Personnel Review
ISSN 0048-3486 Volume 31 Number 3 2002
Issues in teamworking Guest Editors Frank Mueller and Stephen Procter Paper format Personnel Review includes six issues in traditional paper format. The contents of this issue are detailed below.
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Access to Personnel Review online _________________ 259 Editorial advisory board ___________________________ 260 Abstracts and keywords ___________________________ 261 Introduction _______________________________________ 263 Teamworking and managerial control within a Japanese manufacturing subsidiary in the UK Diana Rosemary Sharpe__________________________________________
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Gender, emotional labour and teamworking in a call centre Kate Mulholland ________________________________________________
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How teamworking works in the Inland Revenue: meaning, operation and impact Stephen Procter and Graeme Currie ________________________________
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Collective and individual improvement activities: the role of reward systems Ma´ire Kerrin and Nick Oliver _____________________________________
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The mini-company: a specification of sociotechnical business systems Jan de Leede, Jan Kees Looise and Maarten Verkerk___________________
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Team responsibility structure and team performance Hans Doorewaard, Geert Van Hootegem and Rik Huys_________________
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CONTENTS
CONTENTS continued
What do we know about the incidence of group work (if anything)? Jos Benders, Fred Huijgen and Ulrich Pekruhl ________________________
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Book reviews______________________________________ 386 About the authors _________________________________ 394
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EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Dr Stephen Bach The Management Centre, King’s College, London, UK Professor Greg Bamber Graduate School of Management, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia Dr Yehuda Baruch University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK Professor Birgit Benkhoff Lehrstu¨hl fu¨r BWL – Personalwirtschaft, Technische Universita¨t, Dresden, Germany
Professor Ulf Johanson Ma¨lardalen University and the IPF Institute at Uppsala University Professor Janice R.W. Joplin University of Texas at El Paso, Texas, USA Professor David Megginson Sheffield Business School, Sheffield, UK Dr Kathy Monks Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland
Professor Cathy Cassell Sheffield University Management School, Sheffield, UK
Professor Peter Nolan The School of Business & Economic Studies, University of Leeds, UK
Professor Nancy E. Day Henry W. Bloch School of Business and Public Administration, University of Missouri-Kansas City, Kansas City, USA
Dr Emmanuel Ogbonna Cardiff Business School, University of Wales, Cardiff
Professor Ken Dovey Rhodes University, East London, South Africa
Professor Stephen Procter School of Management, University of Newcastle, UK
Simon Down University of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia
Dr Chris Rowley Department of HRM, The Business School, City University, London, UK
Professor David Farnham Portsmouth Business School, University of Portsmouth, UK
Professor Margaret Shaffer Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
Dr Alan Fish Department of HRM, Charles Sturt University, Australia Dr Stephen Gibb Department of HRM, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland Dr Irena Grugulis Manchester School of Management, UMIST, Manchester, UK
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Dr Devi Jankowicz Luton Business School, University of Luton, UK
Professor Ed Snape Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong Professor Shaun Tyson Cranfield University School of Management, Cranfield, UK Professor Tony Watson Nottingham Business School, Nottingham Trent University, UK Professor Adrian Wilkinson Loughborough University Business School, UK
Teamworking and managerial control within a Japanese manufacturing subsidiary in the UK Diana Rosemary Sharpe Keywords Teamwork, Managerial power, Employees, Shopfloor This paper presents an in-depth analysis of processes of ‘‘team’’ working within a shopfloor manufacturing setting. Drawing on ethnographic case studies, the paper examines how human resource management (HRM) practices shaped and influenced the outcomes of ‘‘team’’ work, and addresses the influence of context in examining how and why team-based systems took on their own particular characteristics and processes with both intended and unintended consequences on the shopfloors studied. The paper argues that an interplay of contextual factors (important factors include company history and worker orientation), HRM strategies and features of the socio-technical system (including technology, work organisation and control, and social dimensions of the managerial control system in the teams) influenced team processes and outcomes. This analysis builds on Mueller’s work on contextual factors by recognising the influence of traditional modes of managerial control, management style and company culture. Gender, emotional labour and teamworking in a call centre Kate Mulholland Keywords Teamwork, Management control, Gender, Participation, Resistance This article examines teamworking in a call centre and how this is shaped for the employees by an increase in technical control, the dynamics of emotional labour and gender politics. The research is based on a case study of call centre work organisation in different sectors, and this paper draws specifically on ethnographic research on two teams and their managers in broadcasting. Drawing on theoretical insights, it suggests that teamworking results in a fundamental contradiction involving a ‘‘soft’’ discourse versus a regime of increasing managerial control. Participation is measured against Thompson and Wallace’s three-dimensional notion of participation, showing that
employees have little discretion over the way work is organised. The normative aspect of team organisation accommodates managerial coping strategies in conditions of staff shortage via numerical flexibility. However, management’s efforts to disguise control are resisted by employees who transform workplace discourses into an oppositional politics, shattering the illusion of unity promoted by the pundits of team organisation.
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How teamworking works in the Inland Revenue: meaning, operation and impact Stephen Procter and Graeme Currie Keywords Teamwork, Work organization, Performance, Inland Revenue, Public sector, United Kingdom Studies of teamworking suggest that, for it to be successful, fundamental changes must take place in many aspects of an organization’s structure and operations. This study of the Inland Revenue reveals that only in a few aspects does its operation of teamworking follow this model. The range of work is little changed; employees exercise little in the way of new skills; they appear reluctant to adopt responsibility for the work of others; and the performance management system operates on the basis of individual performance. Nonetheless, teamworking appears to work in the Inland Revenue. It does so by having a team rather than an individual allocation of work, and by encouraging individual identity with the team target. This suggests that, although a limited version of teamworking exists, this might be all an organization needs. Thus what is needed is a more sophisticated understanding of teamworking, its objectives, and the relationship between the two. Collective and individual improvement activities: the role of reward systems Ma´ire Kerrin and Nick Oliver Keywords Teams, Problem solving, Continuous improvement, Reward Mechanisms for increasing participation of employees in problem-solving activities such as continuous improvement (CI) programmes often include the use of problem-solving teams. Teams can support problem solving
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by emphasizing accountability for the production process within the work unit, thereby increasing the sense of responsibility for (local) problems. However, it is unclear how effort within these organisational forms should be rewarded. This article describes the use of problem-solving teams within a UK automotive component company, and examines the implications for human resource policy, in particular for the reward and recognition systems. The article outlines the outcomes that ensued when two reward systems existed, one for team-based activities and another for individual suggestions. The contradictions of the two systems are considered in the context of the organisation’s historical individualistic approach to reward systems.
The mini-company: a specification of sociotechnical business systems Jan de Leede, Jan Kees Looise and Maarten Verkerk Keywords Teamwork, Sociotechnics, Market orientation, Teams, Systems development Sociotechnical systems theory (STS) does not address in full the implications of the teamcontext relations, despite its open systems character. There is a need to open STS into a sociotechnical business systems (STBS) theory and practice. We observe three interrelated aspects that are important for STBS. First, the design of the production structure is a traditional STS aspect. Second, the design of the control structure on the team level needs an elaboration compared with STS. The third aspect is the social-dynamic alignment. We describe the mini-company concept and argue that this concept is a specification of STBS covering the three aspects. The case of the implementation of mini-companies in a Dutch manufacturing plant illustrates the strengths of the concept.
Team responsibility structure and team performance Hans Doorewaard, Geert Van Hootegem and Rik Huys Keywords Teamwork, Human resource management, Performance, Self-managing teams The purpose is to analyse the impact of team responsibility (the division of job regulation tasks between team leader and team members) on team performance. It bases an analysis on 36 case studies in The Netherlands which are known to have implemented team-based work. The case studies were executed in 1997 by means of face-to-face interviews with HRM staff and line management. It concludes from the analyses that two different types of team responsibility prevail. In a ‘‘hierarchical team’’ team leaders take responsibility for decisions concerning work preparation, support and control, while in the ‘‘shared-responsibility team’’ decisions are taken by the team members themselves. The analyses show that ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ are thought to contribute more substantially to team performance outcomes than ‘‘hierarchical teams’’. The analysis helped gain a better understanding of the relationship between HRM and organisation performance, as it is viewed in the ‘‘human resource-based view of the firm’’.
What do we know about the incidence of group work (if anything)? Jos Benders, Fred Huijgen and Ulrich Pekruhl Keywords Group working, Self-managing teams, Statistics, National cultures, Evidence Whereas group work has been much discussed throughout the 1980s and 1990s, there are few statistical studies about its incidence. The available surveys have adopted a variety of methodological approaches. This paper discusses these studies to investigate two questions: Are there differences in the incidence of group work in different countries? Is its popularity indeed increasing?
Introduction
Introduction
About the Guest Editors Frank Mueller MA (Konstanz) MSc DPhil (Oxon) holds a Chair in Organisation Theory at the University of Leicester. Previously, he had held positions at Royal Holloway University of London, Aston University, and London Business School. His research interests are centred on the following topics: .
Comparative organisational behaviour and national business systems.
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Rhetoric and reality of human resource management and teamworking.
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Change programmes in (ex) Public sector organisations.
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He has published widely on these topics, including multiple publications in each of the following: Organization Studies, Human Relations and Journal of Management Studies. He is Co-organiser of the annual International Workshop on Teamworking (IWOT). Stephen Procter BA (Warwick) MSc (Econ) (London) PhD (Bristol) holds the Alcan Chair in Management at the University of Newcastle. Previously he had held posts at the University of St Andrews and University of Nottingham. He is Co-organiser of the International Workshop on Teamworking and, jointly with Frank Mueller, is editor of Teamworking (Palgrave Macmillan, 2000). Most recently, he has been involved in projects investigating the introduction and operation of teamworking in the Inland Revenue, National Health Service and the petrochemical industry. He has published on these and other issues in Organisation Studies, British Journal of Industrial Relations and Work, Employment and Society.
This Special Issue contains a selection of papers dealing with team- or groupwork. It emerged from the 3rd International Workshop on Teamworking (IWOT) held at Royal Holloway University of London in September 1999. (The 6th International Workshop on Teamworking will be held in September 2002 in Malmo¨, Sweden.) In terms of methodology adopted, papers range across the whole spectrum: ranging from a highly intensive ethnography of the reality of teamworking, and its contradictions, in a call centre to a macro assessment of survey evidence regarding the spread of teamwork in a number of countries. Thus, the papers provide different kinds of answers to the question: What does the reality of teamworking look like? Sharpe’s ethnographic study is based on a 15-months participant observation of a Japanese-owned car manufacturing operation in the UK. Its focus is on the role of contextual factors in influencing the adoption of HR strategies/practices in two different sites. Specifically, the location of the greenfield site in a non-unionised environment allowed the introduction of HR practices – associate meetings instead of trade union representatives – that were not possible in the brownfield site, where the labour market was one of unionised manufacturing industry with little inward foreign investment. But there was also an age/experience variable at work, in the sense that younger, inexperienced workers were more open to new working practices including teamworking. Mulholland’s research is based on an intensive case study of Info Co.’s call centre, drawing on non-participant observation, informal ‘‘chat’’, and formal
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interviews with open-ended questions. This intensive case study allowed her to analyse what she sees as the ‘‘fundamental contradiction [that is] how to balance the need for quality with that of productivity’’. The predominance of the latter is indicated by the fact that the selection of line management remains solely the prerogative of management, and that meetings are used primarily for ‘‘downwards’’ communication. The harshness of the productivity discourse is somewhat softened, however, by occasional drawing on a ‘‘caring’’ or HRM discourse. In effect, emotional labour is utilized to support what essentially amounts to a form of ‘‘Team Taylorism’’. Procter and Currie’s paper deals with the introduction of teamworking into Inland Revenue offices. It is based on in-depth investigation of six offices, which were chosen on the basis of their providing a range of sizes, types and experiences of teamworking. The introduction of teamworking was almost necessitated by the move to a new approach to dealing with tax declarations, so-called ‘‘self-assessment’’. The researchers found that, if a narrow definition of ‘‘teamworking’’ was adopted, it could be said not to exist: they acknowledged that the variety of work had changed little, few new skills were utilized, there was a reluctance to accept responsibility for the work of others. Also, the performance management system implied individual grading, and thus encouraged an individualistic orientation rather than team orientation. Also, there was no evidence for a broad transformation of organisation culture. However, if more broadly defined, teamwork was certainly present: namely in the sense of a more facilitative management style, and the replacement of individual allocations of work by team allocations. The authors acknowledged that, most likely, it would be futile to attempt to quantify the impact of teamwork on organisational performance. Kerrin and Oliver’s case study is based on intensive research, consisting of non-participant observation and interviews, conducted at an automotive component plant located in the UK, jointly owned by a Japanese and a Continental European components firm. They studied the important role of reward systems, and discovered a significant tension between a team-based reward system, and one for individual suggestions. One of the unintended outcomes was the ‘‘banking’’ of ideas, whereby ideas would be held back and used as bargaining tools. The authors point to the difficulty in trying to simply replace existing incentive structures, which discouraged incremental improvements, and encouraged the saving-up of ideas until they became ‘‘tradable’’ and acquired financial value as a suggestion submitted to a formalised suggestion scheme. In de Leede et al.’s paper, the team idea is seen in the company context in line with socio-technical systems theory and practice. They describe a case study concerning the design and implementation of so-called ‘‘mini-companies’’. While the concept of the ‘‘mini-company’’ rests in socio-technical systems theory, in two ways it goes beyond it: first, there is a strong market-orientation by using the client-supplier relationship, and second, it utilizes incentives for improvement and innovation on the shopfloor. The paper hypothesizes that the
reason for the increased innovative capacity of the mini-company may well be that the teams are told by their customers and suppliers what kind of improvements are needed. Structural and social-dynamic alignment are the concepts used in order to analyse the link with the organisational context in which the mini-companies are embedded. The authors utilise both qualitative (document analysis, observation and interviews) and quantitative (surveys) methods in order to develop a case study of a Philips manufacturing plant. They found that the reason for the increased innovative capacity of the minicompany is that, rather than being imposed by higher management, the pressures emanate from those groups to which the group delivers and from which they receive goods, services and information. However, the paper also acknowledges the limitations of the mini-company concept. An important one is that the metaphoric use of the notion ‘‘company-within-a-company’’ may not actually be a good description of practice. Indeed, the authors go on to acknowledge that the ‘‘market’’ as a regulator of internal and external relationships has its limitations. Doorewaard et al.’s study, based on a survey of 36 organisations in The Netherlands, can be seen as the most comprehensive in The Netherlands on team-based work design. It involved the collection of both qualitative and quantitative data. The study distinguished two types of team responsibility structures: first, the hierarchical team, where team leaders have responsibility for workplace decisions. Second, the shared responsibility team, where these decisions are made collectively by team members. These two designs can be seen as arrangements at the opposite extreme ends of a continuum. The research attempts to investigate the perceived impact of design arrangements on team performance, whereby a range of performance indicators (productivity, quality, through-put time, HRM outcomes, . . .) are utilized. They established that the type of team responsibility structure mattered for performance outcomes; specifically, that shared responsibility arrangements with regard to work preparation, work support and work control contributed to higher team performance. The Benders et al. paper wants to find answers to the questions, first, whether there are differences in the incidence of group work in different countries and, second, whether group work’s popularity is in fact increasing, as is often claimed. The main source for answers to the first question is data from the so-called ‘‘Employee (direct) participation in organisational change’’ (EPOC survey), which was commissioned by the ‘‘European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions’’. In providing answers to the second question Benders et al. draw on the few available (albeit one country) surveys with longitudinal data. EPOC’s inclusion of decision rights was seen as an improvement on earlier surveys, which had simply asked for the existence of ‘‘work teams’’. The inclusion of autonomy builds on socio-technicallyinformed traditions in work and organisational design: the word ‘‘group’’ must be more than merely a label, i.e. the group must be assigned a minimum degree of discretion. In contrast with most other studies on the topic, the authors
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adopted a so-called ‘‘substantive’’ rather than a purely rhetorical understanding: neutral terms were used to describe the phenomenon instead of asking directly for the phenomenon by its name. In terms of findings, these authors caution that the simple question as to how popular teams are is surprisingly hard to answer, as only a few studies allow for reasonably reliable comparisons. Cross-nationally, the EPOC data confirm that group work is most widely used in Sweden, whilst data on Denmark are inconsistent. Longitudinally, data including the 1990s are only available for two countries: Germany and the USA. Two German surveys, using different populations, suggest that the incidence of group work appears to be rather low but on the increase. (The US data are more problematic to interpret.) The authors point out that, given the high costs involved in data collection, there should be more effort at standardisation to make results comparable. Thus, all papers contribute to our understanding of the realities of teamworking in the face of internal (e.g. team members) and external (e.g. company) constraints. Frank Mueller and Stephen Procter Guest Editors
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Teamworking and managerial control within a Japanese manufacturing subsidiary in the UK
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Diana Rosemary Sharpe Lecturer in Organisational Behaviour, Warwick Business School, Warwick University, Coventry, UK Keywords Teamwork, Managerial power, Employees, Shopfloor Abstract This paper presents an in-depth analysis of processes of ‘‘team’’ working within a shopfloor manufacturing setting. Drawing on ethnographic case studies, the paper examines how human resource management (HRM) practices shaped and influenced the outcomes of ‘‘team’’ work, and addresses the influence of context in examining how and why team-based systems took on their own particular characteristics and processes with both intended and unintended consequences on the shopfloors studied. The paper argues that an interplay of contextual factors (important factors include company history and worker orientation), HRM strategies and features of the socio-technical system (including technology, work organisation and control, and social dimensions of the managerial control system in the teams) influenced team processes and outcomes. This analysis builds on Mueller’s work on contextual factors by recognising the influence of traditional modes of managerial control, management style and company culture.
Methodology The study of group processes took place through an ethnographic, participant observation approach, in which the author worked as a member of each of the groups being studied. This longitudinal research method enables a processbased understanding of organisational life and, by attempting to observe and explain events within the context in which they occurred, generates an understanding of behaviour premised on the cultural perspectives of the people being studied (Scott, 1994, p. 29; Jurgens, 1993, 1995; Cutcher-Gerschenfeld et al., 1994; Sharpe, 1996, 1998). The research was based on an in-depth study of one Japanese-owned manufacturing organisation, operating in the car industry in the UK and was carried out over a period of 15 months across two manufacturing sites, one greenfield and one brownfield. The brownfield site had a long history under local ownership and management prior to being purchased by the Japanese organisation. The author was taken on as a shopfloor worker for the duration of the 15 months under the agreement with a senior director and ‘‘gatekeeper’’ in the company that she be treated as any other worker on the shopfloor. The gatekeeper was supportive of her eagerness to learn about shopfloor management practices as part of her academic studies that she was completing. She was introduced to people in the organisation as a student working on a job
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placement. Whilst this meant that she was sometimes looked upon as someone different from the others on the shopfloor when her student status was first mentioned, this seemed to be unimportant, as the immediacy of the work situation and the demands of work on the shopfloor workers shaped the workers’ attitudes to newcomers. Newcomers were judged on whether they pulled their weight and whether they tried to get any special treatment themselves, which was looked upon with hostility. The study involved participation in four shopfloor manufacturing teams, two at each site. The minimum amount of time spent working in any one shopfloor team was two months. This enabled a detailed analysis of group processes in their wider context to take place. Comparative analysis across teams and sites helped to develop the analysis of the influence of context and contingencies on group processes and outcomes. The research was supported by interviews with senior managers, and discussions with supervisors and teamleaders of the sections in which work took place. Findings The two manufacturing sites provided an opportunity to study shop floor culture and changing managerial control initiatives comparatively across a greenfield and brownfield site. ‘‘Greenfield’’ (acronyms used to maintain confidentiality) was established in the early 1990s. ‘‘Brownfield’’ had a long history as a UK engineering company before being purchased by the Japanese parent shortly before the greenfield site was established in the late 1980s. The following section presents a comparative analysis both within and across sites of management control practices, focusing on ‘‘teamwork’’ in its contexts. Labour market context The two sites studied displayed significant differences in the ways that change initiatives were managed and their outcomes. Contributing factors to this were the difference in the labour market context surrounding the sites studied and the differences in the composition of the board of directors. The greenfield site was located in a ‘‘new town’’, where there was a large Japanese investment. This was important in shaping the local industry culture and providing a supporting infrastructure for the directors in the greenfield factory to implement practices that were atypical in traditional UK manufacturing environments. For example, industrial relations in the local labour market were excellent with few examples of stoppages and strikes compared with the rest of the country. Few organisations had a union and workers were accustomed to working in a non-unionised environment. The labour market surrounding the greenfield site was therefore quite homogeneous and had many new manufacturing organisations operating in a non-unionised environment, having similar wage rates and employing mainly unskilled manual workers. Workers maintained a network of social relations outside work, which enabled them to know about working conditions and
availability of work in other factories. The workers in the local labour market had comparatively little experience in traditional UK manufacturing. In contrast at the brownfield site, the labour market was one of unionised manufacturing industry with little inward investment. The local labour force was heterogeneous in terms of skill levels, experience and cultural background. The brownfield factory was one of the largest employers in the work catchment area. Many workers at the brownfield site had worked there or in similar unionised engineering environments and had certain expectations about labour management relations that were not present with the inexperienced recruits at the greenfield site. Therefore differences in the local context of the two sites were significant in shaping the human resource management (HRM) strategies that were possible. The location of the greenfield factory in a non-unionised environment provided an opportunity to implement HRM practices that would facilitate the shaping of the organisational culture and practices. For example, the introduction of associate meetings as an alternative to worker representatives and a trade union presence was facilitated at the greenfield site by the local labour market. The large foreign direct investment in the greenfield labour market, including Japanese greenfield investment, led to many workers in the labour market being familiar with alternative work practices, control systems and HRM initiatives. The homogeneous workforce, having a local orientation and family ties within the region, and often within the same factory, facilitated management initiatives to portray a sense of common interest and shared goals. The availability of young unskilled workers in a low wage labour market also supported management initiatives on the greenfield site to recruit unskilled workers on comparatively low salaries and implement job flexibility policies. The shopfloor workers’ orientation to work varied considerably across the two sites, being influenced by the local labour market and previous experience of work and union involvement. Workers at the greenfield factory tended to have no previous experience of union industrial relations in traditional UK shopfloor environments, compared with workers in the older sections of the brownfield site. This is a significant difference, as it influenced the way that management practices were perceived and responded to by the workers, including the outcomes of teamwork initiatives. On the greenfield site the inexperienced younger workers were more open to new ways of working and the working ‘‘culture’’ that the management were seeking to implement, as will be discussed in the following section. HRM strategies The Japanese parent company mission statement was communicated to employees across both sites and was present in company literature, on entrances to the factories and on noticeboards on the shopfloors. It emphasised the desire to continuously improve service and quality to customers, to develop
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abilities and skills, to foster teamwork amongst employees and to increase customer confidence in the product. While the mission statement represented a set of values and beliefs that would guide practices across the sites, the extent to which the mission statement was ‘‘enacted’’ on a day-to-day basis was significantly influenced by the commitment of the people to upholding and encouraging these values. On the greenfield site there were more opportunities through HRM strategies to influence and shape the formal organisational culture. Recruitment, selection, training, appraisal and promotion systems worked to encourage employees with the ‘‘right attitude’’ to come through the system. On the brownfield site the task of management was much greater. First, the board itself was heterogeneous in its understanding of the values and beliefs it wanted to foster in the organisation. Cultural differences as well as differences in orientation, expectations and understandings amongst the directors and managers prevented a coherent approach to the management of shopfloor processes. Second, the organisation had a long history and the existing cultures that existed at shopfloor level and throughout the organisation were communicating very different values and beliefs from those expressed through the mission statement of the parent company in Japan. Many workers in the older sections of the brownfield site had over ten years’ experience of traditional UK unionised engineering shopfloors, where confrontation between workers and management was common and the values of teamwork and shared goals were absent. At the greenfield site HRM practices significantly contributed to managerial normative means of control through activities including the recruitment, selection, grading, appraisal and promotion systems used and the communications/industrial relations strategy adopted. Shopfloor culture at the brownfield site was more heterogeneous than at the greenfield site, although across both sites it was possible to see a profile of the kind of person selected to work in different sections of the shopfloor. At the greenfield site, recruitment strategy focused on recruiting young, inexperienced workers for the assembly lines as well as some middle-aged women. The largest proportion of female workers on the shopfloor at the greenfield site were located on the assembly lines, where they were represented in almost equal numbers to men. The majority of men that were recruited on the greenfield site, however, worked on the manufacturing process lines, being concentrated in the earlier stages of manufacturing rather than in final assembly. This recruitment and selection strategy led to the development of different subcultures across the shopfloors. The strategy of selecting comparatively inexperienced younger workers for the assembly lines facilitated the introduction of work practices, including teamworking procedures and social control systems, for example, the cleaning of the teams’ rest areas and use of peer pressure, which would have faced more resistance from older experienced workers cynical of management initiatives for team work and collaboration. This was confirmed by the orientation of the older male workers on the manufacturing processes at the greenfield site. Thus
at the greenfield site, workers selected across all sections were comparatively inexperienced in shopfloor work. Few men had worked on shopfloors in the past. Those men who had had experience were placed on the heavier process sections, which involved machine setting and some technical ability. The induction programmes that were run across both sites also provided opportunities to communicate what was expected of workers. At the greenfield site the induction programme had a very strong ‘‘cultural orientation’’ emphasis, so that workers at the very start of their job were told what was expected from them in terms of attitude and orientation. The term ‘‘skill’’ was used at the greenfield site by management to mean competence in a task rather than qualification or experience in a particular traditional shopfloor craft or job such as welding, sheet metal working or CNC machine operation. This was an important part of the HRM strategy at the greenfield site to develop a flexible workforce that could be moved around, within and across multitasked work teams according to the demands of production. Workers were recruited as ‘‘associates’’ and told that they could be required to work anywhere where they were needed on the shopfloor. The significance of this strategy can best be understood by comparing it with the traditional grading structure that existed at the brownfield site. Traditionally workers at the brownfield site were recruited as unskilled general operators or as semi-skilled operators in one of up to eight grades of manual work. Workers identified with their craft, e.g. sheet metal worker, and would use union support to ensure that they were not required to do work outside their area of skill. The orientation of the directors at the greenfield site to the shopfloor was significant in setting the tone for relations between management and workers. The use of associate meetings, with workers being chosen on a rotating basis to represent their section in a meeting with the directors, was one example of a communication/industrial relations system that potentially ensured that a group of workers did not work together to oppose management, as could be the case, for example, with works committees or trade unions. There have been significant changes at the brownfield site following the Japanese purchase, towards the greenfield site form of single status and HRM policies. However, five years later the formal shopfloor culture at the brownfield site remained fragmented and much less homogeneous than had been the case at the greenfield site. Each section of the brownfield site, the ‘‘Press Shop’’, A Shop ( acronyms are used to retain confidentiality) and J Shop, had distinctly different norms, expected ways of behaving amongst workers and authority relations. The performance appraisal criteria used across the two sites provide clear indications of the attitudes and orientation to work that were being encouraged in employees. Both appraisal systems included attention to attitude and commitment to work, as well as job capabilities and attendance. Appraisal of teamworking skills and attitude was central to the appraisal at both sites. Communication with/support of other associates and a disciplined approach to work were rated as dimensions of teamworking skills on the greenfield site. On
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the brownfield site teamworking skills were rated on a scale from ‘‘uncooperative and resists any changes’’ through to ‘‘excellent team member’’. Job capabilities looked at productivity but also quality and safety across the two sites. The HRM policies and practices discussed above shaped the context in which teamworking initiatives and group processes unfolded. However, actual practices and outcomes across sections and sites were also significantly influenced by the technology, work organisation, job design and sociotechnical system across sections of the two sites. These were found to have an important influence on the way that managerial control systems could be and were implemented and also the way in which the team culture could be managed. This is discussed in the following section. Socio-technical systems, teamworking and managerial control This paper draws on the research carried out as a participant observer within four teams across the two sites. Team processes and outcomes were significantly influenced by the technology, work organisation, job design and sociotechnical system within which the team worked. This paper discusses findings from the research by focusing on one comparative example of two work teams from the same greenfield site – the assembly line team and the manufacturing process team. Comparatively high task interdependency and social interaction were found to facilitate managerial ‘‘social control’’ on the assembly line. On the assembly line 22 associates were involved with the immediate work of the line with strong sequential interdependencies between workers. They were physically working in close proximity and their work was controlled by the same ‘‘tact’’ time. This high co-operation, dependency and communication between workers on the line provided a suitable context and climate for the development of a sense of team spirit and a fragile ethos of unitary goals as part of the social means of control discussed in the analysis of HRM practices earlier. The situation on the process line contrasted significantly with the assembly line in work organisation and job design. In the process line work group studied, five people worked at individual work stations with no interdependencies between themselves and, compared with the assembly line lower interdependencies, with other teams, as workers produced their own materials for use in the team. Workers carried out the same type of work with the same requirements. The layout of the work, however, meant that the workers had little chance to talk to one another during their work and they worked independently. In this type of work organisation there was little notion of ‘‘letting the team down’’ (a central element of the social control on the assembly line), as each worker could work independently of the others. Workers also did not have to co-operate to get the work done and so workers could work at different speeds with different standards. This reduced the influence of the technical organisation of work on the creation of a sense of team. However, what remained across both the assembly line and the process
