover, various considerations suggest that these structural impacts vary with business cycle activity. Accordingly, one of the research aims is to examine the extent to which various dimensions of organizational structure serve to differentially insulate workers from wage stagnation as economic conditions deteriorate. Finally, because firms may devise different institutional responses to declining product demand, these structural effects on both wage rates and unemployment propensities are examined.

Health and Safety Training:

The safety representative/committee regulations of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, which became law in October 1978, have led to a substantial health and safety training programme being mounted by the TUC. In May 1977 a special TUC Conference on workplace health and safety discussed a variety of matters pertaining to this subject area. Among their most important decisions was one reaffirming that the emphasis of such training should be on TUC approved courses only, with the key functions of such training being to help identify health and safety issues in the workplace, find appropriate means and standards for dealing with health and safety problems and help establish an “infallible union workplace organisation” to ensure that the employers actually implemented safety measures. The TUC's target was that some 160,000 safety representatives would have undergone such training by 1980. In fact the TUC failed to attain this extremely ambitious target figure as is evidenced by the following figures:

Political Efficacy at Work: The Connection between More Autonomous Forms of Workplace Organization and a More Participatory Politics

Carole Pateman (1970) argued that democratized industrial authority structures would require workers to develop precisely the skills and resources necessary for participation in political life beyond the workplace. She based her argument on a close analysis of classical democratic theory and the indirect empirical evidence available at the time concerning workplace-related political participation. Although a great deal of research in industrial psychology and sociology and organization behavior is available, none treats expressly political correlates of workplace democracy. Analysis of data from a new factory designed on the basis of semi-autonomous, self-managing work groups provides empirical evidence directly supporting Pateman. The analysis also results in empirically grounded scales that differentiate betweenwork humanizationandwork democratization.The latter correlates significantly with a sense of political efficacy. Further research to support democratizing industrial authority structures seems warranted for a political science that would contribute to a more participatory politics.

Flexible Manufacturing Systems with Automatic Transport of Tools

Efficiency of flexible Manufacturing systems for unmanned 24-hours machining of workplaces can be substantially improved by Introducing of automatic handling and automatic transport of tools among Individual machining centres and the tool room. This paper describes solution of some serious problems connected with development of unmanned machining centres equipped with high-capacity tool magazines and tool transport equipment. Tools are stored in plastic cells for their protection during long time storing and are handled automatically by N/C handling units., The paper shows examples of developed flexible manufacturing cells and of flexible manufacturing systems under construction with automatic handling and transport of 432 resp. 1440 tools under computer control. New strategy in tool and workplace organization based on described equipment reduces substantially the total number of necessary tools and workplace pallets in highly automated manufacturing systems of non-rotary, box-like workpieces.

Shop steward tenure and workplace organisation*

The shop steward theme is continued in this article which is based upon research carried out in six manufacturing plants in Hull. Graham Winch identifies the problem of shop steward turnover and argues that the most important cause lies in the shop steward being deprived of resources necessary for carrying out the job.

Work and growth: A review of research on the impact of work experience on adolescent development

Work has not been extensively studied as a context for adolescent development, even though increased work experience has been widely recommended as a means of improving the transition of adolescents to adulthood. Studies of the impact of work experience on adolescent socialization, defined broadly, suggest that work has beneficial results that persist over time. Developmental theorists and critics of conventional patterns of workplace organization remind us, however, that current knowledge is inadequate to specify optimal types and amounts of work experience for adolescents. Studies of narrower outcomes of work experience - career knowledge and plans, job-related attitudes, behavior, and skills - are less persuasive. An ecological strategy is recommended for future research. Such research should consider the varying effects of different kinds of work experience on different adolescents and should seek those effects in settings other than the workplace and over long periods.

Managerial and supervisory custom and practice

The term ‘custom and practice’ is more usually associated with the behaviour of workers rather than managers and supervisors. In addition, previous studies have been of large plants with strong workplace organisation. Peter Armstrong and John Goodman discuss managerial and supervisory custom and practice in the context of a study in a medium‐sized factory in England.

Uncovering the Hidden History of the American Workplace

The first part of this report outlines our framework for developing a model of work relations activity. Part II traces an important part of work rela tions history, showing the destruction of the 19th century pattern of craft worker control of industrial production, and its replacement by managerial control, thereby setting the stage for the study of more current forms of workplace organi zation. Part III examines how management has used its power over the structure of the work process as a means for controlling both the workplace and workers. It outlines the strategies management has developed to increase its control over this process. Part IV deals, conversely, with the formal and informal ways that workers have exercised counter-power over their lives at the workplace. It shows worker strategies for establishing and retaining control over their activities on the job. Part V presents a few concluding reflections on the political significance of work relations research.

Organization of the workplace in the grinding shop

Organization of the workplace in the grinding shop