Managerial Responsiveness to Union and Nonunion Worker Voice in Britain

Abstract

Over the last two decades, there has been a switch in British workplaces away from union voice and representative worker voice more generally toward direct employee involvement and nonunion representative forms of voice. This article assesses the implications of this switch for the effectiveness of worker voice, as measured by employee perceptions of managerial responsiveness. In general, perceptions of managerial responsiveness are better among employees with nonunion voice than they are among employees with union voice.

Collective and individual voice: convergence in Europe?

“…Individual voice may be expressed through briefing groups, Brewster et al: Collective and individual voice 1247 problem-solving teams, regular meetings between management and the workforce at large, written forms of communication including newsletters and via notice boards, electronic communication including intranet and emails (including e-mail-administered employee surveys) and suggestion schemes (Bryson, 2004). Although these are sometimes categorized into union or management friendly forms (Colvin, 2004), practices exist that are harder to demarcate outside of power relations contexts.…”

Understanding Worker Participation and Organizational Performance at the Firm Level: In Search for an Integrated Model

“…We recognize but have not discussed here the special role manager's expertise and skills play for successful worker participation (e.g., Bryson, 2004;Bryson et al, 2006). The significance of direct supervisors' attitudes and behaviors, as well as top managers' competence to direct these, cannot be underestimated.…”

“…This last proposition about the critical role of both direct and indirect participation has been ignored by many scholars and practitioners. Just a sparse handful of investigators have recognized the point and gone so far as to claim direct participation should even have a special status within research on performance: direct participation presumes listening to employee needs and only when meeting their needs will desired outcomes be gained (e.g., Bryson, 2004;Bryson, Charlwood, & Forth, 2006;Gollan, 2003;Torka, Van Riemsdijk, & Looise, 2007). Given our review of unmistakable patterns of blind sight in the accumulated evidence, when compared to other HRM-practices, there can be little doubt that participation deserves at least equal attention in organizational performance research and practice.…”

Vive les différences? Voice in French MNCs' overseas workplaces: a comparative study of voice in French, German and US subsidiaries in the UK

“…The 'voice' concept (Hirschman, 1970) has been extended to cover mechanisms by which unions channel employees' concerns to employers as well as other communication methods (Allen and Tüselmann, 2009;Bryson, 2004). The latter include nonunion employee representative structures, as well as various forms of direct employee participation, communication, and information sharing and their combination.…”

“…This sub-category involves the use of indirect-voice channels in both the introduction and operation of direct-voice practices. A co-existence approach indicates that establishments operate direct-and indirect-voice channels independently with no interaction between the channels (Bryson, 2004).…”