work group was the use of teams with a team leader. On the process line the team studied was made up of the workers on the individual assembly workstations together with workers preparing the raw materials for assembly machines. The just-in-time (JIT) system was running with some slack on this section which again reduced the dependencies between workers. The assembly line and the process work group provide examples of two contrasting forms of team under one team leader. The assembly line with high interpersonal communications and high task interdependencies (with a cycle time of around 45 seconds workers were co-operating in keeping up with the line speed), and the process work group with lower task interdependencies and communications. The team leader and supervisor on the assembly line utilised these features facilitated by the work organisation to develop a sense of team identity and responsibility to the team. Applying a quality assurance (QA) network, where workers checked the work of their colleague up the line, was an important control feature on the assembly line. However, this had some unintended consequences of facilitating the emergence of subcultures and conflict on the line, when faults were ‘‘reported’’ and ‘‘recorded’’ through the network. Where the JIT system was implemented with comparatively less slack in the system there were increased dependencies in the manufacturing process, increased attention in supervision to control and an increased sense of responsibility on the worker not to stop the system. This was experienced on the assembly line, where on a few occasions customer lorries waited outside the factory whilst we finished assembling a delivery order for them. Such intense requirement for co-operation also led to an increased sense of group identity as being separate from ‘‘outsiders’’ on other sections. The managerial control system also developed further the sense of ‘‘team’’ identity, distinct from other teams in the factory through the use of segregated rest areas. This layout of the shop-floor ensured that there was little opportunity to mix and interact across teams, and encouraged workers to stay with their team. The processes of reduction of difference and increase in sense of team were important in influencing group processes and will be discussed further below. Where the JIT system did not work intensely, for example, in the process work group studied, there was less pressure on workers to keep the output requirements demanded. Aspects of work organisation and job design therefore influenced the nature of co-operation required between workers and provided the climate in which further managerial control systems could be implemented. The research showed how the assembly line facilitated the development of a sense of team and social control around this. Where ‘‘stand-alone’’ work stations were used, such as in the process work group studied, more effort was required by the team leader to generate a sense of group identity and responsibility for performance. Teams and team processes in social control The work organisation and technology, together with the technical control systems, set the climate for social interaction on the lines including social
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control systems and outcomes on the lines. Social control systems on the lines were themselves embedded in the broader organisational climate which was shaped by HRM practices, as discussed earlier in the paper. This section studies and compares some of the features of the social dimensions of the managerial control system which operated in the different sections and includes a comparative analysis of the management of teams as an aspect of social control across sections. Across all sections studied the term ‘‘team’’ was used by the team leader and management to describe the group of workers organised under one team leader. This team was the formal way in which shopfloor workers were organised around an authority structure. Mueller (1994) argues that companies design teamwork not according to a best model, but according to their objectives, which in turn are shaped by management style, employee relations and company traditions, i.e. their internal firm-specific resources. In this research the economic dimensions of teamworking (Mueller, 1994) were stressed across all sections studied. These included particularly the emphasis on removing demarcations, developing flexible working practices, facilitating higher capital productivity, better quality, and the inspection and maintenance part of an operator’s job. The social controls surrounding teamworking sought to encourage people to identify with the company, achieve a common outlook, develop commitment and improve the absenteeism record. The teams studied in the research across all sections most closely resembled productivity teams and not involvement teams. Economic objectives were dominant and a hierarchical foreman (i.e. team leader) was present, who was appointed not rotated. Time-based pay systems existed, ‘‘job enrichment’’ was not a key objective and the teams were fully integrated into the hierarchy. Such a form of teamworking is associated in the literature with a move towards lean production, compared with ‘‘involvement teams’’, which have social and cultural objectives alongside economic objectives (Mueller, 1994). The teams studied displayed features of neo-Taylorism (Pruijt, 1999), that have been associated with lean production and particularly the Toyota production system. This included continuous attempts to increase the standardisation of work, technical discipline, managerial prerogative to set standards and work targets and the appointment of a team leader by management not the work team. A comparative analysis of social dimensions of teamworking across the assembly line team and the manufacturing process team at the greenfield site highlights significant differences in the way that the teams were managed to develop group cohesiveness and commitment, and in the social relations within and between groups. The assembly line team stood out as an extreme example of the management of group processes to encourage commitment to performance targets. Gronning’s (1992) research at Toyota in Japan and Nummi in the USA identified five aspects of team organisation which were closely linked to other plant institutions, including HRM. These included standardisation, capability
at the group/team level, team capability to improve and respond and bring up younger, more experienced workers, minimum manpower levels and peer pressure. These aspects were also clearly intended by the Japanese managers across the brownfield and greenfield sites. The extent to which they were achieved, however, did vary and supports the argument that contextual factors influenced the extent to which management systems can be implemented, how they can be implemented, and their outcomes. This builds on the work of Delbridge et al. (1997), which showed variation in the structure of teams within a lean production environment according to the specific local context in which they were introduced, including the industrial relations system, labour markets and predispositions of employees and managers (Thompson and Wallace, 1996). There were significant differences across lines in the way that the teams were managed and the extent to which team leaders attempted social control through facilitating group processes and dynamics, such as, for example, ‘‘team spirit’’ and the notion of ‘‘letting the team down’’. Team meetings were an important component of the development of a sense of ‘‘team’’ and team responsibility for performance improvements, but the frequency and nature of team meetings did vary across the lines studied. The assembly line had the most systematic approach to team meetings with meetings at the beginning of work every day. In these meetings team members were encouraged to see themselves as part of the assembly line team to which they had a responsibility, both to other team members, and in helping the team perform well and set an example to other shopfloor teams. This contrasted with the process line, where team meetings were not used to foster a sense of team responsibility. Thus team meetings were arranged differently across sections and also served different objectives, varying in the extent to which they were used systematically to develop a sense of shared values and commitment to continuous improvement. On the assembly line, the team meetings were most clearly a central element in managerial control on the line in which individual performance records were monitored daily and workers who were making faults were clearly recognised in the meeting. The team leader or supervisor running the meeting would seek to develop a sense of responsibility among workers for improving the performance of the team and the atmosphere was very much one of seeking improvement and reducing faults through a ‘‘positive attitude’’, concentration and trying harder. An important factor that enabled this process to take place was the orientation of the workers on the assembly line, comparatively inexperienced in traditional UK unionised shopfloor environments and openminded to some extent to new work practices. This contrasted with the process line where the tone of the meetings was more ritualistic and often little was said. The workers on the process line, including the team leaders, appeared more cynical of the company philosophy of kaizen and commitment to improvement. Team meetings held by the team leaders expressed little in the way of developing a sense of team responsibility and responsibility of the individual to the team. The meetings appeared less formal and critical. The orientation of the workers
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across the two sections studied was very different and the tone of the team meetings reflected this. On the process line the workers who were used to traditional UK work practices remained cynical and removed from any attempts to foster new shared values and ways of working together. Therefore workers’ orientation, and the team leaders’ commitment to changing attitudes and shaping the team work culture, varied across sections. The assembly line provided the most systematic example of a team leader actively seeking to shape culture on the line, and of workers who appeared to have fewer preconceptions of how shopfloor work should be managed. The use of team meetings to develop a sense of team and social control through the team differed across sections and was partly a function of the commitment of the team leader to developing improved performance in this way and the orientation of the workers who were more or less responsive. This is an important point, which moves beyond the ‘‘black box’’ presented in much research on shopfloor social processes surrounding the implementation of ‘‘teamwork’’ and highlights the important role and ability needed by the team leader in managing the introduction and development of a team-based work organisation. Managing social interaction and team cohesiveness An important element of the team dynamics on the assembly line was the way in which social interaction amongst workers on the line was channelled into intra-team communications on an informal as well as a formal level. The arrangement of the hot corners, the planned tea-breaks and the nature of the work, all facilitated workers on the line mixing with one another rather than with workers from other lines. This encouraged the sense of team cohesiveness and an ‘‘us and them’’ feeling by many workers. This focused social interaction on the assembly line was not replicated on any of the other lines studied. For example, the process line work group studied had joint team meetings with the two other teams on the line. Second, workers on the process line took their teabreaks as individuals (workers would go to take their own drinks from the drinks-dispenser rather than contribute money towards drinks being brought for everyone, as was the case on the assembly line) and third, workers were more able to talk to other workers down the line in other teams both for their work and also informally. Hot corners (rest areas) were present across all sections of both factories. Communication of information took place on hot corner walls including performance control charts and company news. Thus hot corners took on an important role in being a focus for communication with workers across all sections. The extent to which the hot corners enhanced managerial control was influenced by the team leader and section leader/supervisor and the expectations of more senior people including the production directors and managers. The assembly line hot corner was systematically used as a means of developing a sense of ‘’team’’ and commitment to shared objectives. The hot corner processes, including daily team meetings, updating of performance
charts on the hot corner walls, cleaning rotas and drinks rotas, facilitated a sense of team identity and an isolation of the group from other groups on the shopfloor, thus further increasing the sense of team cohesiveness. The findings expand on the work of Oliver and Davies (1990), Graham (1993) and Delbridge (1995, 1998) on the harnessing of peer pressure and the existence of inter-group conflicts in JIT/TQM systems, by looking at the features of the socio-technical system and context which influence the managerial control system processes and outcomes. The features of the assembly line technology, with high task interdependencies, high social interaction and little slack, were intensified in the JIT/TQM system, providing a comparatively more conducive context for the implementation of social controls, including team cohesiveness and peer pressure than the stand-alone work stations. The research found that workers on the assembly line often worked around the expected behaviours in utilising the control technology, leading to unanticipated consequences. For example, the turning-on of the red andon on the line was sometimes used as a way of expressing antagonism against another worker who was in a different clique. Workers would also try and protect their friends down-line by helping them out, so as to avoid turning on the red light. This became more frequent when an attempt was made by the supervisor to link the andon calling system to the monitoring of faults in the QA network. Here a worker was expected to signal a fault through a yellow light, which would then be recorded in the faults book against the person who had made the fault. There were examples of workers helping others out, so as not to have faults recorded, also of workers not hesitating to report a fault by someone in a different clique. The andon system was manipulated by the workers to some extent, in enabling them to ‘‘get by’’ and avoid criticism by management and also to express their antagonism at other workers. Occasionally the andon system was used by a worker in the assembly team to express resistance, for example, as a form of protest against difficult work or poor parts. This highlights how the impact of control systems on shopfloor practices will be mediated by the context in which they are implemented, including the orientation of the workers involved, their need to keep their job and their relations with other workers, the work organisation and social relations around the work. The importance of the particular context is highlighted by comparing the use and outcomes from the andon system by the assembly team with those by the process team. On the process line the andon system had been set up down all the line. In the first process team where the author worked the andon switches were located by each major process but workers tended to walk over to the team leader or supervisor rather than use the andon system. On the core assembly process, for example, workers tended not to use the andon system. If they had problems they could easily stop and walk over to the team leader, unless he was not in sight. The assembly line technology, however, on the assembly line allowed less slack and freedom of movement for the workers and an increased use of the andon system to avoid or reduce time lost from stoppages. For the assembly
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line team the andon served to highlight which worker was having a problem and increased the visibility of workers who were under-performing. On core assembly, the stoppage of work by a worker for five or ten minutes, e.g. before the lunch-break, often took place among the quicker workers, with workers being able to catch up and still make an acceptable output level for the day. This illustrates the comparative autonomy of the workers on the process core assembly compared with the assembly line and the way that workers’ interaction and experience with the andon system are influenced by this contextual difference. Inspection of work by co-workers and reporting of co-worker faults The assembly line team worked with a multifaceted control system including a QA network, in which workers were expected to systematically check the work of the person before them on the line and report any defects. The QA network system sometimes led to an unintended consequence of increased co-operation between workers to help one another out, by correcting faults and not reporting them. Another unintended consequence of the QA network was that workers sometimes reported faults of those with whom they did not get along so well. This led to antagonisms on the line and the emergence of conflict between subcultures. Thus social normative controls had developed in the assembly team that encouraged workers to report the faults of their co-workers, which would be considered as a shortfall in performance. In the process team, reporting of faults of co-workers was not formalised. There was much less pressure on the workers to reduce faults. Individuals’ faults were not systematically monitored, and workers saw faults less as a serious mistake and shortfall in performance (as was the case on the assembly line) than as a tedious requirement for repair. A significant contrast therefore exists in control processes between the assembly team with the presence of formal social control through peer inspection and the QA network, and the near absence of formal social control that existed on the other sections studied. The assembly line technology intensified the peer control system, providing immediate feedback to the worker, although this was mediated to some extent by the specific contingencies of the situation, which included the orientation of the workers and the team leaders on the line together with the production demands. Team-focused responsibilities on the process line were less than on the assembly line. There was no hot corner cleaning rota or collection of money from the team members for coffee at break-time. Workers acted as associate representatives in the meetings but they did not really liaise with the others in the section or team. They had responsibility for checking their own work and cleaning their own workstation. They also completed individual output charts and process control charts. In this sense the individual workers were all involved in controlling the quality and output from their own workstation. There was a clear attempt across both the greenfield and brownfield sites, influenced by the Japanese parent, to build control into the production process.
This was reflected in the control charts and process charts required across all sites and sections. However, the way that this translated across sections was influenced by the technology, work organisation and orientation of the workers and shopfloor leaders. While, on the assembly line, control was effectively built into the job through training, monitoring and social control including identification of workers ‘‘letting the team down’’, on other sections such as the process line pressure to reduce scrap was not so intense, although workers who did perform below quality or output requirements would receive a warning. On the process line therefore control was achieved more by formal disciplinary procedures than by the use of concertive control through informal social or peer pressure (Barker, 1993). The work organisation and technology, together with the technical control systems described above, shaped the context and possibilities for social interaction on the lines including social control systems and outcomes on the lines. Social control systems on the lines were themselves embedded in the broader organisational climate and supported by the HRM practices discussed earlier. The assembly line team provided an example of attempts to increase formal worker solidarity including group cohesion, mutual defence, group discipline, clear group boundaries and clear formal leadership through the hierarchy (Hodson, 1996). Group processes have been shaped and managed through managerial practices that have sought to focus the teams’ processes on supporting the organisational values and objectives (Barker, 1993). The analysis also indicated that, even under the most highly controlled work environment such as the assembly line studied, there were examples of work group solidarity towards the organisational objectives being weakened by subgroup conflict. While the assembly line team provided the clearest example of a system of managerial control that encouraged worker compliance, the research illustrates how workers still engaged in forms of resistance. While the nature of resistance is less overt and direct than has traditionally been associated with shopfloor worker-manager relations in unionised UK factories of the 1970s, resistance is still present (Thompson and Ackroyd, 1995) but needs to be understood in the context in which it is acted out. Conclusion This paper has drawn on a comparative ethnographic study of management practices and shopfloor processes across two sites of a Japanese subsidiary in the UK. Much research on Japanese investment in the West has focused on identifying ‘‘packages’’ of practices that are transferred from the parent organisation to the subsidiary. Much less attention has been given to how practices are actually translated and implemented across different contexts and the influence of contingent factors on shaping shopfloor practices and outcomes.
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This paper has sought to provide a brief overview of some of the contextual and contingent factors that significantly shaped how management practices were introduced and their outcomes within one organisation. In this way the research builds on the work of Boyer (1998) by providing a detailed case study of how intentions to diffuse management practices, including teamworking, in practice followed a process of planned but often unplanned hybridisation, as the constraints and opportunities of the local context were manifest. The difference in the local labour markets across the two sites of the organisation was an important factor in influencing the orientation to work of the employees and the extent to which new work practices and management systems could be implemented. The greenfield site, located in an area of high foreign direct investment, low trade union presence and large supply of comparatively inexperienced labour, provided an opportunity to introduce practices that met with more resistance on the brownfield site. The difference in orientation and expectations of the managers and directors across the two sites also influenced how management practices were shaped and translated into shopfloor practices. On the brownfield site the heterogeneous board produced inconsistencies in management practices at shopfloor level and were less consistent in the management of shopfloor culture. The paper has summarised how HRM strategies in recruitment, selection, training and appraisal were particularly powerful and consistent in shaping the organisational culture on the greenfield site. On the brownfield site the legacy of custom and practice with an established workforce restricted the use and influence of such strategies. The research builds on the work of Doorewaard et al. (1999) through providing empirical support for the human resource-based view, emphasising the connection between HRM practices and teamworking outcomes. Focusing on two work teams at the same site, the paper has analysed how shopfloor culture was intentionally shaped by management and how this process was significantly influenced across sections of the shopfloor by the technology, work organisation, job design and sociotechnical system within which the team worked. Findings were that on the assembly line the high co-operation, dependency and communication between workers, that were demanded by the production and technical control system, provided a climate for the development of a sense of ‘‘team’’ and unitary goals, as part of the social means of control on the line, which was not reproduced in the manufacturing process team studied. The latter team had lower task interdependencies and lower demands for communication and co-operation between members. The work organisation and technology, together with the technical control systems, set the climate for social interaction on the lines. The social controls on the lines were themselves embedded in the broader organisational climate which was shaped by HRM practices. The paper presented a comparative analysis of the management of two teams on the shopfloor to highlight how social control was managed differently and with what outcomes across the two teams.
Implications for future research The research findings provide a contribution to the literature on the management of change in organisations and the transfer of management practices, including forms of teamworking across contexts. Findings stress the need to study management practices in their social context and to examine the role of contingent factors including the technology, socio-technical system, work organisation and orientation of employees in studying how management control systems are implemented and their outcomes, including the social or normative controls as well as the technical controls that develop within different work teams. Comparative ethnographic studies provide a means to access such processes. References Barker, J.R. (1993), ‘‘Tightening the iron cage: concertive control in self-managing teams’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 38, pp. 408-37. Boyer, R. (1998), ‘‘Hybridization and models of production: geography, history and theory’’, in Boyer, R., Charron, E., Jurgens, U. and Tolliday, S. (Eds), Between Imitation and Innovation: The Transfer and Hybridization of Production Models in the International Automobile Industry, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Cutcher-Gershenfeld, J., Nitta, M., Barrett, B., Belhedi, N., Bullard, J., Coutchie, C., Inabe, T., Ishino, I., Lee, S., Lin, W., Mothersell, W., Rabine, S., Ramanand, S., Strolle, M. and Wheaton, A. (1994), ‘‘Japanese team-based work systems in North America: explaining the diversity’’, California Management Review, Vol. 37 No. 1, pp. 42-64. Delbridge, R. (1995), ‘‘Surviving JIT: control and resistance in a Japanese transplant’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 32 No. 6, pp. 803-17. Delbridge, R. (1998), Life on the Line in Contemporary Manufacturing: The Workplace Experience of Lean Production and the ‘‘Japanese Model’’, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Delbridge, R., Lowe, J. and Oliver, N. (1997), ‘‘Brave new world? Evidence of multiskilling, worker autonomy and teamworking in the world automotive components industry’’, paper presented at the 15th Annual Labour Process Conference, Edinburgh, March. Doorewaard, H., van Hootegem, G. and Huys, R. (1999), ‘‘The impact of team responsibility structures on team performance and organization performance’’, paper presented at the 3rd International Workshop on Teamworking, School of Management, Royal Holloway University of London, London, September. Graham, L. (1993), ‘‘Inside a Japanese transplant: a critical perspective’’, Work and Occupations, Vol. 20 No. 2, pp. 147-73. Gronning, T. (1992), ‘‘Human value and competitiveness: on the social organisation of production at Toyota Motor Corporation and New United Motor Manufacturing Inc.’’, PhD dissertation, Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto. Hodson, R. (1996), ‘‘Dignity in the workplace under participative management: alienation and freedom revisited’’, American Sociological Review, Vol. 61, October, pp. 719-38. Jurgens, U. (1993), ‘‘National and company differences in organizing production work in the car industry’’, in Kogut, B. (Ed.), Country Competition: Technology and the Organizing of Work, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Jurgens, U. (1995), ‘‘Group work and the perception of Uddevalla in the German car industry’’, in Sandberg, A. (Ed.), Enriching Production: Perspectives on Volvo’s Uddevalla plant as an Alternative to Lean Production, Avebury, Aldershot.
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Mueller, F. (1994), ‘‘Teams between hierarchy and commitment: change strategies and the internal environment’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 31 No. 3, pp. 383-403. Oliver, N. and Davies, D. (1990), ‘‘Adopting Japanese-style manufacturing methods: a tale of two (UK) factories’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 27 No. 5, pp. 555-70. Pruijt, H. (1999), ‘‘Teams between neo-Taylorism and anti-Taylorism’’, paper presented at the 3rd International Workshop on Teamworking, School of Management, Royal Holloway University of London, September. Scott, A. (1994), Willing Slaves: British Workers under Human Resource Management, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Sharpe, D.R. (1996), ‘‘Managerial control strategies and sub-cultural processes: on the shopfloor in a Japanese manufacturing organisation in the UK’’, in Sackmann, S. (Ed.), Cultural Complexity in Organizations, Sage, London. Sharpe, D.R. (1998), ‘‘Shopfloor practices under changing forms of managerial control: a comparative ethnographic study’’, PhD thesis, Manchester Business School, Manchester. Thompson, P. and Ackroyd, S. (1995), ‘‘All quiet on the workplace front? A critique of recent trends in British industrial sociology’’, Sociology, Vol. 29 No 4, pp. 634-51. Thompson, P. and Wallace, T. (1996), ‘‘Redesigning production through teamworking: case studies from the Volvo Truck Corporation’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 16 No. 2, pp. 103-16.
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Gender, emotional labour and teamworking in a call centre
Teamworking in a call centre
Kate Mulholland Sociology Department, Queen’s University of Belfast, Belfast, UK
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Keywords Teamwork, Management control, Gender, Participation, Resistance Abstract This article examines teamworking in a call centre and how this is shaped for the employees by an increase in technical control, the dynamics of emotional labour and gender politics. The research is based on a case study of call centre work organisation in different sectors, and this paper draws specifically on ethnographic research on two teams and their managers in broadcasting. Drawing on theoretical insights, it suggests that teamworking results in a fundamental contradiction involving a ‘‘soft’’ discourse versus a regime of increasing managerial control. Participation is measured against Thompson and Wallace’s three-dimensional notion of participation, showing that employees have little discretion over the way work is organised. The normative aspect of team organisation accommodates managerial coping strategies in conditions of staff shortage via numerical flexibility. However, management’s efforts to disguise control are resisted by employees who transform workplace discourses into an oppositional politics, shattering the illusion of unity promoted by the pundits of team organisation.
Introduction The debate about team working has largely been about manual workers within the manufacturing sector. Underpinned by a concern about the impact of organisational change, McCabe’s (2000) study of the adaptation of team working amongst manual workers and Findlay et al.’s (2000) examination of team flexibility and efficiency in the distilleries are examples of this trend. It is only recently that this work paradigm has been introduced into the service industries, a sector that appears to be markedly different from manufacturing in terms of the labour process and products. However, Lloyd and Newell (2000) have examined the introduction of team organisation among sales personnel in the pharmaceutical industry and, while they call for greater scope in the analysis of team working, they question whether this form of work design is appropriate in other sectors. In their study of two call centres Kinnie et al. (2000) argue that they are managed by a hybrid of tight control and high commitment management, which includes teamworking alongside other features such as low value incentives. While they assert that characteristics of high commitment management system such as teamworking are compatible with low task discretion, they say very little about the practice of teamworking in the context of such tight control. The author wishes to thank the journal’s referees for their helpful suggestions for this paper. Her gratitude also goes to Per Sederblad, Antony Lindgren, Caroline Lloyd and Pauline Prior for their encouraging comments on earlier drafts. She also wishes to thank the participants at the 3rd International Workshop on Teamworking for their comments, and the Department of Sociology, Queen’s University, for providing the time for her to conduct the research for this project. She is also very indebted to all those who participated in the project.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 283-303. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486 DOI 10.1108/00483480210422714
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The aims of this paper are to examine the practice of teamworking in a nonunionised and newly established business, namely a call centre, and to explore how this is shaped by an increase in technical control, the dynamics of emotional labour (Hochschild, 1983), and gender politics. The paper will argue that team organisation is overlaid on other features of work organisation, reminiscent of lean production, that result in a paradox for employee involvement. To illustrate this contradiction, the paper will show that increases in automation reduce employee discretion, while numerical flexibility and the stress on productivity are at odds with the need for knowledge sharing and meaningful communication among members, thus compromising the effectiveness of team organisation. In developing this argument a further section will provide an illustration of the extension of technical control and the implications this has for team organisation. The next two sections will examine teamworking for the day and night shifts. It will be suggested that teamworking organised within the boundaries of standardised operating procedures gives rise to a set of contradictions where there is a constant tension between the demand for quality and for productivity. The relationship between gender power and teamworking will be examined in the final section. Before going on to do this, it is important to say how the labour process debate contributes to this discussion. Theoretical overview Theoretically the paper draws on insights from recent debates on teamworking (Proctor and Mueller, 2000), labour process theory (Edwards, 1979; Friedman, 1977; Parker, 1999), emotional labour (Hochschild, 1983; Bolton, 2000), and gender power (Collinson and Hearn, 1996; Hearn, 1998). The recent edited collection on teamworking by Proctor and Mueller (2000) raises several issues central to understanding the organisation of teamworking in the call centre labour process. These include the logic of work design based on the notion of a team, strategic intent, employee performance, productivity, and an ideology that places unity over conflict. Although Benders and Van Hootegem (2000) suggest that the current wave stems from two distinct traditions, sociotechnical theory and the Japanese managerial model, arguably they are both underpinned by the same managerial logic, that is a concern with productivity and employee performance. The issue of employee involvement is a central feature of team organisation and is defined by Marchington (2000) in the context of a ‘‘teamworking matrix’’. Thompson and Wallace (1996) also address the question of the form of employee involvement. They argue that technical, governance and normative considerations formulate employee roles within teams. While recognising that the issue of conflict is the point of departure, the debate about worker involvement is consonant with Edward’s (1979) periodisation of managerial control, when shifts in patterns of control from direct to bureaucratic control may indicate different levels of worker involvement. Based on strategic choice, Friedman’s (1977) notion of direct control versus responsible autonomy is another illustration of the contingent
and variable nature of worker involvement. The importance of labour process Teamworking in theory for this issue is that it will explicate the ways in which control remains a a call centre key managerial strategy in defining employee participation within teams. Other important insights are offered by Procter and Mueller (2000), who argue that the current wave represents a shift of emphasis from the operational and social aspects of work to more strategic concerns such as efficiency and 285 white-collar productivity. In exploring these issues, it will be suggested that, parallel with considerations for efficiency, teamworking in call centres rather endorses the centrality of operational and social dimensions of team organisation in the provision of a quality service delivery. However, this brings to the surface the irresolvable tension between the goals of white-collar productivity and the need for quality in service and this point is illustrated by drawing on the lean production paradigm (Delbridge et al., 1992). Insights from the debate on emotional labour (Hochschild, 1983; Bolton, 2000) are also drawn on to convey the sense in which the call centre enterprise harnesses the less tangible capacities of human labour in the context of team organisation in search of competitive advantage. Accordingly, the term ‘‘emotional labour’’ refers to the management of human feeling during the execution of the labour process. First, defined as ‘‘feelings management’’ it is performed as part of paid work. Second, it is undertaken during the commercial interaction involving a direct encounter between employees and customers and between the producers and the market. The product of emotional labour is the state of mind and the feelings of the customer. In practice this means that the employee must persuade the customer to love the product and the enterprise (Bolton, 2000). The third aspect of emotional labour entails the management of employees’ own feelings as defined by enterprise needs, when they become the business ambassadors of their companies, magnifying the importance of performance during the employee/customer interaction. Bolton’s (2000) elaboration of emotional labour into four categories: the pecuniary, the prescriptive, the presentational, and the philanthropic, will be selectively drawn upon to suggest that the effectiveness of team organisation necessarily depends on whether employees have the autonomy to articulate their range of skill (cultural capital – Bourdieu and Passeron, 1990) within the team. Insights will also be drawn from Hearn’s (1998) work, which highlights the complexity and ambiguity of gender divisions and the patriarchal and class nature of organisational power (Hearn, 2000). Collinson and Hearn’s (1994) argument about the dominance of masculine discourse and the ways in which such discourse perpetuates men as decision makers within managerial hierarchies (Collinson and Hearn, 1996) is insightful in explaining the persistence of male domination in a labour process that is historically defined as women’s work (Belt, 2000). The notion of gender subtext (Benschop and Doorewaard, 1998) or hegemonic gender regulation will also be drawn on to explore the configuration of management hierarchy, the dynamics of the team politics and how these shape the articulation of emotional labour during customer/employee interactions.
