Product Quality Improvement through Employee Participation: The Effects of Unionization and Joint Union-Management Administration

Abstract

This study investigates the effectiveness of employee participation in achieving product quality improvement in union versus nonunion settings and in programs unilaterally administered by management versus programs with joint union-management administration. An analysis of data from two surveys of manufacturing firm managers suggests that among unionized firms, those with jointly administered programs achieved significantly greater improvements in product quality than did those with more traditional, adversarial collective bargaining relationships (that is, with no participation programs), but those with programs administered solely by management fared no better than those with no programs. The gains associated with jointly administered programs in unionized firms were at least equal to the gains associated with participation programs in nonunion firms.

The Survival of Employee Participation Programs in Unionized Settings

“…Nadler, Hanlon, and Lawler (1980), basing their approach on Walton and McKersie's classic work on negotiations theory (1965), viewed the development of cooperative and participative programs in the unionized setting as a type of integrative bargaining, the success of which rested on three factors: motivation, information, and trust. Cooke's (1990) recent work on the development and institutionalization of labor-management "collaboration" derived from economic theory. He argued that the decision to cooperate involves the weighing by each side of perceived costs and benefits of cooperation.…”

“…Lack of job security would be one indication of poor economic performance. On the other hand, it has been argued that workers and unions are reluctant to become involved in programs without guarantees of continued employment, and there are many examples of programs undermined by layoffs (Cooke 1990;Drago 1988:345;Levine and Tyson 1990;Schuster 1984). Drago (1988), however, found a weak positive association between continued insecurity after program implementation and the survival of quality circles.…”

“…Many authors cite the importance of commitment to participation from all levels of management (Cooke 1990;Goodman 1980;Kochan et al 1984;Lawler and Mohrman 1985;Nadler et al 1980;Schuster 1984). As suggested by Bushe (1988), management is far from homogeneous in its orientation toward participation.…”

“…By the same token, many observers have stressed the importance of commitmentfrom union leaders (Cooke 1990;Goodman 1980;Nadler et al 1980), as well as, more generally, union participation in the program (Kochan et al 1984;Drago 1988). Therefore, union commitment to the process should also be associated with program survival.…”

An empirical study on the impact of R&D investment and employee involvement on innovation commercialization — Evidence from IT firms in China

“…Lots of researches showed that EI has positive impact on firm's indicators of operation performance, such as quality, job satisfaction, absenteeism and turnover, and of financial performance such as sales and profit [20][21][22][23][24] .…”