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Parker’s (1999) recent attempt at reconciling the division surrounding the dualism characteristic of labour process theory and Spencer’s (2000) concern for the neglect of value theory raise important questions for labour process theorists. Acknowledging Parker’s (1999) concern with the limitations of labour process theory, the author still thinks that concepts such as class, agency, power and resistance provide valuable insights into illustrating the persistence of the dualism that characterises the contemporary call centre labour process. The study The research for this project is based on case studies from three business sectors: broadcasting, the financial services, and telecommunications. The companies chosen were interesting, because they had very different employment reputations and served different markets. The first one took incoming calls from listeners and viewers, while financial services and telecommunications processed incoming and outgoing calls. However, this paper specifically draws on data from one of these companies, the broadcasting business (Info Co.). In providing a 24-hour service it was an opportunity to see how team working operates under different pressures. This made it possible to make comparisons between the teams. Consonant with Bolton’s (2000) typologies, it will be suggested that variations in work volumes have a defining impact on the articulation of emotional labour. The research for this paper was conducted during July and December 1999. Management at Info Co. was very supportive of the project and gave generous access, allowing periods of observation on different shifts including night work in July and August. There was open access to the employees, making it possible to observe formal work procedures, to listen at first hand to the agents taking calls, and to see under varying conditions how agents handled the work process. The friendly environment made it possible to chat informally to the agents during intervals between calls and during breaks. This was followed by formal interviews, where employees were interviewed outside the operations room. Encouraging an interactive approach and free from the management gaze, 20 randomly selected female and male employees from the different shifts were interviewed using open-ended questions. Managers were also interviewed. All the interviews were taped and later transcribed. The name of the company and the employees’ names have been changed to protect their identities. Attendance at team briefings, management meetings and training sessions provided another perspective on management style. This triangulation (Denzin, 1978) or multiple strategies made it possible to compare different versions of issues, while highlighting the tensions between management and employees. These methods proved to be a rich data source and revealed employee discontent over the extension of technical control, feelings of powerlessness and concerns over the lack of trade union representation. The analysis of the data has been influenced by grounded theory (Glazer and Strauss, 1967), where the emphasis is on emergent themes and on agency ‘‘allowing the data to speak’’, which are then made sense of via the theoretical insights discussed above.
The re-organisation of information services: the call centre labour Teamworking in process a call centre In order to contextualise (Marchington, 2000) the organisation of teamworking, it is important to comment on the logic of other features of the labour process. As part of a restructuring programme, a large national broadcasting company has contracted-out its information services to a management services enterprise that 287 specialises in call centre services. An interview with the plant manager suggests that the re-organisation of information services stems from the need to reduce operational costs, to improve competitiveness and to innovate. For instance, underpinned by an emphasis on control, the operational aspects of work design in call centres resemble the production paradigm in a number of ways. Technical control (Edwards, 1979), the fragmentation (Taylor, F.W. 1911; Braverman, 1974) of emotional labour (Hochschild, 1983), and new forms of direct control that combine first line supervision (Friedman, 1977; Edwards, 1979) with new technologies influence the design of call centre jobs. First, the principle of the flow line means that employee leverage to regulate the pace of work is mediated by their ingenuity to eschew this variant of technical control, raising the question about the scope for worker autonomy, a key feature of teamworking. Second, the fragmentation of call-handling time, when the telephone interaction between the agent and the customer is divided into ‘‘talk, wrap and idle time’’ (Mulholland, 1999, 2001), is suggestive of task individualisation and specialisation (Taylor, F.W. 1911; Braverman, 1974). Finally, similarity characterises the agents’ tasks; when harnessed to the instruments of labour, a headphone, a mouthpiece, a computer screen, information directories and on team consultation, which is contingent on work volumes, they process calls, suggesting a tendency towards the re-composition of jobs via homogenisation (Clarke, 1990). Appearing genderneutral, such Tayloristic job models are designed for the ideal worker (Benschop and Doorewaard, 1998), raising the question of whether gender power plays any role for team members. Performance is individually- and team-based, and the appearance of updated productivity statistics on a large screen facing the agents is a sharp reminder of the importance of productivity. These features raise key questions about how this structure – which essentially standardises operating procedures accommodating team organisation – will affect the operational logic of team working, and how issues of quality can be balanced against concerns for productivity. Selection, recruitment and agent profile Paradoxically interviews with managers show that quality service is dependent on particular personality types and the ability to act as a ‘‘team player’’, considerations which strongly feature in the selection and recruitment of agents. This means fitting into the group and demonstrating a willingness to share knowledge and time in problem solving. This requires a repertoire of social skills (Hochschild, 1983) and cultural capital (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1990) that the agents bring with them to the workplace. Geary’s (1994) notion of the young worker is an apt depiction of the typical calling agent at Info Co.,
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who is in her or his early 20s and likely to be a graduate, perhaps with a postgraduate degree, and is increasingly unionised (Taylor and Bain, 1999). It is not coincidental that there is a correspondence between high unemployment and call centre growth. In this case, the lack of career opportunities accounts for the high educational attainment and the disproportionate number of young men amongst the agents, who constitute one-third of the workers. The company’s success in recruiting such high calibre agents also stems from its close connection with the client, and the career aspirations of the agents, who in tight labour market conditions see a job in the call centre as a stepping-stone to improved career opportunities with the client business. Perfunctory knowledge is a necessary component of the emotional labour of an agent, and at the start of employment each agent receives a month’s training to this end. This includes insights into work organisation, the character of the business and how to source routine information. To keep abreast of the changing nature of necessary information, agents are required to study scheduling publications and to soak up diligently the regular barrage of information communicated through management briefings and e-mail. The research reported in this paper suggests that this information is limited and that a quality service depends on the agents’ cultural capital and is most effectively exploited in a team-working environment. Further sections of this paper will explore the relationship between the agents’ education/knowledge or cultural capital and teamworking and will highlight how this relationship is mediated by gender relations and a Tayloristic job design. Management and gendered hierarchies In gender terms managerial power at Info Co. is male-dominated (Collinson and Hearn, 1994, 1996). The plant manager is a man and the engineers are all men, suggesting the masculine character of technical knowledge and executive power. Reflecting this, the operational managers, such as acting team leaders, team leaders and co-ordinators, are all women, a finding consistent with Martin et al.’s (1998) study of Body Shop. They manage mixed teams of 12 men and women, who work alongside one another in similar jobs. Drawing on the notion of gender subtext (Benschop and Doorewaard, 1998), further sections will explore the ways in which the dynamics of gender power is played out between managers and agents and among the team members. Team briefing, productivity and teamworking Reflecting features of the Japanese model, gendered team working at Info Co. occurs normatively (Thompson and Wallace, 1996) at company level (Benders and Van Hootegem, 2000), when productivity discourse attempts to incorporate team members into the enterprise. At a second level teams are also organised around tasks such as operating the telephones, e-mail and letter correspondence. In terms of Thompson and Wallace’s (1996) notion of team governance, the research shows that team members have no influence over the setting of productivity targets, nor over the selection of line management. Consonant with
Wilkinson’s (1998) study, senior management select acting team leaders and Teamworking in team leaders. The prominence of the team leaders is exemplified at the pre- and a call centre post-shift briefings, which are the institutionalised channel in which line management convey corporate expectations to team members. This regular assembly is compulsory for all the agents, and the observations at meetings show that flows of information are virtually one-way, spiralling down from 289 management to the team. Moreover, the productivity issue magnifies the importance of line management in the contemporary call centre team. Triangulated data collection methods reveal the contradiction in the style of team governance. The hard and quantitative feature of the style is exemplified by the stress on productivity. In this respect, new information systems rather widen the scope for direct control, by providing team leaders with a detailed breakdown of individual member performance in addition to team output. This and the ongoing monitoring of performance is at odds with the ‘‘soft’’ discourse of ‘‘caring’’, which signals a more negotiated production politics and is suggestive of such writers as Kinnie et al. (2000) and Frenkel et al. (1998). Indeed the need for direct control is enhanced by a further contradiction. Line managers struggle to reconcile the need to balance quality standards in service with productivity. Produced and consumed simultaneously, quality is difficult to define, although, from a management perspective, quality appears to be measured by the speed with which customer queries are answered. By contrast, interviews with agents and observations of the labour process suggest that the variety of incoming queries calls for agent discretion and collective problem solving, and would be better accommodated by more leverage in the span of call-handling time. However, as the next section illustrates, changes in the work design is geared towards increasing rigidity. This entails the integration of the computer and the telephone and is an extension of technical control. ‘‘Naming and shaming’’, ‘‘pilot’’ and technical control This section looks at the implications of integrating the computer with the telephone for team members. While the research was under way at Info Co., there was some technical change in the labour process. Technical control (Edwards, 1979) and thus direct control (Friedman, 1977) were extended with the integration of the telephone and the computer. On exploring this event with management, they argued that it would improve productivity: From this month we don’t want the ‘‘Talk Time’’ to be much over 2.2 minutes. ‘‘Pilot’’ will help us do that. We don’t want it to be any less; otherwise customer satisfaction will suffer (Unit Manager, Day Shift, August 1999).
Suggesting a low trust relationship between workers and managers, the assumption is that average call-handling time can be further reduced. Ironically, the interviews with the agents show that, as is usual with many management initiatives, it has some unintended consequences: If there are several people in the queue and I have to take a particularly ‘‘bad call’’ like just now on the complaints side. I have had to fill in that description box, which takes 40 seconds,
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I could have done that, while taking details of the next call. You can do two things at once. You can still be working on this particular contact while taking the next call without that affecting anything. You can be ‘‘wrapping up’’ and ‘‘starting off’’. It takes about fifteen seconds to work out what the caller wants anyway. ‘‘Pilot’’ puts an end to that (Agent G., Info C., August 1999).
This shows that ‘‘Pilot’’ is double-edged. While increased automation has eroded the agent’s limited discretion over the pace of work, by slowing down the work process it has paradoxical results for management. Task fragmentation enables more experienced agents to combine ‘‘talk’’ and ‘‘wrap’’ time, as they are able to complete one call, while starting the next one. The advantage of the old system to management is that alongside productivity discourse it encourages the agents to engage in work intensification, because the absence of externally controlled pacing allows calls to be overlapped. This limited discretion over the management of tasks helped the agents to improve productivity. Such technical change also shifted the control over the transfer of calls from agents to management: It prevents you from transferring calls. More often than not the transfer facility will bring the system down which means that you have to wait for the whole system to reconfigure before you can activate the calls. You then have to activate the next call which takes time and that is not just bad for us as time is lost, it is also bad for the organisation especially when there is a queue (Agent Winston, Info Co., August 1999).
In addition to slowing down the pace of work the integrated system introduced new operational problems, which cause breakdowns, considerable delay, frustration and stress for the agents. For instance: If I want to transfer somebody I have to justify what I am doing every second of the way and it just makes the whole thing time consuming. Instead of just punching a number and transferring I have to call up the directory. I have a choice of searching for an extension or keying it in and it is actually quite slow using a mouse to click in a number instead of typing it in with all the fingers. It slows me down. Definitely (Agent Jane, Day Shift Info Co.. August 1999).
Such delays have implications for the quality of service, because they increase the waiting time for the caller and lengthen the queue of waiting calls. Although it is beyond their control, the agents feel that callers are made to wait unnecessarily: I find it quite awkward especially if somebody is impatient to be put through, or even if they are not, and they have a reason to be put through to somebody. I feel awkward that I’m putting them ‘‘On Hold’’ and they are sitting there for a minute. And in addition, it is negatively affecting my statistics (Agent Dilly, Day Shift, Info Co August, 1999).
This suggests that, although the minimisation of waiting time ties in with productivity, consonant with Lankshear et al.’s (2000) study of a holiday bureau, the concern is also for the customer, and the need to defray negative experience. The prescriptive effect of the change to the labour process compromises the agent’s discretion in the management of the encounter and, corresponding with Bolton’s (2000) presentational typology of emotional labour, provides the minimum standard of service. Questioning the managerial logic of ‘‘Pilot’’, the agents argue that the imperative of management control is at the heart of the more integrated system:
I think the fact that it integrates the phone and the computer means they know exactly what we are doing. That will give them a very detailed analysis of our statistics and that is what they are looking for. It doesn’t help me (Agent Emma, Info Co., August 1999).
Team members see this measure as an increase in management control that adversely affects their overall output. These examples suggest that agents want to be able to control the pace of work in order to meet productivity targets and to use discretion over how they manage commercial encounters. The foregoing discussion is indicative of some of the problems with ‘‘Pilot’’ and it should not be surprising that the agents resist it by avoiding to use it. The management of such opposition provides an insightful perspective on management style at Info Co. By linking ‘‘Pilot’’ with productivity, pay and the six-monthly bonus payments, the interviews show that management draws on tangible and coercive strategies to enforce the acceptance of the new system. Management’s sense of timing can hardly go unnoticed, because the bonus payment coincides with the introduction of the new system. However, the plant manager announced that the bonus could not be paid, because output had been below agreed productivity targets. Yet, as the data reveal, there are many initial organisational problems with the new call centre, which has been in existence for only six months; therefore patterns of working and output norms have not been established. Nevertheless, management ignore such extenuating circumstances, refuse to pay the bonus and, in an attempt to shift responsibility and blame to the agents, make the payment dependent on the acceptance of ‘‘Pilot’’. Most importantly, observations at the shift briefings show that the agents’ argument that increased automation impedes rather than facilitates their progress is glossed over. Management resolve to impose the new system became more apparent when they brought in a ‘‘troubleshooting’’ manager from Scotland ‘‘to improve training amongst the agents’’. This began with the ‘‘naming and shaming’’ of under-achievers. For instance: Well I feel very low today. It’s not the work really. I don’t mind it. It’s just the way they manage. I usually get on and do it, but I can’t today. I have been feeling bad since Friday. We have no rights here. A . . . wanted time off to go for a hospital appointment and was told she’d have to repay the time. Then at the briefing she [Visiting Training Manager] passed around the statistics and some people’s statistics were low. She shouted and said, ‘‘if they can do it in S . . ., why can’t it be done here.’’ I was mortified for them. It was awful. Surely, they can’t do this to us? (Agent Sophia, Info Co., August 1999).
Clearly such ‘‘training methods’’ are intended to break down the resistance among the agents. By identifying, cracking down on and disgracing low achievers, management hope that team members will come under pressure from their peers. Contrarily, the attack on individual team members heightens the sense of injustice among them, and this fuels the demoralisation of the team collectively, while fostering growing resentment towards management, whose practice is called into question. Such resentment is evident when team members insist on being interviewed and seek advice on workers’ rights and trade unionism. The interviews show that the absence of a trade union does not
Teamworking in a call centre
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signal complicity, a finding that is quite at odds with Leidner’s (1993) portrayal of service workers as compliant and complacent. Elsewhere the issue of agent resistance is explored (Mulholland, 1999, 2001). It is quite clear that this highhanded approach has had the effect of nurturing the beginnings of an oppositional culture amongst the members of day teams. Nevertheless the visiting manager appears blind to this: There was a lot of whinging about Pilot. It does of course have its problems like any new system, but they were using this as an excuse. I passed the statistics around for effect (Visiting Training Manager, August 1999).
While this outside manager resorted to bullying, the response of local management to agent opposition is resonant of human resource management discourse (Legge, 1995) in that they see the problem as one of communication. For instance: We are open and honest. We all work as one big team, a big happy family. Everyone gets developed and their ideas are appreciated. There is no hierarchy. The door is open. We are approachable. You know we want their ideas. The briefings are there on top of this. And I mean Pilot is there to help them (Unit Manager, Info Co., August 1999).
On further probing the reality behind such cosy discourse soon emerges, when first line managers are invited to elaborate the meaning imputed to communication in the particular work setting. Pointing to her monitor, a teamleader spells it out: Here is a list of agents on one side of my computer and it tells me how long a person has been talking, and how long it takes that person to do what we call the write up. This is important because we are a very statistically oriented environment, even though we are about customer services as well. It is hard to get the balance right, and when they are getting the balance right you can see it in the figures. Our manager wants us to reduce the call handling time to 2.5 minutes, and if everyone was getting the balance right all of the time, we’d be hitting that target (Team Leader, Info Co., August 1999).
Covert surveillance is used to identify the mis/management of worker time and it allows the continual exploration and re-assessment of the potential capability of the agents. The logic of such direct control (Friedman, 1977) is that it also enables management to identify the variety of cultural capital expressed in emotional labour with a view to enhancing performance and to reduce call-handling time. This coincides with continuous improvement, a central feature of the lean production paradigm (Garraghan and Stewart, 1992; Rinehart et al., 1997). Even so, the interviews show that management is sceptical that the agents can achieve the targets they set and have questioned those who accrue no complaints but exceed the targets. One of the star performers confirms this point: It has no benefit for us. I make a point of meeting the quotas. It is a personal thing, but it gives them a blow by blow account of how we are doing (Agent Oscar, Day Shift, Info Co., August 1999).
This suggests that the primary management aim is to identify any porosity in working time and to remove opportunities for ‘‘making out’’ (Burawoy, 1979). Through the synchronisation of the computer and telephone the agents lose control over ‘‘wrap time’’, when, instead of using the phone, the number is keyed
into the computer. This makes call-handling time more amenable to managerial Teamworking in scrutiny and the labour process more susceptible to external adjustment. Whilst a call centre it could be argued that such an efficiency measure eliminate any opportunities to make out, it also reduces worker discretion and the scope for interaction among team members, one of the measures of effective team working. Day teams, the Taylorisation of emotional labour This section will focus on two teams, one on the day shift and the second on the night shift, and will explore the implications of labour flexibility. It also explores the ways in which the exchange of knowledge encourages team interdependence. The day team examined is one of several teams involved with operating the phones. There are other functions such as e-mail and letter correspondence, but there is no evidence so far for the rotation of such tasks, which Mueller (1994) argues must occur for teams to exist. However, in terms of the technical (Thompson and Wallace, 1996) dimension, the sharing of knowledge which implicitly is gendered means that, contingent on the volume and character of information queries, there is team interdependence. The significance of the technical dimension is also evident in the manner in which numerical flexibility is accommodated through the standardisation of tasks: Really it is a team effort. I mean they pull together. You get agents swapping shifts. This is good for us (Unit Manager, Info Co., August 1999).
In the conditions of a chronic labour deficit, teamworking normalises numerical flexibility, when team members cover points of acute shortage by working flexibly across the staggered day shifts that cover a 12-hour period. Numerical flexibility in the context of a lean production model (Parker and Slaughter, 1988; Delbridge et al., 1992) accommodates the peaks and troughs in work volume that pertain at Info Co. For instance, at the time of the research, the particular day team operated with a deficit of seven full-time workers, a finding that has resonance with O’Reilly’s (1992) findings. One of the key concerns for line management is how to cope routinely with such labour shortage: It means every day you come in and you do a brief with your team and you gear your management approach to the problems on hand. The two big issues are the level of expected calls and the number of full-time workers on the floor. If you are two or three down it is my job to manage that at the terminal, where I can see where everybody is logged on. At the moment we are short and have some people training who are waiting to come on board. Basically one of the management team is watching all the time, and if somebody is talking for 4 minutes, well there is a problem, and we would listen remotely (Team Co-ordinator, Info Co., August 1999).
Shortage becomes all the more pertinent when the volume of calls builds up; it is then that the pressure for speed-up arises. The flexible use of labour through the regularisation of overtime and the pacing of work provides management with other mechanisms for coping in such critical times. For the team members stress and anxiety become a residual feature of the work experience:
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It gives you no headspace to be frank. You are very, very, very busy trying to meet service level [targets]. This is what makes it quite stressful because each of us takes on responsibility to meet the service level. It is not nice feeling a sense of panic knowing that there is a queue behind you and you can’t fulfil the quality aspect when there is a queue. It means that you can’t have a quality conversation when you have to rush through and deal with things as quickly as possible (Agent Anya, Info Co., August 1999).
Typically members believe that responsibility for ensuring a quality service is made impossible when a backlog of calls accumulates. The demands of processing high volumes of calls result in panic and stress and these are exaggerated by feelings of guilt when agents feel that they have failed to meet the quality criteria. Placing callers on hold is at odds with the agents’ sense of a quality service, which often needs a more elaborate response than that prescribed in the context of a labour process modelled on the lean paradigm. The interviews show that management have no solution to problems of this sort and do not necessarily believe that quality can be delivered; yet they insist that the agents both believe in and deliver it: I think they have got to quickly build rapport and retain a balance. You have to build rapport and remain professional and not over familiarise yourself and not be over chatty (Interview with Co-ordinator, Info Co., August 1999).
Comments such as this highlight the vacuous character of management discourse on quality when productive pressures are felt most keenly. Moreover, in a climate of lean production, the team concept has little meaning for team members, because the isolation it imposes through pressure for output forces agents to act individualistically. Furthermore, agents do not have the time to find answers to more complex queries and cannot confer in the exchange of tacit knowledge, nor engage in conversation with customers except in the most perfunctory fashion. In an attempt to draw attention to this dilemma the researcher enquires: Are there not reasons for agents to run over the 2.5 minutes and does this not in any event discourage them from going that extra mile for the customer?
Questions such as this meet with persistent evasion from management, who frequently resort to much quoted mantras: They are under a lot of pressure to hit the right balance. All we can do is to make sure they understand and know that (Interview with Co-ordinator, Info Co., August 1999).
Given the rigidity of the labour process, particularly in conditions of work intensity, the onus is on each individual team member to balance customer expectations with organisational goals. Meanwhile management continue to promote the quality discourse: We want to be a centre of excellence, and that means we want to give ‘‘a lost for words service’’. We want people to go off the phone and think, ‘‘Wow, wasn’t that just great’’. You know you get a 100 per cent rapport (Interview with Acting Team-Leader, Info Co., August 1999).
Set against the foregoing discussion, this comment is a little ingenuous. In Teamworking in reality, the increasingly intensified pace of work suggests in practice that the a call centre system facilitates little more than the minimum service standard. For most of the time, the most agents can offer is the fac¸ade of politeness and helpfulness that is best understood within the boundaries of Bolton’s (2000) pecuniary typology. Elsewhere, it is argued that agents draw on the quality issue to resist 295 such work intensification (Mulholland, 2000). However, management almost admit that in practice quality is difficult to deliver: Yes I can see that maybe they cannot give 100 per cent all of the time, but they still must aim to and be professional, polite, friendly, but not too chatty. They must try to build that rapport, you know (Team Co-ordinator, Info Co., August 1999).
With responsibility for the provision of solutions to the difficulties that arise with too few workers, this manager admits that, while quality cannot be sustained, agents must intend to deliver on agreements. To deliver on quality would require what Bolton (2000) calls the philanthropic dimension of emotional labour, which means that agents must be able to strike a chord with the customer, calculate instantly what the customer expects and to respond accordingly, something that requires more time than the lean paradigm allows. In the lean labour process when workers respond to the continual flow of incoming calls, all management advocate is a superficial friendliness and a standardised form of response, which are often at variance with the agents’ definition of quality. What this suggests is that the day team members draw on perfunctory knowledge and give out the standard pat, which is particularly evident in the case of large volumes of calls, many of which may require more complex solutions than that offered, seriously undermining the possibilities and the benefits of team solutions. The night team, emotional labour and gender power In examining the work conditions for the night shift, in this section it will be argued that lower call volumes and differences in customer queries shape the scope for team interdependence and knowledge sharing. Second, the opportunity for knowledge sharing also shows the ways gender relations inform team organisation. The night team is small and consists of three men and two women members and a team leader and they work a 12-hour stretch. Similar to the day shift, night agents also cope with peaks in the volume of calls that occur late at night and early in the morning. However, a disproportionate number of calls are varied and complex and often require a more nuanced response that depends on the cultural capital (Bourdieu and Passeron, 1990) that the agents bring with them to the workplace. Alongside social skill (Hochschild, 1983), cultural capital is formally acquired knowledge, consisting of degrees in English, the arts, business studies and from interests in drama, film, sport, current affairs and travel. The sharing of such knowledge enhances team effectiveness and sustains the comprehensive range of Information
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Services about the wide variety of programmes broadcast by the different television and radio channels. For instance: The other week there was this programme on radio about continental philosophers. And this woman rang up wanting to know when they would discuss Nietzsche. It sounded interesting to me. I hadn’t even heard of the guy, but B . . . there knew all about him and had been following the programme. He passed the information on to me and I very quickly was able to tell the woman, who was really very happy with my extended information (Agent Billy, Day shift, August 1999).
Typically, this suggests that team members draw on one another’s expertise when processing customer enquiries. The interviews show that the influence of a common-sense understanding of gender operates at different levels in different contexts. For instance, agents are sometimes required to demonstrate empathy and sensitivity with callers: I had this lady on the phone for a full 20 minutes. Her daughter had been killed and we ran a story, which referred to this. It brought up old wounds and she re-lived every moment of the death. It was very upsetting for me listening to her. I felt like crying. But you have to listen and be sympathetic. You let them talk and say you understand (Agent Eva, Evening shift, August 1999).
Queries such as this require a skilful response and team members draw on a repertoire of competence including traditional caring skills. In this case, diplomacy and judgement are called upon, where there is a need to empathise with the caller, while also defending the organisation. This is gendered and, while there is an assumption that women have this skill, men equally are expected to be able to manage such queries. In this case, the programme upset the caller. Typically the agent’s ability to manage both their own and the callers’ feelings becomes critical when programmes addressing controversial and sensitive issues are broadcast. Calls of this sort illustrate the range of competencies that the agents need, but which are wholly taken for granted by management, who assume that such skill exists ‘‘out there’’. However, this example serves to demonstrate the wider significance of Benschop and Doorewaard’s (1998) notion of a gender subtext, and of how a common-sense understanding of gender can be adapted to serve organisational goals. This point is further endorsed by the interviews with management. In raising the issue of whether training was provided for such sensitive work, the researcher enquired: Do you take into account how the agents might feel, and do you not think that this aspect of the work does affect them in some way? Negatively perhaps? Maybe they need training for that?
While worker stress is acknowledged as a factor, the concern is how it will affect performance and the quality of the customer/agent interaction: Well we assume that they would not let that affect what they do. They don’t have any counselling either. I think they would benefit from it. But from a business point of view, it is not what we are here for. But I understand how draining it is for the agents to take emotional and other difficult calls, and especially with the variation. You may have a person in tears for
fifteen minutes because she has been reminded of a family member they have lost. No we don’t train for that (Team Leader, Night shift, Info Co., August 1999).
The concern is with how team members respond to the caller, whilst recognising that the work in this context demands more than information provision, when the feelings of ‘‘upset’’ customers need to be managed. The emphasis is on how well team members suppress their own feelings in the management of the feelings of others. The research suggests other ways in which the notion of a gender subtext subtly pervades team interdependence and is evident in the assumption that gender identity is suggestive of a particular ‘‘expertise’’. One of the most obvious illustrations of this is when female agents make reference to male colleagues on questions about sport. Sexual identities also play a role in how agents negotiate their interactions with customers. The interviews suggest that agents draw on their personalities, sexuality, charm and guile when talking to customers. Flirtation is part of the skill repertoire for both men and women. For instance, one of the male agents elaborated: Well you know when some of them want to win you over and they will tell you, ‘‘You have a nice voice’’. I must admit ‘‘it works when I get called a charming young man’’. I then turn it on myself. I mean they don’t mean it and neither do I, but it makes them feel good and I have a laugh (Agent Richard, Night team, August 1999).
Flattered by such compliments, agents also reciprocate by trying to please the customer, which often involves more extensive and time-consuming searches for the relevant information. Similarly, women also use sexual banter and flirting: I got this bloke on the phone and he had the most gorgeous French accent, so I kinda made the conversation last by asking him questions and being friendly. I also invited him to ring back if he needed more help. He asked my name then. But even if he did ring back there is only a small chance that I’d receive the call (Colette, Night team, August 1999).
Such incidents are premised on gender relations and sexuality, when flirtation and flattery become part of the agents’ repertoire of emotional skill in the course of answering calls. This lends support to Hall’s (1993) study of gender and job construction in the restaurant trade. Of course, it must be remembered that agent/customer interaction of this sort is finely tuned by the standardised character of the labour process set against the timing of call handling, which in the context of high work volumes may be mitigated. Gender power, managers and call centre culture This section provides a tentative insight into the different ways team members and managers draw on the politics of gender to define oppositional ‘‘spaces’’ within the boundaries of control and resistance. First, managers draw on aspects of gender relations to promote the normative dimensions of team working. Second, managers in an attempt to obscure the rigidities of ‘‘hard’’ control engage in sexual banter and in the manipulation of gender stereotyping
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to magnify the social aspect of team working. With the exception of the limited opportunities for knowledge sharing, the absence of any tangible technical structure, such as multi-skilling, or job rotation, team identity is fostered around a discourse, in which the idea of ‘‘working hard’’ is linked to ‘‘playing hard’’. In this context, management manipulates the dynamics of gender relations and the interplay between the notion of the team, socialising and work: I have a young crew in there and they work hard and play hard together. In my experience of a team-working environment it is good to have a mix. I have worked in teams of just women, and there is a lot of bitching, whereas when you have that balance of men there, women are not interested. There is more banter and a better rapport. My team works hard and they go out together and play hard (Unit manager, Info Co., August 1999).
This comment enforces gender stereotyping, suggesting that mixed teams are conducive to more cordial workplace relations. However, by encouraging banter and sexual innuendo between the team members, the female managers try to mask structures of control and figures of authority. For instance: People like a laugh. What I have out there is quite a young crew so you do get a lot of that kind of thing, kidding each other on, teasing each other. On Monday there is bits of gossip and every now and then I resurrect it. Like I did this afternoon with one of the girls when one of the guys came from downstairs and I said: ‘‘How come when you are on duty he is always up here.’’ That sort of thing (Manager, Info Co., August 1999).
What is important, in this example, is that ‘‘having a laugh’’ (Collinson, 1992), a shopfloor strategy, has been appropriated by a woman manager and reshaped as sexual banter and teasing among the agents. Reflecting Pollert’s (1981) earlier study of women factory workers, management at Info Co. similarly infuses the dynamics of gender relations into structures of control. What is remarkable about this is that the entry of women into middle management has not greatly altered the masculine character of workplace culture (Collinson and Hearn, 1996), a point also observed by Wajcman (1998) in her study of managers in the corporate sector. To the team members, who experience the disappointment with the company’s failure to pay the bonus payments and are sharpened by production pressures and poor industrial relations, such team-building gestures have little kudos. Unimpressed, the members ruefully point out that: ‘‘J (the manager) is masquerading as one of the lads’’. The rejection of such managerial gestures is one of the means by which the team members re-create a distance between themselves and the managers, suggesting conflict over unity. Reminiscent of women’s traditional domestic role, line managers draw on caring discourses to remind team members of management’s feelings towards them: ‘‘Hi, team, you know that we care. All we need is just that little bit more push and I know that you can get us there today’’. At the same time, particularly for the day shift, there is little relief from managerial pressure for productivity when agents face a continuous barrage of e-mail disguised in the same chummy, cheery discourse, such as ‘‘Hello, team, well done today. You know that we are there with you’’. In rejecting such paternalism the agents are
derisive and dismissive of such cosy messages. Resentful and cynical, they Teamworking in resort to wit and humour to turn around the unequal power relations that exist a call centre between them and the managers. Most derision is directed at acting teamleaders who are regarded as gullible and management pawns, because they are selected from the shopfloor and are persuaded for a one-off payment of £200 to take on first-line management duties and longer working hours. Such 299 opposition conforms with traditional patterns, when agents are critical of firstline supervisors, who are clearly seen as part of the power hierarchy, when in reality their social status is much more ambiguous (Wright, 1989). Making fun of a management style is a form of resistance (Collinson, 1992) and is important, for it rejects the unitary premise of the management discourse. In recognition of the reality of the waged labour relationship agents supplant gendered management discourse with their own, pointing out that: ‘‘It’s a ‘them’ and ‘us’ situation here’’, thus shattering the veneer of unity, one of the central goals of team organisation. Conclusions In raising the question of whether team organisation can be adapted to work design in the call centre labour process, which the research suggests is characterised by a fundamental contradiction, that is how to balance the need for quality with that of productivity, this paper has examined the relationship between team working, emotional labour and the dynamics of gender relations embedded in the wider labour process. First, the focus on the structure and role of team supervision alongside the increases in technical control emphasises that any understanding of how team working operates must be located in the wider labour process. In this case, old regimes of control, such as technical control (Edwards, 1979), have been adapted; for example, in the integration of the telephone and the computer, and re-aligned with reconfigured line supervision to suggest that direct control (Friedman, 1977) remains pivotal in explaining team structure and the ways it functions. It is argued that teamworking is identified at two levels, at enterprise level and around particular functions. In the first sense, the company symbolises the team, when the productivity strategy draws individual members together in the pursuit of corporate goals, a configuration that is consonant with Benders and Van Hootegem’s (2000) wider notion of team organisation. Team identity is also fostered around the different functions, such as processing customer telephone calls and answering e-mails and letters. Thompson and Wallace’s (1996) notion of governance, technical and normative dimensions of team organisation, puts into perspective the meaning that team membership has for call centre workers. In terms of governance, the manner in which the selection of line management remains the prerogative of management and the downward direction of information flows evident at the team briefings suggest that team members have little impact on team management or on the organisation of work.
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In the absence of job rotation (Procter and Mueller, 2000) and multi-tasking (Knights and McCabe, 1998) the technical dimension of team organisation has been re-adapted to suggest that numerical flexibility and knowledge sharing are the core features of team organisation in the call centre labour process. Confronted by chronic labour shortage, management benefit from the idea of the team, for it normalises managerial coping strategies, such as numerical flexibility, overtime and work intensification, when team members work flexibly across the different teams that cover day working, a finding confirmed by O’Reilly (1992). The focus on the day and night teams illustrates the manner in which variations in call volumes shape the experience of team interdependence. The focus on the work experience for the day and night teams suggests how the benefits of team interdependence, especially in problem solving, has been mediated at Info Co. by productivity pressures. The research shows that the opportunities for the sharing of knowledge and more team-based solutions are constrained by the tight call-handling time for the day team, when management discourage all but a perfunctory response to customer queries. On the other hand, the relaxed call-handling times that prevail during the night provide the autonomy for team members to engage in the sharing of information and limited problem solving, supporting Findlay et al. (2000), who show that team organisation enables members to offer diagnostic solutions to operational problems. With the exception of night working this means that, in terms of the technical dimension of team working, team members’ involvement is largely restricted to swapping shifts, while opportunities for knowledge sharing are confined to the limited dips that occur in patterns of call volumes. This then suggests that, although the market has an impact on volumes of call, the prerogative to intervene in the regulation of such demand is with management. The paper has argued that gender relations are embedded in different ways in the context of team organisation at Info Co. The normative dimension of team organisation provides a framework showing how gender power influences the management structure, the relationship between managers and team members and team interaction. First, although the line management of the teams at Info Co. is undertaken by female managers, senior managers and technical staff are men, suggesting that class power within re-configured managerial hierarchies remains masculine (Collinson and Hearn, 1996). Second, the notion of gender subtext (Benschop and Doorewaard, 1998) is suggestive of some of the ways female managers attempt to mask such regimes of control within the boundaries of team organisation, whilst also perpetuating the current configuration of established hierarchies. In order to soften the harshness associated with productivity discourse and to foster the team spirit, it has been argued that managers draw on traditional caring discourse alongside human resource management (Legge, 1995). However, this has resulted in countervailing tendencies, when team members question management sincerity. In rejecting such managerial overtures team members draw on wit and humour to re-define team boundaries. Third, the examination of work for the two teams suggests that some degree of autonomy is pivotal for
sharing the range of knowledge that exists amongst the members. The Teamworking in importance of gender in this context is that it widens the range of general a call centre knowledge, while allowing team members to tap into specialised information. At the same time, it has also been argued that there is a tendency to standardise the agent/customer interaction and to reduce emotional labouring (Hochschild, 1983) to the fastest possible time, when the most agents can offer 301 in terms of quality is a perfunctory standard of service, which is consonant with the pecuniary dimension of Bolton’s (2000) typology. In such circumstances the primary task of agents is to manage the callers’ feelings, to suppress their negative feelings and to remain passive. The experience of retaining that level of control over one’s emotional state helps team members to bond, to be interdependent and to share knowledge. Such solidarity between the agents is also born out of moments of resistance to management control, which ironically has arisen when the agents insist that quality must be delivered (Mulholland, 2000). What is unique about the expression of emotional labour in the call centre labour process is that, aside from being concerned with the regulation of customer feelings, it is also about the appropriation, intensification and expenditure of the emotional aspect of human labour on an unprecedented scale, a process that is accommodated by team organisation. Although Baldry et al. (1998) define this as team Taylorism, it must be distinguished from ‘‘ordinary’’ Taylorism, because it is shaped and limited by the uniqueness and independence of the human personality. References Baldry, C., Bain, P. and Taylor, P. (1998), ‘‘‘Bright sanatic offices’: intensification, control and team Taylorism’’, in Thompson, P. and Warhurst, C. (Eds), Workplaces of the Future, Macmillan Business, London, pp. 163-83. Belt, V. (2000), ‘‘‘Call girls’: women, work and the telephone’’, 18th Annual International Labour Conference, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. Benders, J. and Van Hootegem, G. (2000), ‘‘How the Japanese got teams’’, in Proctor, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan Business, London. Benschop, Y. and Doorewaard, H. (1998), ‘‘Six of one and half a dozen of the other: the gender subtext of Taylorism and team-based work’’, Gender, Work and Organisation, Vol. 5 No. 1, pp. 5-18. Bolton, S.C. (2000), ‘‘Emotion here, emotion there, emotional organisations everywhere’’, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Vol. 11, pp. 155-71. Bourdieu, P. and Passeron, J.C. (1990), Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture, Sage, London. Braverman, H. (1974), Labour and Monopoly Capital, Monthly Review Press, London/New York, NY. Burawoy, M. (1979), Manufacturing Consent: Changes in the Labour Process under Monopoly Capitalism, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Clarke, S. (1990) ‘‘What in the f——’s name is Fordism?’’, in Gilbert, N. and Pollert, A. (Eds), Fordism & Flexibility, Macmillan, London. Collinson, D. (1992), Managing the Shopfloor, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin. Collinson, D. and Hearn, J. (1994), ‘‘Naming men: implications for work organisations and management’’, Gender, Work and Organisation, Vol. 1 No. 1, pp. 2-22.
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Collinson, D. and Hearn, J. (Eds) (1996), Men as Managers: Managers as Men: Critical Perspectives on Men, Masculinities and Management, Sage, London. Delbridge, R., Turnbull, P. and Wilkinson, A. (1992), ‘‘Pushing back the frontiers: management control and work intensification under JIT/TQM factory regimes’’, New Technology, Work & Employment, Vol. 7 No. 2, pp. 327-38. Denzin, N.C. (1978), The Research Act: A Theoretical Introduction to Sociological Methods, McGraw-Hill, New York, NY. Edwards, R. (1979), Contested Terrain: The Transformation of the Workplace in the Twentieth Century, Heinemann, London. Findlay, P., McKinlay, A., Marks, A. and Thompson, P. (2000), ‘‘‘Flexible when it suits them’: the use and abuse of teamwork skills’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan Business, London. Frenkel, S.J., May, T., Korczynski, M. and Shire, K. (1998), ‘‘Beyond bureaucracy? Work organisation in call centres’’, The International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol. 9 No. 6, pp. 957-79. Friedman, A. (1977), Industry and Labour: Class Struggle at Work and Monopoly Capitalism, Macmillan, London. Garraghan, P. and Stewart, P. (1992), The Nissan Enigma, Flexibility at Work in a Local Economy, Mansel, London. Geary, J. (1994), ‘‘Task participation: employees’ participation enabled or constrained?’’, in Sisson, K. (Ed.), Personnel Management, Blackwell, Oxford. Glazer, B. and Strauss, A. (1967), The Discovery of Grounded Theory, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Hall, E. (1993), ‘‘Smiling, deferring and flirting, doing gender by giving ‘good service’’’, Work and Occupation, Vol. 20 No. 4. Hearn, J. (1998), ‘‘On ambiguity, contradiction and paradox in gendered organisations’’, Gender, Work and Organisation, Vol. 5 No. 1, pp. 1-4. Hearn, J. (2000), ‘‘On the complexity of feminist intervention in organisations’’, Organisation, Vol. 7 No. 4, pp. 609-24. Hochschild, A.R. (1983), The Managed Heart: Commercialisation of Human Feeling, The University of California Press, Berkeley, CA. Kinnie, N., Hutchinson, S. and Purcell, J. (2000), ‘‘‘Fun and surveillance’: the paradox of high commitment management in call centres’’, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol. 11 No. 5, October, pp. 967-85. Knights, D. and McCabe, D. (1998), ‘‘What happens when the phone goes wild? Staff, stress and spaces for escape in a BPR telephone banking work regime’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 35 No. 2, pp. 163-94. Lankshear, G., Cook, P. and Mason, D. (2000), ‘‘Call centre: something old, something new, what’s different, what’s true?’’, 18th Annual International Labour Process Conference, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. Legge, K. (1995), Human Resource Management, Macmillan Business, London. Leidner, R. (1993), Fast Food, Fast Talk, University of California Press, Los Angeles, CA. Lloyd, C. and Newell, S. (2000), ‘‘Selling teams to the salesforce: teamworking in the UK pharmaceutical industry’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan Business, London, pp. 183-202. McCabe, D. (2000), ‘‘The team dream: the meaning and experience of teamworking for employees in an automobile manufacturing company’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan Business, London, pp. 203-22.
Marchington, M. (2000), ‘‘Teamworking and employee involvement: terminology, evaluation and context’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan Business, London, pp. 60-80. Martin, J., Knopoff, K. and Beckman, C. (1998), ‘‘An alternative bureaucratic impersonality and emotional labour: bounded emotionality at Body Shop’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, No. 43, pp. 429-69. Mueller, F. (1994), ‘‘Team between hierarchy and commitment: change strategies and the ‘internal environment’’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 31 No. 3, pp. 383-403. Mulholland, K. (1999), ‘‘Back to the future: a call centre and new forms of direct control: ‘slammin’, scammin’, smokin’ an’ leavin’’’, 17th Annual International Labour Process Conference, Royal Holloway College, University of London, London. Mulholland, K. (2000), ‘‘Emotional labour and tacit resistance in call centre employment ‘insisting on quality’’’, 18th Annual International Labour Process, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. Mulholland, K. (2001), ‘‘‘Slammin’, scammin’, smokin’ an’ leavin’’: resistance in Irish call centres to new forms of direct control’’’, Sociology. O’Reilly, J. (1992), ‘‘Where do you draw the line? Functional flexibility, training and skill in Britain and France’’, Work, Employment and Society, Vol. 6 No. 3, pp. 369-96. Parker, M. (1999), ‘‘Capitalism, subjectivity and ethics: debating labour process analysis’’, Organisational Studies, Vol. 20 No. 1, pp. 25-45. Parker, M. and Slaughter, J. (1988), Choosing Sides: Unions and the Team Concept, South End Press/Labour Notes, Boston, MA. Pollert, A. (1981), Girls, Wives, Factory Lives, Macmillan, London. Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (2000), Teamworking, Macmillan Business, London. Rinehart, J. et al. (1997), Just Another Car Factory? Lean Production and its Discontents, LR Press/ Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY. Spencer, D.A. (2000), ‘‘Braverman and the contribution of labour process analysis to the critique of capitalist production – twenty-five years on’’, Work, Employment & Society, Vol. 14 No. 2, pp. 223-43. Taylor, F.W. (1911), Scientific Management, Harper & Row, London. Taylor, P. and Bain, P. (1999), ‘‘‘An assembly line in the head’: work and employee relations in the call centre’’, Industrial Relations, Vol. 30 No. 2, pp. 101-17. Thompson, P. and Wallace, T. (1996), ‘‘Redesigning production through teamworking: case studies from the Volvo Truck Corporation’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 16 No. 2, pp. 103-18. Wajcman, J. (1998), Managing Like a Man, Polity Press, Cambridge. Wilkinson, A. (1998), ‘‘Empowerment, theory and practice’’, Personnel Review, Vol. 27 No. 1, pp. 40-6. Wright, E.O. (1989), The Debate on Classes, Verso, London/New York, NY. Further reading Manz, C. (1992), ‘‘Self-leading work teams: moving beyond self-management myths’’, Human Relations, Vol. 45 No. 11, pp. 119-40. Manz, C. and Sims, H. (1986), ‘‘Leading self-managed groups: a conceptual analysis of a paradox’’, Economic and Industrial Democracy, Vol. 7, pp. 141-65. Taylor, S. (1998), ‘‘Emotional labour and the new workplace’’, in Thompson, P. and Warhurst, C. (Eds), Workplaces of the Future, Macmillan Business, London.
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How teamworking works in the Inland Revenue: meaning, operation and impact Stephen Procter School of Management, University of Newcastle, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, and
Graeme Currie Business School, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, UK Keywords Teamwork, Work organization, Performance, Inland Revenue, Public sector, United Kingdom Abstract Studies of teamworking suggest that, for it to be successful, fundamental changes must take place in many aspects of an organization’s structure and operations. This study of the Inland Revenue reveals that only in a few aspects does its operation of teamworking follow this model. The range of work is little changed; employees exercise little in the way of new skills; they appear reluctant to adopt responsibility for the work of others; and the performance management system operates on the basis of individual performance. Nonetheless, teamworking appears to work in the Inland Revenue. It does so by having a team rather than an individual allocation of work, and by encouraging individual identity with the team target. This suggests that, although a limited version of teamworking exists, this might be all an organization needs. Thus what is needed is a more sophisticated understanding of teamworking, its objectives, and the relationship between the two.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 304-319. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486 DOI 10.1108/00483480210422723
Introduction There are a number of ways in which the concept of teamworking can be understood. In the more popular management literature the focus has been on the idea of the team itself and, in particular, on how successful teams can be identified and created. Perhaps the most prominent example of this kind of approach is Belbin’s (1981, 1993) work on the identification of the different roles that members of a team need to take on. A second important approach – and the one adopted in the present paper – is to place teamworking more squarely within the context of the employment relationship and, as such, to see it as a management strategy for the organization of work. Rather than management, project or product development teams, the concern in this approach is with the employees who make up the bulk of an employing organization. At the risk of some over-simplification, we can say that it is the organization rather than the team that is the focus of attention. Taking this as our starting-point, this paper examines the operation and effectiveness of teamworking in the Inland Revenue, the UK’s tax assessment and collection department. We begin, however, by surveying the literature in order to build up a general, outline picture of teamworking as a management strategy. This introductory section is in four parts. We show, first, how teamworking’s strategic nature means that it can have implications for the
structure of the organization and for the roles and responsibilities exercised Teamworking in within it. Second, we broaden our discussion to look at the management styles the Inland and the organizational systems associated with teamworking. Third, we turn to Revenue the link between teamworking and organizational performance, which, while often assumed to exist, has proved difficult to identify in practice. This leads us into the final part of the introductory section, which, by looking at studies of 305 teamworking in non-manufacturing organizations, suggests that any link with performance may not be the same in all settings. This introduction provides the framework within which we can examine teamworking in the Inland Revenue. We shall see that only in a few aspects does it resemble what the literature suggests teamworking might look like. The range of work is little changed, employees exercise little in the way of new skills, they appear reluctant to adopt responsibility for the work of others, and the performance management system continues to operate on the basis of individual performance. Nonetheless, teamworking appears to work in the Inland Revenue. It does so primarily by having a team allocation rather than an individual allocation of work and by encouraging individual identity with the team target. In addition, employees show a willingness to accept a joint responsibility for the distribution of work, and this is facilitated by a more open middle-management style. All this suggests that, although a rather limited version of teamworking exists, this might be all an organization needs. It seems that what we need to do is to develop a more sophisticated understanding of teamworking, its objectives, and the relationship between the two. In order to do this, however, we must first look at some of the dimensions along which we can assess what teamworking looks like. Structures, roles and responsibilities The first implication of the strategic nature of teamworking is that, as Buchanan (1994) expresses it, distinguishing between work design and organizational design becomes very difficult. In particular, what we have is a situation in which the team becomes the basic organizational unit, and there may have to be an element of organization re-design in order to bring this about (Thompson and Wallace, 1996). Production technology is important here, for certain production systems will lend themselves better than others to this redesign (Procter and Mueller, 2000). While teamworking is often associated with flowline production and, in particular, with the production of cars, Cutcher-Gershenfeld et al. (1994) showed that in manufacturing industry it is in batch production that the necessary flexibility of design is more likely to exist. In any case, a number of changes in the nature of work are likely to accompany this reorganization. Along with decisions about how tasks should be grouped together, organizations are faced with decisions about how they should be distributed among team members. In this context teamworking is generally associated with a widening of the range of tasks undertaken by an individual (Dunphy and Bryant, 1996). Team members might also have to take
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on new kinds of work. In some accounts this is problem-solving and improvement activity (Delbridge et al., 2000; Findlay et al., 2000); in others, ‘‘soft’’ skills, such as communication, are given emphasis. Perhaps most contentious is the expectation that individuals will take on a greater degree of responsibility for the work of fellow team members. In some accounts this is the essence of teamworking: the replacement of bureaucratic control by the ‘‘concertive’’ control of peer pressure (Barker, 1993). Management and organization Just as team members are expected to take on new roles and responsibilities, so too are middle-level managers. In many cases it is the role of the team leader that assumes great importance. With their team leaders expected to manage as ‘‘coach’’ rather than as ‘‘cop’’, organizations can often find it very difficult to find the right people for these positions (Procter et al., 1995). Once in position, moreover, team leaders, faced with short-term production and financial targets, can come under great pressure to revert to a more ‘‘command and control’’ style (Watson and Rosborough, 2000). We need in any case to examine not just the teams themselves but the organizational context in which they operate (Cohen et al., 1996). Although it might seem obvious that, in particular, the system of appraisal and reward in an organization would have some relationship with teamworking, very little work has addressed this question directly. Among work that has done so, Harvey and von Behr (1994) found that a system of individual piece rates in the non-automotive metal industry worked against flexibility, and hence teamworking, by encouraging workers to stay on one machine in order to maximise earnings. Likewise, Lloyd and Newell (2000) show how the operation of teamworking in a pharmaceutical salesforce was severely hampered by the fact that evaluation and pay continued to be based on individual performance. Studies of situations in which team-based payments systems have been introduced seem to be just as uncommon. Ezzamel and Willmott (1998) are an exception in pointing up the conflicts and issues raised by a clothing manufacturing company’s introduction of a bonus based on team performance. Teamworking and performance What all this leaves us with is an impression of how teamworking works; from an organization’s point of view, what is also important is how well it works. In other words, what the strategic nature of teamworking does is to put it in a much more direct relationship with organizational performance. In looking at this, we have first to establish what we mean by performance. Dunphy and Bryant (1996), for example, identify three forms of team, each of which is most suited to the pursuit of a particular aspect of performance. While simple, multiskilled teams are thus most likely to impact most heavily on an organization’s costs, self-managed teams will have their main effects on value, and self-led teams on innovation.
Even if the impact of teamworking can be isolated, there is the question of Teamworking in the ‘‘transmission mechanism’’ through which it has its effects. From a the Inland sociotechnical perspective, the link between teamworking and performance can Revenue be explained by the self-regulation provided to employees by the more structural properties of teams but, as Cohen and Ledford (1994) point out, because the kinds of job to which such teams give rise – high in variety, 307 autonomy, identity, significance and feedback – are similar to those advocated by the job characteristics model, a single channel of influence is difficult to identify. Cohen et al.’s (1996) ‘‘predictive model’’ looks at four sets of factors in the performance of teams: (1) task design; (2) supervisory behaviours; (3) group characteristics; and (4) organizational context. They found that it was those variables relating to organizational context that had the strongest relationship with team effectiveness. They were thus also unable to provide any comfort to Manz and Sims (1987), who, despite seeing value in certain ‘‘leader behaviours’’, had been unable to provide evidence of a direct link with performance. Teamworking in the service and public sectors This account of the nature of teamworking and its impact relies very heavily on work conducted in a fairly small range of settings. There is an overwhelming concern with manufacturing industry and, even within this, certain sectors – automotive, electronics, engineering – tend to feature very strongly. It is only more recently that studies of teamworking in service settings have begun to emerge. Thus we now have, for example, Cohen and Ledford’s (1994) and Cohen et al.’s (1996) studies of the telecommunications sector, and Lloyd and Newell’s (2000) study of a pharmaceutical salesforce. As Lloyd and Newell argue, a key issue is what factors, if any, differentiate the use of teamworking in the service sector. Cohen et al. (1996) suggest that elements of the organizational context that support employee involvement, such as rewards and training, may assume greater importance in services, where the nature of work is likely to be less straightforward than in manufacturing. A further complication is added, if we allow for the fact that a service setting may be found in the public rather than in the private sector. Again, while the bare figures suggest the presence of team-based working in the public sector, research has been slow to follow. One exception is Martinez Lucio et al.’s (2000) examination of the UK postal service, although the focus here is on the nature of the trade union response to teamworking rather than teamworking per se. With the public sector in the UK and elsewhere under increasing pressure to perform and to adopt ‘‘private sector’’ methods in order to do so, we need to
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understand what teamworking looks like here, and how, if at all, it achieves its objectives. How does teamworking in the public services match up against the characteristics we have identified in this introduction? What does it mean for employee roles and for organizational structures and systems more generally? Moreover, if teamworking can be seen to work in this kind of setting, how precisely does it effect any improvement in performance? It was with questions such as these in mind that our study of teamworking in the Inland Revenue was undertaken. The research project The Inland Revenue The Inland Revenue is the UK’s tax assessment and collection department. Since income tax was reintroduced on a ‘‘temporary’’ basis in 1842, the main developments have been the introduction of pay-as-you-earn (PAYE) in 1944 and self-assessment (SA) in 1997/1998. In 1998 the Inland Revenue employed over 52,000 people, of whom around 9,500 were part-time. For operational purposes the Revenue is divided into ten regional offices and a number of more specialist sections. Operating offices, of which there are between 500 and 600, have been of two main types, concerned with the assessment and the collection of tax respectively. Under the new office structure (NOS) programme, however, these two functions are gradually being brought together. The size of office varies from around 50-60 staff up to around 500, with mergers producing an increasing average figure. Both the number of staff and the number of offices have fallen significantly in recent years, and the intention is that this process will continue. Under the Inland Revenue’s pay and grading system, staff are placed in one of five pay bands, A to E, A being the highest. Our concern here is with those on the lowest grades: Bands E – divided between E1 and E2 – and D. As might be expected, the majority of staff are to be found at these grades. From 1997 figures, Band E2 accounted for 27 per cent of staff, Band E1 for 34 per cent, and Band D for 22 per cent. The jobs and responsibilities of each of these grades are as follows. At Revenue Assistant (RA) (Band E2) level, work is made up of basic clerical tasks such as receiving mail, record-keeping, and sorting and filing documents. Revenue Officers (RO) (E1) are concerned with the routine calculation and collection of tax. They would also be the point of contact for members of the public. Revenue Executives (RE) (D) deal with more complex tax cases and with the tax affairs of more highly paid employees. They also provide technical support to RAs and REs. Front-line managers (FLM) (D or above) have a role that is managerial rather than technical. Project scope and description It was felt that the objectives of the project would best be achieved by the indepth investigation of a relatively small number of offices. Access to six offices was negotiated through an initial contact in the central human resources division (HRD). The offices were chosen by the HRD on the basis of their
providing a range of sizes, types and experiences of teamworking. Over the Teamworking in period December 1998-February 1999 a total of six offices were visited. One or the Inland both of the researchers spent two days in each office, carrying out a series of Revenue hour-long semi-structured interviews. The interviewees were chosen by the researchers’ point of contact within the office, who was asked to provide people from a range of functions, grades and points of view. A total of 74 people were 309 interviewed in the offices. Amongst these were eight Band E2 employees, 27 Band E1 and 23 Band D. In addition, interviews were carried out with members of the HRD and training office. Internal documentation was also provided. Teamworking in the Inland Revenue: what and why? Background to teamworking Teamworking in the Inland Revenue needs to be seen against the background of major changes that have been taking place in the way that it is managed and organized. These include what was widely seen as a half-hearted attempt to introduce ‘‘empowerment’’ in the early 1990s. Of more direct bearing on teamworking was the delayering process undertaken in 1995/1996. This aimed to remove one layer of management completely – the management inspector role – and to establish the principle that there should be no more than one level of management between any employee and the head of the office in which they worked (the officer-in-charge). This led to the emergence of the position of front-line manager (FLM) and, with it, an attempt to move to a very different approach to middle-level management. Perhaps the most important part of the background to teamworking was the introduction of self-assessment (SA) for a large number of taxpayers in 1997/ 1998. As part of the long process of preparation for this, teamworking was pushed strongly as the best way in which SA work could be organized. The link between SA and teamworking was not self-evident, and our research revealed a number of different ways in which it was understood. Perhaps the most important of these was that the immensity and complexity of SA meant that – at least in the first instance – whole-case working would be too difficult. From the point of view of those in the offices, much of the teamworking initiative came as part of the move to SA. Although non-mandatory, teamworking certainly seems to have been strongly recommended. One senior employee put it as follows: ‘‘The best advice that we were getting from the experts and various comments was that ‘You won’t deliver self-assessment unless you have a teamworking approach to it’’’. Linked to – but not explicitly part of – SA were other attempts by the central human resources division and training office to encourage the use of teamworking. The result of their collaboration was the booklet, Developing Successful Teams, circulated in 1996. The booklet set out the potential advantages of teams and showed how the changing nature of the Revenue encouraged or even demanded their use. This was supplemented the following year by the team development pack, a training package consisting of eight modules designed to take teams through various stages of development.
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Although the booklet and the training package were circulated to all offices, those involved felt that they had no control over the manner in which this was done. From the point of view of one of those involved in its compilation, ‘‘It didn’t get out in quite the way we wanted. We didn’t have control over distribution beyond the officer-in-charge.’’
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Understanding teamworking A first question asked of almost all interviewees was what they understood by teamworking, both in general terms and as the expression was used in the Inland Revenue. General conceptions of teamworking were based around familiar ideas such as its being a collective effort towards a common goal. As these ideas applied more specifically to the Revenue, teamworking was also associated with a willingness to cover for one’s colleagues. ‘‘Teamworking’’ in this sense was seen as giving a name to something which had always gone on. There was, however, widespread recognition that teamworking went beyond both the general notions and a willingness to cover for colleagues. It was recognized that the idea of ‘‘covering’’ or ‘‘helping’’ colleagues itself implied that each individual had an exclusive area of work. Teamworking involved a move beyond this. It meant, said one RO, ‘‘that you don’t have personal jobs, and that you shouldn’t be saying, ‘I’ve finished my work – can I help you?’’’ This was expressed in various ways. According to two ROs: . . . it’s all in one pot and . . . you just all work from the one pot instead of having your own little pots. Teamworking is a whole different concept. You are looking at a whole cake instead of just the slices.
In the Inland Revenue this was a fundamental change. What it meant was an end to the system of ‘‘individual allocations’’ of work. Under this system, each employee had been allocated a certain set of taxpayers, usually on the basis of the taxpayer’s surname. One person would take A-E, the next F-J, and so on. The individual would then take responsibility for all aspects of work associated with these taxpayers. These allocations were often jealously guarded. Said one Band D employee, ‘‘In my day, you had your allocation of work . . . and . . . if anybody tried to take my allocation of work off me, I’d have done murder for it.’’ Reluctance to give up individual allocations, however, was not defended simply on the basis of narrow self-interest. It was widely held that it offered advantages from the point of view of customer service: taxpayers had an identifiable point of contact with the Revenue, and this point of contact had a thorough knowledge of them and their case. The system of individual allocation had not, of course, been without its disadvantages. Many of those interviewed explained how their work would build up when they went on holiday: ‘‘You’d never be able to see your desk when you got back’’, said one RO, ‘‘. . . it would be knee-deep in work, and you needed another holiday by the time you’d finished it.’’ More generally, others associated individual allocations with pressure and isolation.
In line with the considerations raised in our introductory section, those Teamworking in interviewed in the offices associated teamworking with broad ‘‘business’’ aims. the Inland From one standpoint, teamworking was seen simply as a way of getting Revenue increasing volumes of work from declining numbers of staff. In fact, there was little attempt to deny this in interviews with more senior and more central staff. In common with other areas of the public sector, the Inland Revenue is under 311 constant pressure to produce efficiency gains. With such a large part of its turnover accounted for by labour costs, reducing staff numbers was seen as the only way in which this could be achieved. Teamworking could then be seen as first, a way of making this a little less obvious, and second, a way of implementing it more easily. With individual allocations replaced by team allocations, one RO, who had previously been responsible for around 4,500 taxpayers, described this: I think we worked out that after changes . . . we would be actually dealing with about 8,000 each, roughly. So it just seems to be a very back-door way of actually getting us to take on more work without us really realising . . .
Other interpretations placed more emphasis on what might be considered more positive considerations. For some, teamworking was part of the move to make the Revenue a more customer-driven organization: ‘‘The Civil Service has never been like a business’’, said one RO. ‘‘So you’ve got to start thinking of the way that businesses work, and the way that businesses work is by teamworking’’. Working in teams Forms of team: establishing groupings The most pressing concern, and one that best illustrates the issues faced by the offices, was how the new SA work would be organized. Rather than tax returns being checked as they were being processed, the introduction of SA was effected on the ‘‘process now, check later’’ principle. The official recommendation was that each team of employees should deal with the full cycle, starting with the receipt of forms, through the processing stage, and into the ‘‘check later’’ stage. Under the previous system, the close association between function and grade meant that function-based work groups were also essentially grade-based. Although in principle teamworking involved a move from a function-based to an allocation-based system of work organization, distinctions – sometimes physical – between grades meant that in some cases it was not clear what the ‘‘team’’ was. This was illustrated by one RO when asked about her team: There are nine people in [my team] at the moment. Five are at RO level and four at RE level. We’ve got two Revenue Assistants which are supposed to be with our team but because they don’t sit with us at all they are not really attached to us. Only the ROs and REs sit together at the moment.
In fact, even the ROs and the REs were separate from each other: ‘‘All the REs work together and all the ROs work together, so we are divided a bit.’’ Thus, more than anything, it was the target that defined the team:
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. . . but we all have targets we have to meet, so we all work together to meet the target. You can’t say we work as a team like at a building site, because it’s impossible to sit there and observe a team working as a team . . . But we all do the same thing, if necessary, or the same type of work, in order to clear our targets.
The relationship between the different grades also emerged as an issue in another office. According to a senior manager:
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. . . you had an RE at the front of the team, who’s the manager; you had the RAs, who were support; you had the ROs, and you had the RE case workers, that all worked together. That caused a certain amount of friction, because people tended to lose their identity within that team.
In this view, it was the technical REs who were the main losers: . . . although those technical REs were managed by a C2, it was the RE at the front of the team that managed the work . . . And that was difficult for the technicians and it was difficult for the manager.
Quite different tendencies could also operate. The use of multi-band teams meant that severe imbalances of work could emerge. This came about as a result of staff being confined to working on a single team. Teamworking, in other words, rather than being hampered, seemed to be working too well. According to one RO: There was a sort of, if you like, ‘‘My team’s work comes before my grade’s work,’’ which was commendable in one way but, when you haven’t got anybody else who could do that work, there was nothing more you could do.
Teams were thus working at the expense of the office as a whole. As another RO expressed it: . . . the teams have bonded but they’ve bonded to their own team and nobody gives a stuff about anybody else, and that is the downside of it.
Other problems multi-band teams could create were also experienced. Having created and operated such teams, it was felt in one office that the complexity of the SA system – one of the reasons it had been argued that teamworking was necessary in the first place – was too great for a team to deal with. As one FLM expressed it, ‘‘Because it’s such a big system, with so much information to try and learn, it became ‘information overload’.’’ With six SA teams running in parallel in this particular office, there were also fears that taxpayers were not being dealt with in a uniform way. As a result of all this, the work in the SA section of this office was reorganized along functional lines: We’ve still got six teams, but we’ve only got two teams dealing with the initial receipt of forms, two teams dealing with the actual process of those forms . . . then we’ve got two teams . . . dealing with the ‘‘check later’’ aspects. [FLM]
Nature of work The same issues could be looked at from the point of view of how work was allocated within teams. The basis on which teams were established meant that
there could be little increase in the range of tasks taken on by staff. This was Teamworking in clearest when teams were established on a functional basis, but even in the Inland supposedly cross-functional teams the division of work between bands meant Revenue that the scope for task flexibility was limited. One RA said: With the SA they’ve had mixed-band teams, and I don’t know how successful that is, but from what I can see, it’s just the RAs doing the RA jobs and the ROs doing the RO jobs, and they are sort of clonked together.
Thus, on the whole, the nature of the way in which the work was grouped determined the division of labour within the team. A slight blurring of distinctions could be observed in some cases. One Band D caseworker put this down, at least in part, to physical co-location: . . . as you are mixed in with everybody, if an RO, Band E’s phone was ringing, you answer it, whereas you would have been away from it because you would have been in a group of Band Ds at the time . . . I wouldn’t spend a lot of my time doing E1 or E2, but, because I’m amongst them, if it needs doing then you tend to do it.
What discretion there was tended to centre on how team allocations of work were distributed to individuals. This could in some cases involve an effective reversion to individual allocations. One RO described her experiences working in one team: . . . there is one team that used to actually work allocations inside the team, so that the work was literally split up like it was before teamworking came in. I would actually deal with everybody’s name that began from A-D and . . . and so on and so forth.
New skills and responsibilities As well as seeing little in the way of greater flexibility, there was little evidence of the ‘‘new’’ skills often associated with teamworking. Scope for innovation is in any case restricted by the legal and other constraints within which the department must do its work; and, while the introduction of SA did raise issues which required the application of diagnosis or problem-solving skills, these were not seen as anything new. Where some attempt was made at development was in the softer skills associated with teamworking. This centred on use of the team development pack to which we referred above. Use of the pack’s modules was left to the discretion of individual offices, although they could make use of trained regional facilitators. Several of those interviewed had made some use of the pack, and there were those who felt that they and their colleagues had benefited from it. The majority remained sceptical, however, both of the pack itself and of the process by which they had come into contact with it. Some regarded the process as little more than ‘‘party games’’, while others resented the time and effort involved. As a result of working through the early modules, a number of interviewees were able to produce a team charter. These, however, seemed to be of little lasting value: ‘‘We came out with a little charter’’ said one FLM, ‘‘but I don’t
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think it’s had any relevance at all with the staff.’’ ‘‘We drew up a team charter,’’ said an RO. ‘‘I don’t know whatever happened to it. I’ve never seen it since.’’ There was also a marked reluctance on the part of team members to take on supervisory responsibilities with regard to colleagues. One RA said: I think it should come down to the group leader. They should have a word with the individual, because I don’t think an E2 can go to another E2 and say, ‘‘You need to get your finger out’’. Because there’d be, ‘‘You can’t tell me what do, you’re the same grade’’.
Where significant changes were observable was in responsibility for the distribution of work within the team. Some stressed the continued restrictions imposed by the requirements of the department, but one RA described the change that had come about: . . . [you] can have a group meeting, decide how you want to do the work; whereas before it was imposed, whatever the manager said, that went. Whereas now, you can turn round to the manager and challenge them . . . and say, ‘‘Well, no, I don’t think that’s quite how it should be, perhaps we could look at X, Y and Z.’’ I think you can do that now, whereas before you certainly couldn’t.
This assumption of new responsibilities thus needs also to be seen from the perspective of the change in the role of the team leader. Management and organization Role of the front-line manager (FLM) Appointments to the new position of Band D FLM – our main concern here – had come, in the main, from existing Band D group leaders or from the grade below, E1. In many cases these appointments seemed to be quite ad hoc. One FLM said: And it came about that I was asked by the boss to consider being a manager because one was leaving, and I thought I’d done long enough with the technical stuff and needed a change. I do get bored easily, so I said, ‘‘Yes,’’ and that was it, really.
Set against that, the induction offered to FLMs was quite positively regarded. The major complaint was that the course on offer was not well synchronised with their appointment. There could be gaps of six months either before or after taking up the post. The change in management style expected of team-leaders was along the lines of the transition from ‘‘cop’’ to ‘‘coach’’. The ‘‘cop’’ role in the Revenue was described by one FLM: . . . you were hard and kicked people’s backsides, and if you were nice to them you were seen as being a weak manager, because you didn’t go round making a lot of noise and shouting.
One FLM, with 25 years’ experience, described the transition between the old and the new: . . . now you work as a team, you discuss things with your team, you have team meetings, and it’s not the Management Inspector gives you an order and you pass the order on to your group.
On the whole, from the point of the FLMs’ team members, a change in Teamworking in management style was both recognized and welcomed. One RO said of the the Inland management style: Revenue It’s changed greatly. There’s been a massive change. Years back, they would check your work that was going out, they would check repayments, check letters, count post in, keep a record of what came in . . .
The transition, of course, was not simple or seamless. The tension inherent in the team leader role is that the pressure for results might cause a reversion to methods that may be more familiar or seem more capable of generating shortterm improvements. A second, less obvious danger was that a more peoplefocused style would be restricted to the more formal aspects. In the words of one RO: ‘‘They [managers] seem to be there nowadays for the end-of-year reviews and the assessments.’’ For the FLMs it was not just a case of moving to a more facilitative management style; this had to be reconciled with taking overall responsibility for their team’s meeting their target. This was part of their role as the pivot or linchpin in the office, representing team members to more senior management and vice versa. An FLM in one office described how the district target had implications for her team target and, within it, for the targets of individual team members: As a district, we’ve got a district plan, which basically gives an undertaking that our district will capture X per cent of returns. That will be the district’s share of the regional plan. Moving on from the district plan, we’ve got a team plan. So, for us to achieve a district plan, each team talks about it and says, ‘‘We’ll do our share’’ . . . At the same time, even though it’s a team, everybody still wants to claim their individual targets as well.
At the same time it was down to the FLMs to represent their teams in the office as a whole. When asked to describe her role, one FLM replied: A go-between really . . . I’m there as their spokesperson, I suppose. I come down with the task and say, ‘‘How do you want to do them?’’ and they make that decision.
She felt that she was ‘‘piggy-in-the-middle’’ between her team and senior office management. But the input at a higher level was valued: You are more involved with the running of the district than you were before. You have to put your ideas forward for how the district is going to achieve whatever we’ve got to achieve.
One implication of the FLMs’ new roles and responsibilities was that it was difficult for them to maintain a technical role in the team. Their role was described as ‘‘pure’’ management, and any technical problems would be referred to the non-FLM Band Ds: ‘‘It isn’t really our job now’’, said one FLM. ‘‘We are supposed to know somebody who can help them, not to know ourselves.’’ A further danger was thus that the FLMs’ lack of technical knowledge would lose them the respect of their team members and make their management job more difficult. Some FLMs felt that respect could still be generated without the technical know-how, although a number of team
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members regretted the disappearance of the technical role, arguing that, in removing day-to-day contact, this would in fact disadvantage rather than enhance the ‘‘pure management’’ aspects of the role. This stress on the managerial aspects of the FLM’s role also raised longerterm questions about career development. The issue here was whether opportunities existed for those in FLM positions, having given up their technical work, to progress along a largely or wholly management career route. The particular focus was the role of management inspector, which had been a management position in the offices at Band C level but – formally at least – had been abolished as part of the delayering process. Again, a range of views was expressed. Some saw no problem in pursuing a management career, even if it meant moving outside the operating offices. On the other hand, there were those who saw their opportunities as distinctly limited. Performance management Among those interviewed, the aspect of the organizational context that was of most direct relevance to the operation of teamworking was the system of performance management. Under the system, each member of the department was appraised individually each year on the basis of an agreement reached the previous year. There were three basic assessments: ‘‘not met’’, ‘‘succeed’’, and ‘‘exceed’’. This assessment determined part or all of an individual’s pay increase. Teamworking and the performance management system were widely seen as being simply inconsistent with each other. One senior employee said, ‘‘I think it’s like two totally alien cultures. I don’t think the two go together at all.’’ For many, this was because of the feeling that, in order to do well in terms of performance management, an individual had to show that they were performing better than their colleagues. A comment from an RO reflects this: You can’t have the two together, they don’t make sense. Because in performance management you have got to prove that you are better at your job than someone else. In teamworking it’s not about proving who’s best, it’s about getting the job done. So it is a contradiction in terms; it’s just stupid.
The tying of pay increases to appraisal grades added a layer of complication. In some eyes this was the overriding factor in the clash between teamworking and performance management. For others, the differences in salary increases were so small that they were not really an issue. One FLM described how team members described the difference as about ‘‘a Mars bar a day’’. One other aspect of this was that teamworking drew attention to differentials in pay which had accumulated over time. One FLM said of the performance management system: It can be quite divisive, because some of the staff are aware that others are earning more than them, and that can cause resentment . . . The old problem: ‘‘We are doing the same job, we are in the same team, and yet they are on more than me, it’s not fair’’.
Attempts to reconcile teamworking and the performance management system Teamworking in revolved around its inclusion as a ‘‘key responsibility’’ in the performance the Inland management agreement. On the whole this was felt to have little impact on the Revenue essentially individualistic nature of the agreement – ‘‘It’s a bit of a cop-out, really’’, said one FLM – but, at the same time, there was little support for a move to a team-based system of appraisal and pay. Although the idea of team317 based pay was something with which the Revenue was experimenting in a limited way, mention of the idea in the research interviews was met with almost universal suspicion and disapproval. Underlying this was a reluctance on the part of individuals to allow even a small part of their own earnings to depend directly on the performance of other people. Conclusions Before we try to draw out the broader implications of the form teamworking has taken on in the Inland Revenue, can we say that it has been successful? In the Inland Revenue we can take as a measure of success the ability to meet the increasing demands placed upon it by government, and, in particular, the ability to deal with the introduction of SA. If we return to the issues that we considered in our introduction we can see that there exist enormous difficulties in trying to establish the impact of teamworking or of human resource management practices more generally. Any attempt to isolate and quantify the effect of teamworking would almost certainly be futile. The impression gained from employees at all levels was that the successful transition to SA was certainly eased by teamworking and, if anything, might not have been achieved without it. As a less direct measure of success, we might also say that, on the whole, employee attitudes were positive: teamworking was recognized, widely accepted and, in some cases, enthusiastically received. As we have seen, teamworking in the Inland Revenue is of a particular form. The variety of work is little changed, employees exercise little in the way of new skills, and they appear reluctant to adopt responsibility for the work of others. From this last point, it should be noted, it might be inferred that there was little evidence of teamworking working through ‘‘concertive control’’. In addition to the lack of change in roles and responsibilities, moreover, the performance management system operates in a manner which appears to be directly at odds with teamworking. There certainly seems little evidence to support Cohen et al.’s (1996) suggestion that, because service work is more complex than manufacturing, teamworking will rely heavily on the development of a supportive organizational context. Indeed, a superficial analysis might conclude that teamworking does not exist at all. Teamworking, however, certainly carries meaning for those working in the Inland Revenue. For one thing, it is associated with a more facilitative management style, which, in turn, is linked to a willingness on the part of team members to enter into decisions about the distribution of a team allocation of work. Perhaps most importantly, teamworking represents the end to individual
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allocations of work. Individual targets still exist but the shift – small but significant – that seems to have taken place is that the individual target is seen much more as a component part of the team target. A comment from one RO seems to capture the spirit of this: ‘‘With teamworking we are doing the same jobs but we are doing them combined’’. One way of looking at this is that the team (or, more precisely, the team target) acts as a bridge between the individual and the organization. From the individual’s point of view, the team is small enough for them to feel that their contribution is significant; from the organization’s point of view – in this case, the office – the team is large enough for its performance to be significant. To paraphrase Mueller’s (1994) view of teamworking, what we have is the re-alignment of individual motivation and organizational rationality. What is interesting here is that there has been no attempt to achieve this through explicitly ‘‘normative’’ or ‘‘cultural’’ means. Teamworking may certainly have been able to draw on an existing ethos of public service, but the case presented here is in line with the down-playing of the normative aspect, which is suggested in the work of Cohen and Ledford (1994) and Wright and Edwards (1998). The analysis of our case also offers broad support to the approach of Dunphy and Bryant (1996). Thus, although a rather limited version of teamworking exists, the nature of the organization and of its production environment means that this limited version might be all that is needed. More generally, we might conclude, what we need is a better understanding of what an organization seeks to achieve from teamworking, of the way in which teamworking operates in that organization, and of the broader relationship between the two. References Barker, J. (1993), ‘‘Tightening the iron cage: concertive control in self-managing teams’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 38, pp. 408-37. Belbin, R.M. (1981), Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail, Heinemann, London. Belbin, R.M. (1993) Team Roles at Work, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford. Buchanan, D. (1994), ‘‘Principles and practice in work design’’, in Sisson, K. (Ed.), Personnel Management: a Comprehensive Guide to Theory and Practice in Britain, 2nd ed., Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 85-116. Cohen, S. and Ledford, G. (1994), ‘‘The effectiveness of self-managing teams: a quasi-experiment’’, Human Relations, Vol. 47 No. 1, pp. 13-42. Cohen, S., Ledford, G. and Spreitzer, G. (1996), ‘‘A predictive model of self-managing work team effectiveness’’, Human Relations, Vol. 49 No. 5, pp. 643-76. Cutcher-Gershenfeld, J. et al. (1994), ‘‘Japanese team-based work systems in North America: explaining the diversity’’, California Management Review, Vol. 37 No. 1, pp. 42-64. Delbridge, R., Lowe, J. and Oliver, N. (2000), ‘‘Worker autonomy in lean teams: evidence from the world automotive components industry’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan, London, pp. 125-42. Dunphy, D. and Bryant, B. (1996), ‘‘Teams: panaceas or prescriptions for improved performance?’’, Human Relations, Vol. 49 No. 5, pp. 677-99.
Ezzamel, M. and Willmott, H. (1998), ‘‘Accounting for teamwork: a critical study of group-based systems of organizational control’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 43, pp. 358-96. Findlay, P., McKinlay, A., Marks, A. and Thompson, P. (2000), ‘‘‘Flexible when it suits them’: the use and abuse of teamwork skills’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds) Teamworking, Macmillan, London, pp. 222-43. Harvey, N. and von Behr, M. (1994), ‘‘Group work in the American and German non-automotive metal-manufacturing industry’’, International Journal of Human Factors in Manufacturing, Vol. 4 No. 4, pp. 345-60. Lloyd, C. and Newell, H. (2000), ‘‘Selling teams to the salesforce: teamworking in the UK pharmaceutical industry’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan, London, pp. 183-202. Manz, C. and Sims, H. (1987), ‘‘Leading workers to lead themselves: the external leadership of self-managing work teams’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 32 No. 1, pp. 106-28. Martinez Lucio, M., Jenkins, S. and Noon, M. (2000), ‘‘Management strategy, union identity and oppositionalism: teamwork in the Royal Mail’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan, London, pp. 262-79. Mueller, F. (1994), ‘‘Teams between hierarchy and commitment: change strategies and the ‘internal environment’’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 31 No. 3, pp. 383-403. Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (2000), ‘‘Teamworking: strategy, structure, systems and culture’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan, London, pp. 3-24. Procter, S., Hassard, J. and Rowlinson, M. (1995), ‘‘Introducing cellular manufacturing: operations, human resources and high-trust dynamics’’, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol. 5 No. 2, pp. 46-64. Thompson, P. and Wallace, T. (1996), ‘‘Redesigning production through teamworking: case studies from the Volvo Truck Corporation’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 16 No. 2, pp. 103-18. Watson, T. and Rosborough, J. (2000), ‘‘Teamworking and the management of flexibility: local and social-structural tensions in high performance work design initiatives’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan, London, pp. 162-79. Wright, M. and Edwards, P. (1998), ‘‘Does teamworking work and, if so, why? A case study in the aluminium industry’’, Economic and Industrial Democracy, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 59-90.
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Collective and individual improvement activities: the role of reward systems Ma´ire Kerrin Institute of Work, Health and Organisations, Nottingham University Business School, Nottingham, UK, and
Nick Oliver The Judge Institute of Management Studies, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK Keywords Teams, Problem solving, Continuous improvement, Reward Abstract Mechanisms for increasing participation of employees in problem-solving activities such as continuous improvement (CI) programmes often include the use of problem-solving teams. Teams can support problem solving by emphasizing accountability for the production process within the work unit, thereby increasing the sense of responsibility for (local) problems. However, it is unclear how effort within these organisational forms should be rewarded. This article describes the use of problem-solving teams within a UK automotive component company, and examines the implications for human resource policy, in particular for the reward and recognition systems. The article outlines the outcomes that ensued when two reward systems existed, one for team-based activities and another for individual suggestions. The contradictions of the two systems are considered in the context of the organisation’s historical individualistic approach to reward systems.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 320-337. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486 DOI 10.1108/00483480210422732
The concept of teams Recent interest in teamworking and team-based organisation, particularly within manufacturing, has frequently centred on the relationship between teamworking and performance (Cohen et al., 1996; Dunphy and Bryant, 1996; MacDuffie, 1995). Although this issue has dominated research into teams in the manufacturing sector, an associated debate has emerged, which is concerned with the establishment of more accurate conceptualisations of teamworking (Dunphy and Bryant, 1996; Thompson and Wallace, 1996; Delbridge et al., 1997). One of the main outcomes of this has been a shift away from the assumption that teamworking is a unitary phenomenon. Teamworking, in the case company presented later, incorporated many of the structural features of what have been termed ‘‘lean production teams’’ (Cutcher-Gershenfeld et al., 1994). This is the same organisational configuration described by Womack et al. (1990) and MacDuffie (1995) in their research on car assembly operations. Delbridge et al. (1997) have also drawn on the work of Cutcher-Gershenfeld et al. (1994) and Mueller (1994) to provide a working definition of lean teams for their research. The structural characteristics of ‘‘lean teams’’ include:
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The presence of a formally recognised, hierarchically distinct team leader, who is part of the team and whose duties include some element of direct work. Clearly defined and relatively fixed membership. A span of control for team leaders that does not typically exceed 20 workers. A physical location around specific online production activities within clearly recognisable areas (Delbridge et al., 1997, p. 120).
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These structural characteristics are also present for the teams in our case study organisation and, as such, the working definition of ‘‘lean teams’’ is appropriate for the teams examined here. However, in this article, teamworking refers not only to structural characteristics but also to behaviour. Thus, structural characteristics are similar to those defined above; a system in which tasks are grouped around relatively self-contained activities (e.g. cells), with some autonomy of key functions, and flexible, multi-skilled roles. Responsibility for problem solving and improvement lies, in part, with the team, unlike scientific management, where such activities are largely the remit of specialist industrial engineers (Womack et al., 1990). Teamworking as behaviour refers to activities involving the sharing of information about problems, and co-operative working to solve these. ‘‘Pooling’’ of information lies at the heart of this, as represented in Figure 1. Teams are increasingly being used as primary work units within organisations (Guzzo and Dickson, 1996). In a survey reported by Lawler et al. (1992), 51 per cent of Fortune 1,000 companies reported having more than 20 per cent of employees in teams, which increased to 68 per cent in a follow-up survey (Lawler et al., 1995). Teamworking offers many advantages over the fragmented work characteristic of traditional production lines, particularly in relation to problem-solving and continuous improvement (CI) activities. Indeed, the nature of organisational forms required to increase participation in CI has recently attracted much debate (Berger, 1997; de Leede and Looise, 1999; Lindberg and Berger, 1997). Using the above conceptualisation of teams, the first part of the article discusses individual and team-based problem-solving and continuous improvement activities in relation to the role of reward systems. After setting
Figure 1. Structural and behavioural elements of teamwork
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the research in context and presenting the methodology, the results are presented and analysed. Reward systems Numerous rewards systems operate within organisations, often used as a key management tool that can contribute to a firm’s effectiveness by influencing individual and group behaviour (Lawler and Cohen, 1992). Compensation systems also deliver other objectives such as legal compliance, labour cost control, perceived fairness towards employees and the enhancement of employee performance to achieve high levels of productivity and customer satisfaction. The design of these systems may include pay for individual performance, pay for individual development, rewards based on the performance of small groups or teams and finally rewards based on division or organisational performance. It is the rewards for team and individual performance surrounding improvement programmes which are of interest here. The structure and allocation of rewards may affect the motivation of individual team members, and the inclusion of rewards is central to many models of work group effectiveness (Hackman, 1990). However, the impact of rewards on group effectiveness is unclear, and the models provide little guidance regarding the specific type of rewards that maximize particular outcomes in work groups (Magjuka and Baldwin, 1991). As DeMatteo et al. (1998) comment in their extensive review of team-based rewards, there is little research on specific guidance for designing rewards in team-based environments. Much of the existing research was conducted in laboratories under artificial conditions and only a fraction of studies have examined intact work groups in natural settings (McGrath, 1984). Even without this information, organisations have continued to practise team-based incentives. Traditional reward systems have been dominated by base payments determined by specific jobs, the need to maintain equity among employees, and the need to pay salaries and wages that are competitive in the marketplace. Under this system, individual employees were paid according to the skills they brought to the job and not encouraged or rewarded for flexibility, judgement or working with others. Some have argued that these reward systems, based on traditional, bureaucratic models of organisation have been overtaken by new organisational structures and work processes such as teamwork (Agarwal and Singh, 1998, p. 227). These traditional reward systems are based on the principles of scientific management, which emphasize a functional division of labour, hierarchical differentiation in authority and direct standardisation of work routines (Agarwal and Singh, 1998). Often, these types of reward system do not reward and reinforce the kinds of behaviours required by teamwork. As such, there may be an incongruency between traditional reward systems and the requirements of emerging forms of organisations (Lawler, 1990), such as the ‘‘lean model’’ (Womack et al., 1990). In contrast with such individual reward systems, team-based rewards comprise systems in which a portion of individual pay is contingent on
measurable group performance. Individual-based rewards, on the other hand, include incentive plans such as individual performance-related pay. Arguments for adopting team-based rewards include supporting team-based structures, fostering co-operation among team members (Tjosvold, 1986), promoting team productivity and overcoming limitations of larger group-based plans such as gainsharing (DeMatteo et al., 1998). With the growing emphasis on teamwork, many organisations are seeking better ways to link this emerging form of work to compensation. Limited data exist on the use of small group incentives in organisations, but data from Lawler et al.’s (1995) study of Fortune 1,000 companies report 70 per cent of them using some type of work group/team incentive. Kessler (2000) reports the example of Ethicon, a manufacturer of health-care products, which introduced a scheme in the early 1990s linking pay to the three measures of team performance – output, quality, and lead time. However, Kessler (2000) also provides evidence from an IPM study, which indicated that only 11 per cent of white-collar staff had team pay. There are differing views as to how team pay should be configured, with many suggesting that the application of individually-based reward systems may not necessarily support team-based approaches to work organisation (Zingheim and Schuster, 1997). Montemayor (1996) suggests that one of the most important factors to consider in designing pay systems for teams and work groups is the degree of task interdependence. That is, to what extent they are pooled (members work generally independently but combine their output), sequential (members perform tasks in a predetermined serial order), or reciprocal (doing the task requires a high level of interaction). He maintains that pooled interdependence calls for pay based on individual productivity, whereas sequential interdependence lends itself to team bonuses as a percentage of base pay (because base pay can reflect the differences in skill levels involved in the process). The paucity of examples of team-based pay may be related to the difficulties of operating such schemes in practice. Disadvantages of team-based reward systems are often explained in relation to theories of motivation. These include the difficulty that individual employees may have in seeing how their effort is translated into group performance on which rewards are based. There has also been criticism of the ability of teams to foster co-operation, with no effect being found for the type of reward system (individual, group or both) on co-operation, mutual assistance or job satisfaction (Wageman, 1996). Team-based rewards may also foster competition between teams, encouraging teams to focus on their own performance at the expense of other teams’ performance (Mohrman et al., 1992). This may lead to a reluctance to share information or assist other teams. This is especially problematic when the teams’ work is highly integrated with that of others (Gupta and Govingarajan, 1986; Lawler and Cohen, 1992), as in the case of problem-solving and continuous improvement initiatives.
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Problem solving, CI and rewards The increasing uptake of improvement activities and joint problem solving has led to questions about the rewards that employees should receive for this work. Commentators such as Toyoda (1988) and Imai (1986) argue that daily problem solving is part of the job and should be carried out without further reward. Fucini and Fucini (1990, p. 75) note that, in Mazda’s US plant, workers’ payback from CI is primarily financial but ‘‘reflected in future pay’’, relying on deferred gratification. Mazda informed the employees during the recruitment process that through kaizen they will have the opportunity to control the future success of the plant as well as their financial destiny. Where extra rewards for problem solving are offered, companies face choices regarding the type of reward (financial or non-financial), the size of the reward, the frequency with which rewards are provided and collective or individual systems. These choices are summarized in Figure 2. According to Bessant et al. (1994), the existence of clearly identifiable reward and recognition systems is important in developing and supporting CI activities, and in supporting small incremental improvements that are vital to successful CI (Imai, 1986). Two problem-solving mechanisms, suggestion schemes (individual-based) and quality circles (QCs) (team-based), that hold particular issues for the reward system, are discussed below. Individual activities – suggestion schemes Suggestion schemes are typically structured around individual rewards rather than work group rewards. They can provide motivation to participate in CI, as
Figure 2. Problem solving and rewards
most suggestion schemes are based on individual financial rewards (Bessant et al., 1994). Lillrank and Kano (1989, p. 70) describe how some Japanese companies will pay a nominal fee for each suggestion, once it is submitted, and credit will be given, even if the suggestion is not implemented. This is based on the premise that preparing a suggestion is a learning experience in itself, and that learning about why a suggestion was rejected will teach an employee about the production system and how it works. There are a number of potential problems that are posed by rewarding ideas via a suggestion scheme. The first is the extent to which rewards are actually effective in encouraging employees to contribute ideas and participate in the improvement process. The second problem concerns whether rewards should be awarded to individuals or teams. Companies differ in the rewards given. Some give none, others give one-off standard payments regardless of the impact of the suggestion, some make a one-off payment, the size of which is dependent on the savings made. Other rewards include bonus ‘‘points’’, where those making the suggestions are awarded a number of ‘‘points’’, depending on the savings made by the suggestion. These points can accumulate and be exchanged for gifts from catalogues (Imai, 1986). Bessant and Francis (1999) point out that direct financial rewards in proportion to the value of the suggestion – the basis of many ‘‘traditional’’ suggestion schemes – are not particularly effective. They suggest that this is because such systems tend to encourage the submission of ‘‘big’’ ideas, since only these are seen to have high potential reward, and because of their potentially divisive impact (‘‘Whose idea is it, anyway?’’). According to Bessant and Francis (1999), most recognition systems should reward the behaviour itself rather than the suggestion, and often involve giving a token reward for every idea, no matter how simple, and irrespective of whether the idea is implemented. Collective activities – quality circles (QCs) In quality circles (QCs), rewards may go to entire groups, which then have to decide how best to use the prize. Watanabe (1991) found that financial rewards are given to QCs in Japan. These can be up to one million yen for a suggestion leading to a patent, but he notes that the important point is that the reward is shared, as ‘‘workers usually pool small rewards to use for social activities such as parties and excursions’’. Watanabe (1991) and others (Lillrank and Kano, 1989) also argue that the proportion of unpaid quality circle (QC) work reported in the literature is exaggerated. Watanabe (1991) states that: ‘‘Unpaid activity outside regular working hours accounted for only 15 per cent on average and for less than 10 per cent in the largest firms’’ (p. 66). However, the significance may be in the size of the reward. Recent work by Oliver et al. (1998) found that, in their comparison of UK and Japanese organisations, rewards for suggestions in Japan were typically small, averaging around £15. In the UK, the typical reward per suggestion averaged around £130.
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Prizes to individuals, as in many suggestion schemes, may work against the team spirit of QCs. If a company recognises an inspired individual suggestion, the relevant QC may feel aggrieved at this, as they receive nothing, despite working on similar problems. Companies may try to avoid this pitfall by awarding team prizes only – in many companies there are no extra rewards for individuals, as it is expected that suggestions will be made as part of the normal job. In some systems, motivation may be provided through rewarding individuals or teams with recognition of their suggestions, which will be communicated and publicised through ‘‘employee of the month’’ or circulation of the idea around the factory. This system is not based on monetary gain but relies on the recognition of the contribution (Imai, 1986; Kamata, 1984). In examining the increasing use of problem-solving teams, Guzzo and Dickson (1996) observe that organisations face the challenge of determining how to pay and reward individuals in a team-based environment. As Adler and Cole (1993, p. 90) suggest: . . . if management want workers to contribute innovative ideas – to act as knowledge workers – then reward systems will need to be redesigned to look more like those used for knowledge workers.
Within this context, this article examines the issues that emerge when individual and team-based problem-solving activities are introduced in an organisation employing traditional reward systems. The questions that will be examined are: Why did the organisation adopt particular reward systems? How have past practices influenced the development of new pay systems? and How do the political and social influences affect the operation of such pay systems? Research methods The research on which the paper is based is drawn from a case of an automotive component plant located in the UK. The plant supplied products to car makers both nationally and internationally. In 1988, 75 per cent of the company was bought out by a Japanese company. The purchase was part of the Japanese company’s strategy to establish a European site to supply to their UK customers. The other 25 per cent of the company remained owned by a continental European components firm. The company used a wide range of contemporary manufacturing practices including just-in-time (JIT) production, statistical process control (SPC), cellular manufacturing, continuous improvement activities and JIT delivery of supplies. They had recently implemented teamworking, as described earlier, as part of a series of wider organisational changes. At the time of the research, the company had 840 employees at two different sites, approximately 25 miles apart. The largest (and main) site where the research was carried out had 700 employees and had expanded since the change of ownership in 1988. This site had no union representation. The smaller site was unionized, but the majority of workers were not represented.
The company ran a company council to deal with issues traditionally dealt with by the unions. As part of an ongoing research project, the first-named author gained open access to all areas of the factory but, in the interests of focus and depth, the research was confined to three production lines, which we shall call Line 1, Line 2 and Line 3. Different specifications of car and truck radiators were produced on each of these lines. There were some common processes which all the product lines used, such as a paint process and a degreasing process, but most of the products had their own machinery. There was some variation in the process for delivery of raw materials. For example, for Lines 1 and 2, the inward supply of raw materials (tubes) for the product came from the ‘‘tubes’’ and ‘‘stores’’ departments. These materials were delivered directly to the build section. For Line 3, however, the tubes were made from copper and were delivered to the line by an external supplier. Once the tubes were delivered, the parts were degreased, a further cleaning process was run, and then the product was assembled in a process called ‘‘build’’. The product then went through a furnace, before some final parts were attached and the product packed and despatched. The first author spent ten months as a full-time observer within the company, carrying out interviews, making observations and collecting company documentation on individual- and team-based problem-solving activities. Team meetings and weekly management meetings for each production line were attended. Field notes were taken and used alongside company documentation to provide information on problem-solving activities. Interviews, both structured and unstructured, were carried out at all levels of the organisation, including operators, team leaders (TLs), section leaders (SLs), cell managers, the improvement officer and the manufacturing director. Organisation of teams within the factory Shopfloor employees were organised into cells, each with a cell manager, a section leader (SL), and a number of team leaders (TLs), who had responsibility for between five and ten operators. The employees on the three production lines plus the supporting functions were the focus for most of the interviews and observations carried out in the course of the research. Each cell manager was ultimately responsible for all the products manufactured within their product line, which could include several products and customers. There were three SLs for each cell (one for the morning shift, one for the afternoon shift and one for nights), who had control over all the production processes for that area all the way through to delivery. The TLs were in charge of individual processes, for example, all the machines and operators in the ‘‘build’’ section. Individual operators had responsibility for their individual tasks, as allocated by the TL. All the manufacturing cells could call upon support from other areas within manufacturing, for example, production scheduling, or more frequently from quality. In particular, production engineering and quality had specific members
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allocated to each manufacturing cell, and these members would be involved in the weekly meetings for that cell. Progress reports were made on efficiency and productivity rates for each cell to a weekly management meeting, usually via the cell manager, SL or TL. Information concerning the plans and the targets for the organisation were conveyed by the manufacturing director (MD) to the cell managers in this meeting. One of the reasons why the cellular structure was introduced was to encourage employees to learn new skills and tasks (often displayed in the form of a training matrix). This enabled them to be moved around the cell into different jobs, as and when the SL or cell manager needed them. According to the MD, the new cell structure required less formal supervision, and also provided the opportunity of worker input into improvement activities. Owing to delays in layout changes within the factory, the transformation to a cellular structure was still under way in some parts of the factory at the time the research was conducted. Rewards for problem-solving and improvement activities One of the questions posed earlier was why the organisation adopted a particular reward system? Similar to the case presented by Harrison (1994), in this company the introduction of new manufacturing methods was accompanied by the abandonment of the traditional piece-rate system. In both cases, it was recognised that piece-work with the emphasis on output (regardless of whether or not the next process needed this output) was inappropriate to the new regime. Employees were now paid by the hour or by the month, regardless of what was produced. The piece-rate system had previously worked in combination with the individual suggestion scheme, which allowed employees to submit ideas with the chance of gaining income additional to their piece-rate money. When the new payment system was introduced, the suggestion scheme continued. Senior managers reported that at the time they felt that continuing the suggestion scheme would still provide employees with the opportunity for extra income, which they had lost to some extent since the abandonment of the piece-rate system. As such, these past practices still continued to influence the development of a new payment system. Specific problem-solving activities occurred within formal settings such as quality circles (QCs), improvement workshops, the suggestion scheme, as well as within production teams on a daily basis. The emphasis was on developing team-based problem solving and moving away from the traditional approach of specialist problem solving by engineers or personnel from the specialist quality function. Team-based QCs and improvement workshops within the factory had been introduced after the take-over from the Japanese parent company, and they were set up as voluntary activities and received no financial rewards. The emphasis was on the section or team leader to influence and encourage operators and others to join QCs. These met regularly, generally in normal working time. On occasions, members were rewarded by trips to other
companies to compare problem-solving activities, or awarded ‘‘top team’’ trophies. This was in contrast with the individual-based suggestion scheme, where employees who submitted successful ideas received 50 per cent of the savings in the first year and the idea implementer (usually the team leader or section leader) received 10 per cent of the saving. With these systems operating within the company, it was apparent that, while the individual and the implementer gained a financial reward in the suggestion scheme for an idea, the team improvement activities (QCs and improvement workshops) received no financial reward. Individual problem solving – the suggestion scheme An example of one of the suggestions put into the scheme illustrates the conflict that emerged from the different rewards offered for the team and individual improvement activities. An idea was put forward by an operator to adapt a machine to allow it to perform two operations instead of just one, and a team from his section worked on the idea. The idea was submitted to the suggestion scheme and after positive evaluation was implemented successfully. The operator who made the suggestion received 50 per cent of the first year’s savings – approximately £9,000. However, it was predominantly a team effort that made the suggestion work. To overcome potential grievances from co-workers, the operator gave each of the team that worked on the project £50 for helping him, but kept the rest. When asked about the size of the reward allocated to one member, the section leader (SL) commented that he did not ‘‘hold it against the operator’’ that he had received the reward, even though the improvement was a team effort involving other operators, an engineer and designers. However, the SL did not believe that this type of individual award was good for the development of QCs and improvement activities in the section, as it encouraged workers to ‘‘hold back’’ ideas. This issue was also raised by another SL who expressed concern about the impact of the financial rewards of the suggestion scheme. This SL felt that employees were not suggesting ideas in QCs, but holding them back in order to put them into the paid suggestion scheme. Once ideas were introduced within a QC, they belonged to the circle, for which there was no monetary reward. The SL was not confident that other non-financial rewards such as points, or trips to the US parent company for the teams involved in these QCs, were as salient as the financial rewards and benefits being offered through the suggestion scheme. However, there was evidence that the financial gain from the suggestion scheme encouraged operators to put forward ideas, which they perhaps would have been hesitant to do under normal circumstances. An example of this was an idea submitted to the scheme to reduce the manning levels on the furnace process, an idea which, if it had been suggested by management, would have almost certainly been confrontational. One TL, who was an operator at the time, explained that the potential financial reward from the group idea was the main factor in persuading the group to agree to the decrease in manning. When
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he thought of the idea, he knew that it would have to be put into the suggestion scheme as a group idea, as he needed the agreement of those working on the furnace. He was at first unsure what the reaction of the team would be. However, once he outlined the cost savings of the reduction in manning, and the 50 per cent reward they would receive, the operators on the furnace had no hesitation (after they had been given reassurances that they would be deployed elsewhere in the factory). Over time it emerged that the suggestion scheme was costing the organisation more money than it was gaining from the scheme. This was due to payments being made and ideas not being fully implemented, or payouts not being tied to permanent change. An example of the latter was a recycling idea for caps that were put on the product to prevent certain areas being painted as it went through the paint booth. As one operator explained: Like for one instance, you’ve got little caps on the end of the nozzle for when they’re painted and allochromed, to stop things going on the cap end of nozzle. His idea was to clean the caps, ‘cause what we used to do was throw the caps away. I mean you’ve got 240 caps and we were just throwing them away . . . 5p for each cap. So, he suggested to clean them. He worked on degreaser, so he put them in trich and tried cleaning them that way. Anyway, it clogged up the whole system of the degreaser . . . so what they did was that they’d get them back from paint line and what we’d used to do were put them on the floor, and roll around cap on floor with foot. He got paid out 1,400 quid.’’
The operator went on to explain that the employee who had made the suggestion was no longer on that process and the idea was not being implemented all the time: He’s not on the job and the lads that are on degreaser now, they do it, but they don’t do it as often as they should do, cause they’re not going to get paid for it. He got paid out whatever much and they got nowt. They’ve got no interest in the job really, in doing it. Plus it’s not timed into your job. It’s an extra job you’re doing on that degreaser you see and there’s no timings for it.
Team-based improvement workshops Observations and interviews during and after one improvement workshop also highlighted conflict between the team-based activities (which were not financially rewarded) and those of the individual suggestion scheme (which were financially rewarded). Members of these workshops were drawn from one product line along with staff from specialist departments (e.g. quality, production scheduling) and worked as a team over a specified period of time. The brief was to identify and carry out as many improvements as possible on one product over a three-month period. The team worked together for three full days at the beginning of the process and then met regularly for updates and progress. The first day of the improvement workshop was dedicated to touring the area targeted for the workshop and using brainstorming techniques to generate ideas for improvement. The second day was devoted to implementing these ideas, or at least investigating their feasibility. One idea suggested by the team was to save energy by turning machines off when they were not being used. Part of the investigation was to find out how much energy was used per
machine, and work out the cost savings if they were turned off. When the investigating member arrived at the Engineer’s office, he found the Engineer surprised at the request, as someone had put in the same idea to the suggestion scheme that morning. If the idea proved viable, the individual submitting the suggestion would receive the financial reward. The TL involved on the workshop was suspicious of this coincidence and believed that someone had leaked the idea from the workshop and passed it on to a friend, with the intention of splitting any profit. The incident highlighted the fact that the person who puts an idea into the suggestion scheme would gain some financial reward, while the workshop members would receive nothing. This fact was not lost on the team and during the coffee-break they discussed the issue, accusing one another of ‘‘letting the cat out of the bag’’. Even the team leader (TL) admitted that one of the team must have been responsible for the leak. Team-based quality circles (QCs) Quality circles (QCs) were carried out on a frequent basis to address particular problems arising from within the line, or by the QC team identifying their own areas for improvement on which to work. The QCs consisted of a mixture of operators, TLs and SLs from the line, with specialists brought into the circle as needed. QC membership changed when the project finished, as the managers tried to ensure that all operators were involved at some time or another. The quality assurance (QA) manager involved in setting up many of the QCs was also frustrated with the conflict between the behaviour encouraged by the financial rewards of the suggestion scheme and participation in the nonfinancially rewarded QCs that he was attempting to encourage. One illustration of this involved an incident in which an operator had submitted an idea into the suggestion scheme. The suggestion scheme committee informed the operator that the idea had not been accepted as viable. However, a few months later a QC came up with a similar idea and implemented it. The operator who had submitted the idea to the scheme did not receive any reward, as it was the QC that had implemented the idea. The operator complained that the innovation was his original idea that had been slightly adapted and then implemented by the QC. The incident caused difficulties for the legitimacy of the QCs and generated bad publicity for the various problem-solving activities. As the incident had encouraged mistrust in both the suggestion scheme and the QCs, the QA manager negotiated with senior management to award the 50 per cent cost saving to the operator. There were further instances of ideas being taken and implemented by people other than the originator of the idea. For example, one operator reported an idea to his TL about how more products could be put into a process at one time. He felt that it would be a good idea for the suggestion scheme, or the QC currently running in that area, to investigate the idea. They briefly discussed it but nothing was formally documented, nor was it presented at the QC meeting. A couple of weeks later the operator came in to find that the TL had begun to introduce the same idea:
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I mentioned to the TL about increasing productivity on [ABs] line. With [ABs], we now put 120 on a carrier, before we only used to put 80 on a carriage. And I said to him . . . it’s a two bar set up and I’m sure you can get three bars because they are only pretty small. Get three bars on that, there’ll be just enough gap . . . And that were it. I just left it with him. I changed shifts and this that and t’other happened and I come in one day and it were set up for the three bar. So I said, ‘‘ohh nice one, did you put in through the scheme?’’, so he says ‘‘Oh, no it’s not your idea, it’s Tony and John’s’’.
The operator was disappointed that he was not credited for the idea or the savings incurred and blamed the TL for not following up the idea when it was originally mentioned: I said to him, it was my idea, I told you this ages ago, but he didn’t follow it up. The ideas thing is, I give it to you [TL] and you follow it up so . . . They got paid out . . . It hadn’t gone through when I first said it . . . I’d just mentioned it to him [TL] and said you could get three on this and he didn’t take it any further or fill the forms in. If he had have done, I’d have been paid out, not them.
Outcomes of the reward policies These examples illustrate how existing reward and recognition systems at the company, based on non-financial team rewards and financial individual rewards, created conflict between different improvement activities. The outcomes from this conflict are discussed below. The value of ideas A number of outcomes emerged as a result of the individual-based suggestion scheme payouts. First, the suggestion scheme tended to generate only big ideas that would have a large payback. Owing to the nature of the rewards offered (proportional to the cost saving of the idea), operators tended to suggest ‘‘big’’ ideas which would bring large monetary rewards and the less significant ideas were ignored, or not submitted at all. This was evident in the large average payouts from the suggestion scheme, for example, £579.65 in the year previous to the research. Some SLs and senior managers felt that many other suggestions which might have improved work procedures or cross-functional relations had not been put forward, as there may not have been a quantifiable cost saving. As a consequence, small incremental improvements were not made, as they were not seen to be of any immediate financial benefit, either to the organisation or to the individuals involved. These findings support those by Oliver et al. (1998), who found that the substantial awards available in the UK meant that employees were reluctant to put suggestions forward until they felt that the suggestions were ‘‘mature’’. In the same way, employees at the case study kept back ideas until they felt that they would receive a large reward. It also supports Bessant and Francis’s (1999) argument that ‘‘traditional’’ suggestion schemes, like that operating within the case study, only encourage the submission of ‘‘big ideas’’. A second outcome was that employees were holding back ideas in the teambased QCs and improvement workshops (which did not offer financial rewards), in order to submit them to the suggestion scheme (which did offer
financial rewards). In addition, because the idea implementer (often the TL) received 10 per cent of the savings, only the big ideas were followed up and worked upon. Even TLs reported ‘‘banking’’ ideas, holding on to them either as bargaining tools within management meetings, or until they were certain that the idea would work and therefore merit a reward. This system did not encourage the incremental improvements discussed earlier, which Imai (1986) suggests are vital to CI. A final outcome of the individual-based reward scheme was that it was often used to the advantage of operators at the expense of management. An example of this was when a group of operators at the final stage of the process were not consulted on the best way to pack the products in the boxes, and instead were given a prescribed method by senior management. The operators, rather than being upset by this, simply spent the rest of the year submitting numerous suggestions on how to improve the packing, receiving money for the ideas that were implemented. The TL argued that, if they had been asked in the first place, it would have saved the company money in suggestion scheme payouts. These examples demonstrate the historical and individual nature of the suggestion scheme, which would make it difficult for management to introduce a new non-financial team-based reward for improvements. The socially accepted practice of saving up big ideas until they were ‘‘ripe’’ for the suggestion box had advantages for many, including the TL. In many cases, the TL was politically motivated to ensure that certain ideas were followed through, while others were left, not because they were better ideas, but because they had the higher financial rewards if they were implemented. In order to overcome the current individual-based system, team-based improvement activities must offer something over and above the traditional use of monetary rewards to motivate workers. Competency- or skill-based rewards may be one way where participation in workshops and team-based activities would contribute to skill development. The development of a ‘‘market’’ for ideas These examples illustrate the contradictory nature of the policies that existed in this organisation in relation to problem solving and CI activities. On the one hand, QCs emphasised teamwork, but the suggestion scheme emphasised individuality, and the allocation of rewards between these systems differed vastly. One approach to the analysis of this is to examine issues of economics and politics. It appeared that, due to the contradictions that existed in the types of reward offered, a market had evolved to deal with the ‘‘commodification of ideas and knowledge’’ for problem-solving activities. The examples illustrate the creation of a new market within the organisation, which dealt in ideas and knowledge, and where the systems and policies that existed at the time appeared to encourage this. The emergence of a market where ideas became a commodity to be traded in, held back by TLs/SLs in management meetings until a later date, or held back by operators in QCs, was totally the outcome from this process. The payment of large sums of money for ideas contributed to
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this market, and to the political processes involved in ensuring that an idea was followed up by the TL or SL. In the same way, the ‘‘stealing’’ (or implementing slightly adapted versions) of ideas by those in powerful positions for their own gain is a further illustration of the way that ideas had become commodities. This ‘‘market trading’’ thrived under a reward system which offered differing rewards between teams and individuals in problem-solving and CI activities. Implications Many authors (Storey, 1992; Legge, 1995; Oliver and Wilkinson, 1992; Delbridge and Turnbull, 1992; Lowe, 1993) have pointed out how the implementation of manufacturing methods such as JIT and total quality control (TQC), or in this case problem-solving activities, carries significant implications for human resource policy. The evidence presented here shows that there are several challenges for reward and recognition policies when moving to team-based problem solving. The results of this study support the findings of Zingheim and Schuster (1997), namely that existing, individuallybased reward systems are inappropriate for team-based approaches to problem solving and improvement. Research by Smith and Elger (1998) suggests that UK workers actively avoid organisations that do not pay extra for CI and QC activities, seeing such activities as additional hassles or duties. This demonstrates the difficulties in designing reward systems for problem-solving activities. In the case study organisation, similar contradictions had emerged, where a new system (primarily non-financial and team-based) had been introduced in parallel with an old system (financial and individual-based). The difficulties experienced by the case company were linked to its organisational culture and history, in particular, the long history of individualism emphasised by the piece rate approach to payment that had only recently been removed in the last few years. As such, individuals held on to ideas for individual financial gain or to trade in when needed. As Snell and Dean (1994) have proposed, where organisations have replaced individuals with groups as the primary work unit, team rewards should be adopted to support this. One of the rationales behind the creation of teams is to foster co-operation to support problem solving and CI (Bessant and Caffyn, 1997). However, the analysis of this company demonstrates that there will be little chance of real cooperation developing, if ideas become a commodity to be traded. It could be argued that many of the process elements outlined in Figure 1, in particular, cooperative behaviour and the pooling of information, will not develop where contradictory reward and recognition policies exist. Most problem-solving and improvement activities rely on mechanisms within team-based QCs or improvement workshops, where ideas are openly offered and discussed without the threat of individuals gaining from them financially. Team-based non-financial approaches will inevitably suffer, while parallel systems exist which reward individuals with large sums of money for ideas. The case study organisation adopted teams without considering the contradictory nature of existing HR systems such as reward and recognition. The challenge will be in
addressing these factors, so that this ‘‘market’’ for ideas no longer exists. Assessing the choices presented in Figure 2 according to organisational needs and context may be one way of achieving this. Conclusions When selecting motivational systems for problem-solving activities, many companies will be restricted to maintaining systems that have traditionally been used, and may find it difficult to move from one system to another. There are choices to be made but, increasingly, team-based and individual activities will operate simultaneously. As Adler and Cole (1993) highlight, it is important for organisations to select the appropriate system for their situation, which will provide increased participation in CI, and may have beneficial effects on absenteeism and job satisfaction. They also note that problems will arise if manufacturing processes and CI activities are built around the concept of teams, but rewards for CI activities remain primarily based on individual rewards. One of the key questions posed by DeMatteo et al. (1998) is how can multiple reward practices be used to reinforce and encourage high levels of individual performance and, at the same time, foster teamwork among individuals? Some researchers have suggested that, rather than choosing either individual- or group-based incentives, a combination of the two incentive strategies may be more effective in motivating performance at the individual level and cooperation at the team level (Heneman and von Hippel, 1995; Pearce and Ravlin, 1987). In this study, the use of multiple reward practices was not effective and the traditional individual reward system actively worked against team-based problem solving. This led to the situation where ideas were traded as commodities within the factory. Further research and analysis of the contradictory effects of existing HR practices on the introduction of team-based problem-solving activities are needed. The costs and benefits of individual versus collective problem-solving schemes also require further exploration. References Adler, P.S. and Cole, R.E. (1993), ‘‘Designed for learning: a tale of two auto plants’’, Sloan Management Review, Spring, pp. 33-45. Agarwal, N. and Singh, P. (1998), ‘‘Organizational rewards for a changing workplace: an examination of theory and practice’’, International Journal of Technology Management, Vol. 16 Nos 1/2/3, pp. 225-38. Berger, A. (1997), ‘‘Continuous improvement and kaizen: standardization and organisational designs’’, Integrated Manufacturing Systems, Vol. 8 No. 2, pp. 110-17. Bessant, J. and Caffyn, S. (1997), ‘‘High involvement innovation through continuous improvement’’, International Journal of Technology Management, Vol. 14 No. 1, pp. 7-28. Bessant, J. and Francis, D. (1999), ‘‘Developing strategic continuous improvement capability’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 19 No. 11, pp. 1106-19. Bessant, J., Caffyn, S., Gilbert, J., Harding, R. and Webb, S. (1994), ‘‘Rediscovering continuous improvement’’, Technovation, Vol. 14 No. 1, pp. 17-29. Cohen, S., Ledford, G. and Spreitzer, G. (1996), ‘‘A predictive model of self-managing work team effectiveness’’, Human Relations, Vol. 49 No. 5, pp. 643-76.
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Cutcher-Gershenfeld, J. et al. (1994), ‘‘Japanese team-based work systems in North America: explaining diversity’’, California Management Review, Vol. 37 No. 1, pp. 42-64. de Leede, J. and Looise, J.K. (1999), ‘‘Continuous improvement and the mini-company concept’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 19 No. 11, pp. 1188-202. Delbridge, R. and Turnbull, P. (1992), ‘‘Human resource maximization: the management of labour under a just-in-time manufacturing system’’, in Blyton, P. and Turnbull, P. (Eds), Reassessing Human Resource Management, Sage Publications, London. Delbridge, R., Lowe, J. and Oliver, N. (1997), ‘‘Who does what under team working? Managerial perception of employee roles and responsibilities in contemporary manufacturing’’, presented at the International Teamworking Workshop, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, September. DeMatteo, J.S., Eby, L.T. and Sundstom, E. (1998), ‘‘Team-based rewards: current empirical evidence and directions for future research’’, Research in Organizational Behavior, Vol. 20, pp. 141-83. Dunphy, D. and Bryant, B. (1996), ‘‘Team: panaceas or prescriptions for improved performance?’’, Human Relations, Vol. 49 No. 5, pp. 677-99. Fucini, J.J. and Fucini, S. (1990), Working for the Japanese, Free Press, New York, NY. Gupta, A.K. and Govindarajan, J. (1986), ‘‘Resource sharing among SBUs and administrative implications’’, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 29, pp. 695-714. Guzzo, R.A. and Dickson, M.W. (1996), ‘‘Teams in organisations: recent research on performance effectiveness’’, Annual Review of Psychology, Vol. 47, pp. 307-38. Hackman, J.R. (1990), Groups That Work (and Those That Don’t): Creating Conditions for Effective Team Work, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA. Harrison, A. (1994), ‘‘Just-in-time manufacturing’’, in Storey, J. (Ed.), New Wave Manufacturing Strategies – Organizational and Human Resource Management Dimensions, Paul Chapman, London. Heneman, R.L. and von Hippel, C. (1995), ‘‘Balancing group and individual rewards: rewarding individual contributions to the team’’, Compensation and Benefits Review, Vol. 27 No. 4, pp. 63-8. Imai, M. (1986), Kaizen – the Key to Japan’s Competitive Success, Random House, New York, NY. Kamata, S. (1984), Japan in the Passing Lane, Unwin, London. Kessler, I. (2000), ‘‘Renumeration systems’’ in Bach, S. and Sissons, K. (Eds), Personnel Management: A Comprehensive Guide to Theory and Practice, Blackwell, Oxford. Lawler, E.E. (1990), Strategic Pay, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA. Lawler, E.E. and Cohen, S.G. (1992), ‘‘Designing pay systems for teams’’, ACA Journal, Vol. 1, pp. 6-19. Lawler, E.E., Mohrman, S. and Ledford, G. (1992), Employee Involvement and Total Quality Management: Practices and Results in Fortune 1000 Companies, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA. Lawler, E.E., Mohrman, S. and Ledford, G. (1995), Creating High Performance Organizations: Practices and Results of Employee Involvement and TQM in Fortune 1000 Companies, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA. Legge, K. (1995), Human Resource Management: Rhetorics and Realities, Macmillan, London. Lillrank, P. and Kano, N. (1989), Continuous Improvement: Quality Control Circles in Japanese Industry, Centre for Japanese Studies, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI. Lindberg, P. and Berger, A. (1997), ‘‘Continuous improvement: design, organization and management’’, International Journal of Technology Management, Vol. 14 No. 1, pp. 86-101.
Lowe, J. (1993), ‘‘Manufacturing reform and the changing role of the production supervisor: the case of the automobile industry’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 30 No. 5, pp. 739-58. MacDuffie, J.P. (1995), ‘‘Human resource bundles and manufacturing performance: organizational logic and flexible production systems in the world auto industry’’, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Vol. 48 No. 2, pp. 197-221. McGrath, J.E. (1984), Groups: Interaction and Performance, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Magjuka, R.J. and Baldwin, T.T. (1991), ‘‘Team-based employee involvement programs: effects of design and administration’’, Personnel Psychology, Vol. 44, pp. 793-812. Mohrman, A.M., Mohrman, S.A. and Lawler, E.E. (1992), ‘‘The performance management of teams’’, in Bruns, W.J. Jr (Ed.), Performance Measurement, Evaluation, and Incentives, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, MA, pp. 217-41. Montemayor, E.F. (1996), ‘‘Congruence between pay policy and competitive strategy in highperforming firms’’, Journal of Management, Vol. 22, pp. 889-908. Mueller, F. (1994), ‘‘Teams between hierarchy and commitment: change strategies and the ‘internal environment’’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 31 No. 3, pp. 383-404. Oliver, N. and Wilkinson, B. (1992), The Japanization of British Industry. New Developments in the 1990s, Blackwell, Oxford. Oliver, N., Delbridge, R. and Lowe, J. (1998), ‘‘Japanization on the shopfloor’’, Employee Relations, Vol. 20 No. 3, pp. 248-60. Pearce, J.A. and Ravlin, E.C. (1987), ‘‘The design and activation of self-regulating work groups’’, Human Relations, Vol. 11, pp. 751-82. Smith, C. and Elger, T. (1998), ‘‘Greenfields and ‘wildebeests’: management strategies and labour turnover in Japanese firms in Telford’’, Employee Relations, Vol. 20 No. 3, pp. 271-84. Snell, S.A. and Dean, J.W. (1994), ‘‘Strategic compensation for integrated manufacturing: the moderating effects of jobs and organizational inertia’’, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 37, pp. 1109-40. Storey, J. (1992), Developments in the Management of Human Resources, Blackwell, Oxford. Thompson, P. and Wallace, T. (1996), ‘‘Redesigning production through teamworking: case studies from the Volvo Truck Corporations’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 16 No. 2, pp. 103-16. Tjosvold, D. (1986), ‘‘The dynamics of interdependence in organizations’’, Human Relations, Vol. 39, pp. 517-40. Toyoda, E. (1988), Toyota: Fifty Years in Motion, Kodansha International, Tokyo. Wageman, R. (1996), ‘‘Interdependence and group effectiveness’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 40, pp. 145-80. Watanabe, S. (1991), ‘‘The Japanese quality control circle’’, Industrial Labour Review, Vol. 130 No. 2, pp. 57-80. Womack, J.P., Jones, D.T. and Roos, D. (1990), The Machine That Changed the World, Rawson Macmillan, New York, NY. Zingheim, P.K. and Schuster, J.R. (1997), ‘‘Best practices for small-team pay’’, ACA Journal, Vol. 6 No. 1, pp. 40-9.
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The mini-company A specification of sociotechnical business systems Jan de Leede and Jan Kees Looise Faculty Technology and Management, University of Twente, The Netherlands, and
Maarten Verkerk Philips Components B.V., Roermond, The Netherlands Keywords Teamwork, Sociotechnics, Market orientation, Teams, Systems development Abstract Sociotechnical systems theory (STS) does not address in full the implications of the team-context relations, despite its open systems character. There is a need to open STS into a sociotechnical business systems (STBS) theory and practice. We observe three interrelated aspects that are important for STBS. First, the design of the production structure is a traditional STS aspect. Second, the design of the control structure on the team level needs an elaboration compared with STS. The third aspect is the social-dynamic alignment. We describe the minicompany concept and argue that this concept is a specification of STBS covering the three aspects. The case of the implementation of mini-companies in a Dutch manufacturing plant illustrates the strengths of the concept.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 338-355. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486 DOI 10.1108/00483480210422741
The need for an external orientation in sociotechnical systems theory It is striking to observe the recurrent criticism on sociotechnical systems (STS) theory, regarding the ignorance of the influence of the business environment on the organisation. It is striking, because STS is an open systems approach from the outset. Being an open systems approach simply should imply the integration of a comprehensive set of functional requirements including the business environment (de Sitter et al., 1997). Nevertheless, STS tends to be concentrated on the internal organisation, without paying much attention to the impact of the outside world on the design and functioning of the organisation. Several authors raised this criticism, from both a theoretical and a management perspective (Pasmore, 1988; van Eijnatten, 1993; de Sitter et al., 1997; Adler and Docherty, 1998). Classical STS theory has stressed the importance of the employees’ point of view, in an attempt to redesign mainstream Tayloristic practices (see, for example, the characteristics of a ‘‘good job’’ of Emery and Thorsrud (1976)). Despite the good starting-points available in the theory of incorporating the environment into the organisation (Trist, 1981), the external focus never comes to the fore. Therefore, the implications of a consistent application of open systems theory on all levels are still calling for full elaboration. This is even more the case, since nowadays not only is flexibility – the most valuable contribution of STS so far – necessary, but also the
innovative capacity of the whole company. Quite recently, some attempts have been made to include the business environment within sociotechnical theory and practice. One line of literature is close to STS (Adler and Docherty, 1998; Majchrzak, 1997; Taylor and Felten, 1993). Especially, the concept of control capacity of the primary work groups needs to be included with business requirements. In addition, classical sociotechnical concepts like ‘‘variance control analysis’’ and ‘‘social systems analysis’’ should include more market-orientation. Adler and Docherty (1998) coined the term ‘‘sociotechnical business systems’’. This is a well-chosen term, because it is precisely pointing at the business side of organisational systems, implying openness and an external orientation. A second line of literature stems from small-group research and is focusing on the team-context interaction (Gladstein, 1984; Gersick, 1988; Ancona, 1990; Ancona and Caldwell, 1992). These studies reveal several important team strategies and insights on boundary management that can be made fruitful to STS theory. Parallel with these lines of research we performed our studies on selfmanaging teams and their contribution to improvements. In this article we describe a case-study concerning the design and implementation of so-called ‘‘mini-companies’’, that is a good illustration of bringing business into sociotechnical systems theory and practice. Here we are able to show the implications of both lines of literature on the shopfloor. The concept of the minicompany, stemming from the new production concept ‘‘The new shopfloor management’’ (Suzaki, 1993), seems to be quite close to the need we just described. The conceptual basis of the mini-company is to a certain extent comparable with STS. However, two characteristics of the mini-company concept are an enrichment of STS theory. These include the strong marketorientation by using the client-supplier relationships and the strong potential towards improvement and innovation on the shopfloor. In the first part of the article, we analyse the two lines of research (STS and small group research). In addition, we introduce the concept of the minicompany. We analyse this concept, showing the link with the organisational context in which the mini-companies are embedded. We introduce two concepts to analyse the context: structural and social-dynamic alignment. In the second part of the article, we present an in-depth case study of an application of the mini-company concept at a manufacturing plant of Philips. Both qualitative (document analysis, observation and interviews) and quantitative (surveys) methods are used to demonstrate the effects of the minicompanies within this plant. The case makes perfectly clear that the strong structural alignment of the mini-companies has to be supplemented by a careful management of the social-dynamic alignment of the mini-companies. Especially, the power and trust relations of the member of the mini-company with their relevant environment are of decisive importance. In the third part of the article, we discuss these outcomes in the light of the sociotechnical systems theory. We argue that STS theory needs to be
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elaborated with some concepts related to the mini-company concept. We outline some implications for both theory and practice. External relationships of primary work groups In this section we explore whether and how the business relations of primary work groups are dealt with in existing literature. Two lines of literature are discussed. The first line of literature is closely connected to the STS tradition, whereas the second line of literature stems from small group research. After the literature search we will present the mini-company concept. Sociotechnical systems (STS) Following van Eijnatten (1993), we can identify four different streams of contemporary STS, which are geographically distinct: the Australian, the North American, the Scandinavian, and the Dutch approach of STS. In these four different streams of STS we recognise some relevant concepts regarding our topic of the impact of business relations on primary work groups. In this section we describe these relevant conceptual developments briefly. The Australian variant – participative design – is truly a participative approach, breaking away from the traditional expert approach. Tools developed in this approach are the search conference, the participative design workshop and some skill-analysis techniques (Emery, 1993). It is heavily oriented towards learning to learn and learning to participate. The search conference, as a vertical slice of the organisation discussing the future of the organisation, deals with the place of the organisation within the environment. With so much emphasis on process and local knowledge, rather than content, it is difficult to develop general concepts regarding business relations of primary work groups. The North-American variant – modern sociotechnical systems design – is highly influenced by consultancy firms. This variant is very much related to the quality of work-life programmes. In the 1990s, many projects were carried out under team labels: empowerment, self-directed teams, high-commitment teams, high-performance teams, and so on. Taylor and Felten (1993) provide an overview of the STS-thinking in North America. They stress among other things the understanding of the business in which a company is involved and the focus on the product of the STS approach. In the variance control analysis they emphasise the centrality of the employees in delivering the product. Key variances should be controlled by the group of employees where the variances occur. They also indicate the need for competence development for workers to control these key variances and to understand the environment of the company. Still, it remains unclear in the variance control analysis how purpose and product are related to the work organisation and the employees. Furthermore, in the summing-up of design principles, Taylor and Felten (1993) touch on boundary location and power and authority, without making it clear what specific kind of boundaries and authorities is essential. The examples they provide are typical mainstream STS implementations, very successful in
increasing internal control of the teams, but less successful in increasing the control of the teams over business responsibilities. The Scandinavian variant of STS – democratic dialogue – goes beyond the company level, emphasising the formation of network and open communication between the partners. Local knowledge should be developed in sharing information from other companies. Adler and Docherty (1998) claim that, next to the widely cited LOM-program, on democratic dialogue (Gustavsen, 1992), many other studies focus on primary work group control, including the development of business control and customer contact for these work group members. Therefore, their conception of STBS is a natural next step in the development. The Dutch variant – integral organisation renewal – offers a detailed design approach, claiming an integral approach to such diverse phenomena as quality of the organisation, quality of work life and quality of labour relations through the design of the architecture of the systems structure. de Sitter et al. (1997, p. 503) recognise that the open systems approach is much more than only QWL and therefore ‘‘functional requirements with respect to customers, the physical environment, the labour market, suppliers of capital, workers, etc. should be regarded as equivalent’’. The concepts as developed and used within the Dutch variant include the distinction between the production structure, the control structure and the information structure, as well as the logic of designing them in this sequence. Detailed design principles regarding the parallelisation and segmentation of product flows are given. The aim is to reduce the complexity of the organisation and to create primary work groups that are responsible for the whole product flow, from the beginning to the end. As such, this is a promising starting-point for primary work groups having control over purpose, context and system dynamics. On a conceptual level, the work of de Sitter (1994) on control capacity of primary work groups seems to be sufficient, for instance, his decision table is rather comprehensive, including internal/external decisions and routine/ non-routine decisions. However, a close examination of the detailed design principles at work group level (Kuipers and van Amelsvoort, 1990) reveals that the words ‘‘customer’’ and ‘‘market’’ are not even mentioned at all. Also the industrial applications do not illustrate the far-reaching possibilities of the theory. With respect to the external orientation, Verkerk et al. (1997) and de Leede (1997) take the Dutch STS variant one step further. They developed the minicompany concept of Suzaki (1993) both conceptually and in practice within a STS context. Within the mini-company concept the primary work groups do have interactions with the clients and suppliers. The primary work groups manage their business relations, both internal and external to the company. We explain this concept in detail at the end of this section. Sociotechnical business systems (STBS) Adler and Docherty (1998) outlined the need for bringing business into STS. It is based on two observations. The first observation – put forward as a taken-
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for-granted claim – is that in today’s competitive world, many, if not all, companies need dynamic effectiveness, that is, they need to be able to adjust, develop and innovate both products and processes. The second observation is that classical STS, although it is founded in general systems theory, did not address fully these issues. It was oriented towards the internal aspects of the system, with the employees at the shopfloor as the principal stakeholder. The exchanges between the market and the company were seen as belonging to the spheres of the management. Only developments in the last decade or so gradually seem to acknowledge the importance of dynamic contextual aspects at the micro level of the primary work group. Adler and Docherty (1998) present their picture of STBS as the next step in the development of STS. The basic issue still lies within the amount and the character of control available to the members of the primary work group. They define STBS: . . . as systems in which primary work groups have a high degree of actual control over purpose, context, and system dynamics. This high degree of control creates prerequisites for primary work groups to perform business discretion within the top management vision (Adler and Docherty, 1998, p. 328).
Control of purpose means that the primary work groups may have discretion in the formulation of business goals and may exercise discretion in decisions in relation to their customers. Control of context entails the development of direct links between the primary work groups and key groups in the environment of the organisation, such as customers. Control of system dynamics means that the primary work groups have discretion in learning and competence development, related to product and process development. In short, in STBS each unit has business responsibilities and maintains relationships with its environment. These business responsibilities and control issues are extensions from mainstream STS thinking. They are in line, because within STS a strong emphasis has always been laid on enhancing work group autonomy. But the proposals of Adler and Docherty are also one step beyond mainstream STS. In the STS literature these issues are put forward as too far for the primary work groups, although some authors are close, as we have seen. At least, it is safe to state that in STS applications, in practice, these far-reaching control issues never have been realised, as several evaluations of STS-inspired, autonomous work group implementations demonstrate (Pearce and Ravlin, 1987; Pearson, 1992; Cohen and Ledford, 1994; Wright and Edwards, 1998). However, we must also acknowledge that the two cases Adler and Docherty (1998) provide are not typical contexts for STS implementations. The first case is a small company producing standard electrical products, with skilled workers. The size and growth of the company, from six employees in 1989 to 63 employees in 1995, make it an atypical example. Nevertheless the teams of skilled workers have a considerable amount of responsibilities and authority. The second case concerns a business unit of a large, multinational, knowledgebased company developing high technology applications. The primary work
groups here are examples of product development project teams, which makes them atypical. Boundary management in teams The second line of research in external relationships of primary work groups stems from the huge stream of small-group research. Similar to STS, the majority of small-group research is focused on internal group dynamics. Only a few studies focus on external activities of teams. It is this type of studies that examines the external behaviours of teams, which could be of interest to our topic. This type of behaviour is called ‘‘boundary management’’ (Gladstein, 1984), as distinct from the traditional functions of task and maintenance activities (Benne and Sheats, 1948). Group research from an external perspective does not ignore the internal dynamics, but is focused on the influence of the environment on internal team dynamics and on the impact of the team on the environment. The basic underlying hypothesis from the external perspective on group level is analogous to that of the resource dependence theory (Pfeffer and Salancik, 1978) on organisation level. Those teams that manage their environment and are able to obtain critical resources will perform better than those who are only able to manage their internal dynamics. Examples are easy to find on group level. Shopfloor teams are often complaining about the suppliers or clients that are not delivering the right resources and therefore causing trouble in meeting the goals. Or they complain about the support groups that only disturb their smooth operation. Despite the fact that in many cases it is used as an excuse of under-performance, it points to the important observation that groups are to a large extent dependent on the environment. One of the issues in the external perspective has been the external-oriented team roles, such as boundary spanner, gatekeeper or star. These are labels for team members who interact with the environment of the team. Here, we pay attention to another issue: the external strategies which teams exercise in dealing with people and groups in the environment (Ancona, 1990; Ancona and Caldwell, 1992). Ancona and Caldwell (1992) develop a number of external team strategies based on their analysis of external activities of several new product development teams of high-technology firms. They label these external team strategies as ‘‘ambassadorial’’, ‘‘technical scouting’’, ‘‘isolationist’’ and ‘‘comprehensive’’. The ambassadorial strategy means that the team’s external activities are concentrated on buffering and representational activities. Team members employing these activities protect the team from outside pressures and secure resources. The technical scouting strategy combined scouting activities and task co-ordination. That means that these teams have behaviours that include, on the one hand, the general scanning of the environment for ideas and information about competition, market and technology and, on the other hand, obtaining feedback from others on design issues and co-ordination and negotiation with others. The isolationist strategy means that hardly any
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external activity is carried out, with the exception of some scouting activity. And the last one is called comprehensive, because these teams display both ambassadorial and task co-ordination. However, these teams avoid general scanning; instead they focus on the interaction with the environment both to persuade others that the group’s work is important and to obtain feedback. These four external team strategies have different effects on group performance. Although the evidence Ancona and Caldwell (1992) provide is not so compelling and based on only 45 teams, they maintain that comprehensive teams are the best performers (on all ratings, both management and team member perceptions), followed by ambassadorial teams. The technical scouting teams were the least performers and the isolationist performed poor on management ratings, but their internal task processes and cohesiveness were assessed as high. An implication of these results is that it is not the frequency of external contacts that predict performance, but the contact of the external contacts. Furthermore, one can suppose that these strategies follow cycles in dealing with the environment, which may be linked to team development, as some models on team development suggest (Gersick, 1988). However, we must keep in mind that these results are obtained from a study of new product development teams in a high-technology environment. Despite Ancona (1990) and Ancona and Caldwell (1992) claiming their results as general for all organisational teams, teams on the shopfloor in a highly repetitive environment may display different team strategies with different patterns of success. Nevertheless, the general idea of external activities that shape the interaction of the team-context is very important. Especially in the context of self-managing teams, where much of the autonomy lies in boundary management, a close look at the strategies and activities is worthwhile. The mini-company concept as a specification of STBS We may conclude that in both lines of literature (STS and small group research) there are useful starting-points for the integration of the business into the primary work group. STS, as a design approach, is conceptually close to market-orientation, at least at the company level. It includes a number of useful concepts and tolls, such as variance control analysis, the control capacity of primary work groups, and customer contacts. However, on the group level it is not evident how to bring business into sociotechnical theory. The sociotechnical practices in the different countries also show that it has not been picked up so far. The literature on boundary management in teams is different in nature, being more analytical and less design-oriented. Here a useful classification of external team strategies has been developed, although questions on generalisation remain. The implications of both lines of literature need to be outlined, as we are talking about groups on the shopfloor level. Increased amounts of control are not enough for primary work groups. The primary work groups in a sociotechnical sense need to have a customer- and market-orientation. External
contacts will lead to better performance. In the management literature on production management we will highlight one example that stresses these aspects. It is the mini-company concept. It is Suzaki (1993) who has coined the term ‘‘mini-company’’ for primary work groups that are responsible for their supplier-client relationships. The organisation is viewed as a collection of mini-companies. Each work group within the organisation has its own process. The next process is viewed as the customer and the previous process is viewed as the supplier of every unit. It is possible and useful to use the term ‘‘mini-company’’ as a metaphor in thinking about the organisation of the factory (Verkerk et al., 1997). The word ‘‘minicompany’’ provides us with ideas like ownership, commitment, entrepreneurship, and client-supplier relationships. The structural basis of the mini-company is similar to the STS view on primary work groups, with similar high levels of autonomy. The mini-company, however, is much more oriented towards the customer and the market. This has implications for the design and management of these primary work groups. The mini-company has four characteristics, distinct from sociotechnical primary work groups: (1) The mini-company has a name and a mission statement. Both are formulated by the mini-company itself. This relates to control over purpose. (2) The mini-company identifies its clients and suppliers and is responsible for managing its relationships. While external clients and suppliers are not always appropriate for having direct contacts with the minicompany, there are at least the internal client-supplier relationships. This is equivalent to control over context. (3) The mini-company is responsible for its own improvement programme. Based on its contacts with clients, suppliers and management, the minicompany is able to identify its weak points, which are open to improvement. This characteristic entails control over system dynamics. (4) The mini-company presents its name, mission, members, customers, suppliers, improvement programme and results on display walls. This has been called ‘‘glass wall management’’ (Suzaki, 1993). Everyone, including a stranger, must be able to see and understand the process and the actual state. The mini-company process is the dynamic side of the mini-company concept. It represents a cycle in which in every period the name and mission are under review and the relevant clients and suppliers are identified and visited. These visits are oriented towards overall assessments of the mini-company. In realising the cycle of the mini-company process every time the requirements of the (internal or external) customers and suppliers are made visible for the minicompany by itself. These requirements are the inputs for the improvement programme. At the end of each cycle, the results are reported to management.
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Since every cycle in the end is restarted, in fact this is a regular evaluation of the functioning of the mini-company on the basis of market requirements. The first three characteristics are related to the three areas of control that are additional to mainstream STS theory, according to Adler and Docherty (1998). It concerns control over purpose, in formulating the group’s business goals, control over context in maintaining the client-supplier relationships and control over system dynamics in the learning and improvement aspects. Therefore, it is our conclusion that the mini-company concept seems to fit with the notion of STBS. Even more, it seems to be a specification of STBS, in outlining the design and management of primary work groups as mini-companies. Case Philips CMA Roermond Case-study design The question now remains how this mini-company concept performs in practice. Therefore, next we present a case-study of the application of the minicompany concept in a Philips business unit. For Dutch descriptions of the case we refer to de Leede (1997) and Verkerk et al. (1997). Our case-study design consisted of the following methods: document analysis (notes and company reports), observation techniques (one author was the factory manager involved in the introduction of the mini-companies, another author took part in the action team programme and did a two-week internship on the shopfloor) and interviews (a total of 30 interviews with alllevel managers and operators). In addition, two surveys have been carried out on some social-dynamic aspects on teamwork and on the effects of the minicompanies. The first survey (n = 102) was answered by 80 per cent of the (first) operators. The second survey was answered (n = 23) by 50 per cent of indirect staff. The time span of the case-study was from early 1995 until mid-1996. Market and product In 1992 Philips Components decided to start a new business unit. The new business unit was responsible for the development, production and marketing of ceramic multilayer actuators. It was located at Roermond, The Netherlands, because of the availability of both an industrial infrastructure and a development laboratory for ceramic and multilayer technology. The market perspectives were promising from the start. The demand for the main product (CMA) is rapidly increasing. However, the market for ceramic multilayer actuators is very dynamic. The product is an important device for ink-jet printers. In fact, Philips CMA is a sub-contractor for a company operating in the turbulent market for ink-jet printers. Short time-to-market, high flexibility and a very tough competition are typical of this market, which are translated towards the market situation of Philips CMA. The dynamic situation caused by the market is even increased by the complexity of the product. CMA is a new product, applied in a new technology. The product itself was not completely ready for production. Further development was needed in co-operation with the (Japanese) customer. Co-development – in co-operation both with the customer
and some suppliers – was needed. Only then could some technological problems be tackled. These characteristics of the market and the product do imply high demands on the organisation. At Philips the solution has been sought in concurrent engineering – that is, development and production at overlapping stages. The product is in production, though not fully developed. Test series are made on the shopfloor, not in the laboratory. This implies a very strict co-operation between production and development. In addition to the concept of concurrent engineering, continuous improvement is needed to ensure higher yields, better quality and timely delivery. To cope with the growing demand for the product, it is necessary to enhance the production capacity. Design and implementation of mini-companies at CMA The mini-company concept was introduced in 1994, after two years of operation. In fact it was not more than an intensive continuation and formalisation of former management policies. In the years 1992-1994 the business unit grew from 25 to 125 people. The quality and the yield of the production had to be enhanced dramatically. The general approach was characterised by a focus on process control and step-by-step improvement. No breakthrough by one big innovation – only many small improvements were attained by an interdisciplinary approach: many joint efforts of development, factory engineering, repair and maintenance, quality department and purchasing. In addition to this, operator involvement was arranged by teamwork. Many so-called process inventory teams dealt with problems for one specific part of the process. Members of the teams were one developer, one factory engineer, at least one first-operator and, dependent on the problem, other indirect people. The results of these teams were very promising. Quality and yield increased, and products could be delivered to the customers. In 1994 the specifications of the customers were set even tighter. Again, the organisation faced a challenge. Then, factory management introduced the minicompany concept. The structural basis of the mini-company is the unit structure, already designed on sociotechnical principles. The units are responsible for a complete part of the process, which is well identified. The boundaries of the units are carefully chosen, based on the principle that the number of internal relationships exceeds the number of external relationships. The mini-company is designed to be the unit. It is not their own shift, it is not the entire factory, but it is the unit with which they should identify themselves. In five shifts the operators make one discernible product, which is a distinct phase in the process. The production structure consists of five units: (1) foil casting; (2) screen printing and pressing; (3) furnace processes; (4) dicing;
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(5) visual inspection and packing. The hierarchy within Philips CMA includes four layers: (1) general manager; (2) factory manager; (3) unit leader; and (4) operator (see Figure 1). Every shift has one first operator and several other operators. Operators are working in a five-shift schedule. There are three unit leaders, who have a spanof-control varying from 16 to 55. Each unit, i.e. all operators including the unit leader, forms a mini-company. Every member of the mini-company has followed a training programme. In this programme, the mini-company philosophy and the mini-company process were explained. Also the improvement techniques were trained. The mini-company process The mini-company process incorporates two separate cycles, a nine-step-cycle and a seven-step-cycle. The nine-step-cycle (see Figure 2), is a long-term cycle lasting one year. This cycle is a modification of the cycle mentioned in Suzaki (1993). The most important activities of every cycle are the formulation of the mission statement, the identification and interviewing of suppliers and customers, and the design and implementation of an improvement programme. Based on the interview results with suppliers, customers and management, the mini-company itself sets the priorities of the needed improvement activities. Management has to affirm the improvement programme, and demands thorough arguments; however, it never happened that the programme of the mini-company was changed by management. In this way, management values the contribution of the mini-companies on the basis of solid arguments. The improvement programme is realised by improvement teams, so-called action teams. These teams carry out the seven-step cycle, a short-term cycle, which is in fact an extended version of the plan-do-check-act cycle. The planning stage is decomposed in four phases. The action teams consist of one
Figure 1. Organisation chart: Philips CMA
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Figure 2. Mini-company process: nine-step cycle
operator of every shift in the mini-company and – dependent on the problem – several indirect people from quality, factory engineering, product development, etc. The chairman in most cases is the unit leader. Some examples of improvements realised by the mini-companies are the following. Several mini-companies improved their shift change procedures. One mini-company changed the layout of their process. Another mini-company tried successfully to reduce the frequency of some maintenance activities. Also the registration procedures to the computer-aided manufacturing system were reduced. Another action team focused on a specific quality problem and identified the hidden process parameter causing the problem. Effects What are the effects of this application of the mini-company concept? We only present four effects: (1) the number of contacts with internal and external clients, suppliers and experts; (2) the contribution of the mini-companies to improvement; (3) the power relations within the business unit CMA;
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Figure 3. Internal and external contacts of the minicompanies (n = 102)
Figure 4. Contribution of minicompanies to improvements/ innovations
(4) the trust relations within the business unit CMA. The results presented in this section are based on the two surveys, respectively among the (first) operators (n = 102) and the indirect employees (n = 23). These data are fully supported by the interviews and documents. First, a result of working in mini-companies is the number of contacts with internal and external customers and suppliers. Figure 3 shows the results of the survey, indicating the percents of (first) operators who have regular direct contacts with the relevant outside world. Included are also the contacts with internal and external experts. It is obvious that most operators have regular contact with internal clients and suppliers and internal experts (developers, factory engineers, technicians). External contacts are not usual, although some, mainly first-operators, indicate that they have regular external contacts. This result is as expected, when you take into account the design of the minicompanies: the contacts with (internal) clients and suppliers are structurally embedded in the design of each mini-company. The fact that the main customer is a large Japanese manufacturer explains the relatively low level of contacts with external clients. Second, we give an indication of the kind of contribution the mini-companies deliver to three different types of innovation. We distinguish between small improvements, rather big improvements and big innovations. Improvements are changes within the existing process, while innovations are changes
resulting in radical new processes. In Figure 4 the results are presented, based on the survey among the (first) operators. A similar picture arose from the survey among the indirect employees with one exception. The indirect employees indicated that the operators usually delivered valuable observations and experiences also in the case of big innovations. According to them, this is a prerequisite for a smooth innovation process. They view the operators as ‘‘the eyes, the ears and the hands of the developers on the shopfloor’’. The conclusion is that the mini-companies in most cases deliver a contribution towards improvements, and they play a relatively little, though valuable role in innovations. Their role is in the cooperation with developers in failure mode and effect analysis, in the assessment of ergonomic aspects of new equipment, in the design of the lay-out of new workplaces, in the support of new tests and samples, and so on. Another effect in this area is that the number of improvement actions increased so much that the department of technical maintenance was not able to respond to all requests for assistance. This seems to be an indication of the self-propelling characteristic of CI in a mini-company process. The third effect of the mini-company concept is the nature of the power relations. We have measured the power relations with the control graph, an instrument developed by Tannenbaum (1968). In Figure 5 the control graph of this case is presented. This control graph is based on the survey among the (first) operators (n = 102). This control graph shows high levels of influence among all hierarchical levels, as perceived by (first) operators. In the words of Tannenbaum (1968), this indicates a large total amount of control, which is an indicator of effectiveness. The reason is that high levels of influence indicate large amounts of consultation and information exchange among hierarchical levels on these subjects. In this case the nine-step and the seven-step cycles provide the appropriate mechanisms for these intense information exchanges. The fourth effect is on trust relations. When we view the relationships between hierarchical levels, it is not only power that comes in. It is also a matter
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Figure 5. Control graph
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of trust. In this case 85 per cent – which is quite high – of the (first) operators were stated to have trust in the management. Both observation and interviews confirmed this result. Many operators, who worked formerly in other Philips plants, expressed their increased trust in these plants’ management. They were certainly aware of the changes in responsibilities and powers, but simply trusted the managers, who were very open in market and strategic issues. The managers of CMA were also highly visible on the shopfloor. These high trust relations are in line with the successful implementation of the mini-company concept and in the real changes in management style the operators report. Discussion: some implications In this section we outline three theoretical implications. First, the mini-company as a concept seems to be in close connection with the STS concept of the self-managing team. Both are addressing and enhancing the control capacity of the primary work groups. Both are based on carefully chosen boundaries of the work groups. The design of the production structure based on STS (de Sitter, 1994; de Sitter et al., 1997) provides a sound structural basis for the implementation of mini-companies. The CMA case is a good example of STS segmentation: the boundaries of the units are chosen based on sociotechnical criteria. The main criterion is that the number of internal exchange relationships within the mini-company is higher than that of the external relationships with other organisational units. This is really important, because to a large extent these boundaries define the social relations. Second, the mini-company concept is complementary to mainstream STS thinking in specifying the market and customer orientation on the shopfloor level. As we have demonstrated, this is precisely a weak point in STS theory and practice. The STS approach of the design of the control structure does not include the daily interaction of the teams with the (internal) clients and suppliers. In addressing this external orientation by establishing and managing the client-supplier relationship, the mini-company concept is a mechanism in which control over purpose, context and system dynamics can be realised on the shopfloor level. In our case, the mini-companies have regular and systematic contacts with their internal clients. The external (overseas) customers are represented by marketing. The operators themselves interview the clients and suppliers, which is psychologically important. They own the problems, they are more quickly convinced and with the resulting improvement teams are almost by definition customer-oriented. This implies changes in the control structure. We call it the structural alignment of the teams. The structural alignment is also important in the case of continuous improvement (de Leede and Looise, 1999). The reason for the increased innovative capacity of the mini-company may well be that the teams are told by their customers and suppliers what improvements are needed. The need for change is not imposed by higher management, but it comes from the groups to which they deliver and from which they receive goods, services and
information. That is probably more motivating. It is an external criterion that triggers innovation. We acknowledge that mainstream STS always had in mind structural alignment. It is never the case that a team, self-managing or not, runs well on its own: the interdependencies with other parts of the organisation must be thoroughly designed and managed. That is right within the theoretical foundations of the STS: social interaction within a systems model (de Sitter, 1994; van Eijnatten, 1993). Still, STS thinking fails to identify the mechanisms underlying the alignment. It is our claim that the mini-company concept provides one of the most important mechanisms in highlighting the clientsupplier relationship. This claim is close to the claim of STBS (Adler and Docherty, 1998). Third, the alignment of the mini-companies is not only structural in nature. There are many social-dynamic aspects in these internal and external relationships. Our data on the implementation of the mini-company concept suggest that it is not just a matter of the proper design. It is not just creating the right structure and choosing the right boundaries of the mini-companies. It is not just the identification of the clients and supplier. It is not just the nine steps of the mini-company process. It is not just training and educating the workforce in applying the tools and techniques. All these important things need to be done and are helpful in creating the structural alignment. But they are not enough. Our data show that power and trust are just as critical. These aspects are included in what we might call the social-dynamic alignment of the teams. The members of the mini-companies need to be aware that the managers really want to share power and that they are trustworthy. The high-trust relations in our case are very much the result of providing open and honest information on strategic, tactical and operational problems by the managers. They also were highly approachable for the operators. The leadership issue might be the Achilles’ heel of the mini-company concept. The issue of sharing power and control is related to what other researchers of empowerment initiatives suggest, namely that, by increasing the detailed control of employees, management in turn gets an increase in general control over the shopfloor, rather than losing control (Rees, 1999; Wilkinson, 1998). These three aspects, the design of the production structure, the design of the control structure, and the social-dynamic alignment, are interrelated. The case of the mini-companies at CMA illustrates these relationships. The production structure, which defines the boundaries of the control structure of the minicompanies, is itself influenced by the dynamics of the external environment. The boundaries between two units once were adjusted because of its implications for the control aspects. The social-dynamic issues, such as power and trust, are important prerequisites for the real use of the mini-companies’ control over purpose, context and system dynamics. And vice versa, the influence and the trust of the operators are restricted by the choices in production and control structure.
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There are also limitations of the mini-company concept. An important one is that the metaphoric use of the ‘‘company-within-the-company’’ may not be implemented at full length. The ‘‘market’’ as a regulator of internal and external relationships has its limitations. For example, if the mini-companies are provided with some kind of an internal accounting system, including profit and loss responsibilities, some counter-productive behaviour may arise. The other mini-companies are then viewed as competitors, which may easily lead to nonco-operation. Another limitation is that the mini-company concept may lead to extra stress for the employees. If the management does not pay attention to the process of carefully enhancing the responsibilities of the members of the minicompany, the ‘‘weaker’’ employees may view the pressure as being too high. The system stimulates other mini-company members to exert a high peer pressure on these employees, because they are accountable for the results of the mini-company. Other authors have mentioned the risks of this kind of concertive control in work teams (Barker, 1993; Sewell, 1998). It is therefore of high importance that the mini-company and its members are well equipped to perform their tasks. We may conclude that the mini-company concept provides a useful and necessary specification of the STBS approach, by clarifying how to bring business into STS theory and practice. The application of the concept illustrates the strengths of the mini-companies, but highlights also the necessary changes in management style. Providing primary work groups with control over purpose, context and system dynamics implies flat power relations and high trust relations within the entire organisation. References Adler, N. and Docherty, P. (1998), ‘‘Bringing business into sociotechnical theory and practice’’, Human Relations, Vol. 51 No. 3, pp. 319-45. Ancona, D.G. (1990), ‘‘Outward-bound: strategies for team survival in an organization’’, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 33 No. 2, pp. 334-65. Ancona, D.G. and Caldwell, D.F. (1992), ‘‘Bridging the boundary: external activity and performance in organizational teams’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 37, pp. 634-65. Barker, J.R. (1993), ‘‘Tightening the iron cage: concertive control in self-managing teams’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 38, pp. 408-37. Benne, K.D. and Sheats, P. (1948), ‘‘Functional roles of group members’’, Journal of Social Issues, Vol. 2, pp. 42-7. Cohen, S.G. and Ledford, G.E. Jr (1994), ‘‘The effectiveness of self-managing teams: a quasiexperiment’’, Human Relations, Vol. 47 No. 1, pp. 13-43. de Leede, J. (1997), ‘‘Bottom-up innovation; on the contribution of semi-autonomous groups in product and process innovation’’, PhD thesis, University of Twente, Kluwer Bedrijfsinformatie, Deventer (in Dutch). de Leede, J. and Looise, J.C. (1999), ‘‘Continuous improvement and the mini-company concept’’, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, Vol. 19 No. 12. de Sitter, L.U. (1994), Synergetic Manufacturing; Human Resource Mobilisation in Manufacturing: An Introduction in the Design of Structure, Van Gorcum, Assen (in Dutch).
de Sitter, L.U., den Hertog, J.F. and Dankbaar, B. (1997), ‘‘From complex organizations with simple jobs to simple organizations with complex jobs’’, Human Relations, Vol. 50 No. 5, pp. 497-534. Emery, F.E. and Thorsrud, E. (1976), Democracy at Work: the Report of the Norwegian Industrial Democracy Program, Martinus Nijhoff, Leiden. Emery, M. (Ed.) (1993), Participative Design for Participative Democracy, Centre for Continuing Education, The Australian National University, Canberra. Gersick, C.J.C. (1988), ‘‘Time and transition in work teams: toward a new model of group development’’, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 31 No. 1, pp. 9-41. Gladstein, D. (1984), ‘‘Groups in context: a model of task group effectiveness’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 29, pp. 499-517. Gustavsen, B. (1992), Dialogue and Development, Van Gorcum, Assen. Kuipers, H. and van Amelsvoort, P. (1990), Quick-witted Organising: An Introduction of Sociotechnical Systems Design as an Integral Design Theory, Kluwer, Deventer (in Dutch). Majchrzak, A. (1997), ‘‘What to do when you can’t have it all: toward a theory of sociotechnical dependencies’’, Human Relations, Vol. 50 No. 5, pp. 535-65. Pasmore, W.A. (1988), Designing Effective Organizations: The Sociotechnical Systems Perspective, Wiley, New York, NY. Pearce, J.A. II and Ravlin, E.C. (1987), ‘‘The design and activation of self-regulating work groups’’, Human Relations, Vol. 40 No. 11, pp. 751-82. Pearson, C.A.L. (1992), ‘‘Autonomous workgroups: an evaluation at an industrial site’’, Human Relations, Vol. 45 No. 9, pp. 905-36. Pfeffer, J. and Salancik, G.R. (1978), The External Control of Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective, Harper & Row, New York, NY. Rees, C. (1999), ‘‘Teamworking and service quality: the limits of employee involvement’’, Personnel Review, Vol. 28 No. 5/6, pp. 455-73. Sewell, G. (1998), ‘‘The discipline of teams: the control of team-based industrial work through electronic and peer surveillance’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 43, pp. 397-428. Suzaki, K. (1993), The New Shopfloor Management; Empowering People for Continuous Improvement, The Free Press, New York, NY. Tannenbaum, A.S. (1968), Control in Organizations, McGraw-Hill, New York, NY. Taylor, J.C. and Felten, D.F. (1993), Performance by Design: Sociotechnical Systems in North America, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ. Trist, E.L. (1981), ‘‘The sociotechnical perspective; the evolution of sociotechnical systems as a conceptual framework and as an action research program’’, in van de Ven, A.H. and Joyce, W.F. (Eds), Perspectives on Organization Design and Behavior, John Wiley & Sons, New York, NY, pp. 19-75. van Eijnatten, F.M. (1993), The Paradigm That Changed the Workplace, Van Gorcum, Assen. Verkerk, M.J., de Leede, J. and van der Tas, H.J. (1997), Market-oriented Production Management; From Semi-autonomous Group to Mini-company, Kluwer Bedrijfsinformatie, Deventer (in Dutch). Wilkinson, A. (1998), ‘‘Empowerment’’, in Poole, M. and Warner, M. (Eds), The EIBM Handbook of Human Resource Management, International Thompson, London. Wright, M. and Edwards, P. (1998), ‘‘Does teamworking work and, if so, why? A case study in the aluminium industry’’, Economic and Industrial Democracy, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 59-90.
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Personnel Review 31,3
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/0048-3486.htm
Team responsibility structure and team performance Hans Doorewaard
356
Nijmegen School of Management, University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands
Geert Van Hootegem Nijmegen School of Management, University of Nijmegen and Department of Sociology of Labour and Organisation, Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, and
Rik Huys Department of Sociology of Labour and Organisation, Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium Keywords Teamwork, Human resource management, Performance, Self-managing teams Abstract The purpose is to analyse the impact of team responsibility (the division of job regulation tasks between team leader and team members) on team performance. It bases an analysis on 36 case studies in The Netherlands which are known to have implemented team-based work. The case studies were executed in 1997 by means of face-to-face interviews with HRM staff and line management. It concludes from the analyses that two different types of team responsibility prevail. In a ‘‘hierarchical team’’ team leaders take responsibility for decisions concerning work preparation, support and control, while in the ‘‘shared-responsibility team’’ decisions are taken by the team members themselves. The analyses show that ‘‘sharedresponsibility teams’’ are thought to contribute more substantially to team performance outcomes than ‘‘hierarchical teams’’. The analysis helped gain a better understanding of the relationship between HRM and organisation performance, as it is viewed in the ‘‘human resource-based view of the firm’’.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 356-370. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486 DOI 10.1108/00483480210422750
Section 1. Introduction Considering its prominent place in the prevailing organisational discourse, team-based work has proven to be a favourite formula for organisational redesign. It is a promising concept which offers autonomy, responsibility and job enrichment in order to meet the aspirations of the employees. At the same time, team-based work is believed to enhance performance outcomes such as productivity and quality, on both the team and the organisation level. Hence, management fashions such as business process re-engineering, lean production, the modern socio-technical approach and human resources management (HRM), all embrace the core principles of team-based work (Benders and Van Hootegem, 1999; de Sitter et al., 1997; Kuipers and van Amelsvoort, 1990; Kleinschmidt and Pekruhl, 1995; Womack et al., 1991). A major argument for introducing and for developing team-based work stems from recent insights into the impact of human resources on organisational performance. In the current debate on HRM, the ‘‘resource-based view of the firm’’ states that the intangible, imperfectly imitable and imperfectly substitutable internal resources of the organisation enable a firm to
generate and to sustain its competitive advantage (Doorewaard and Meihuizen, 2000). This statement is true especially with regard to the impact of human resources on organisational performance in team-based work organisations. The performance in team-based working largely depends on the employees’ competencies and attitudes with regard to planning, performing and controlling team tasks in an autonomous way. When analysing which features of team-based work add to the enhancement of team performance, management literature (for example, de Sitter et al., 1997) focuses in particular on the team responsibility structure: i.e. the division of job regulation tasks between team leader and team members. A larger allocation of job regulation tasks within the team among the team members is supposed to contribute more effectively to organisational goals than the allocation of these tasks to a separate team leader. However, hardly any empirical evidence exists regarding the relationship between team responsibility structure and team performance (Benders et al., 1999). Based on the results of a ‘‘quick-scan’’research, which was carried out in 1997 in 36 different organisations in The Netherlands, our paper aims at clarifying the impact of the structure of team responsibilities on team performance. In order to do this, we distinguish between teams with a high level of team member responsibility (‘‘sharedresponsibility teams’’) versus teams with a low level of team member responsibility (‘‘hierarchical teams’’). The purpose of our research is to analyse the perceptions of managers and HRM staff with regard to the impact these two types of team responsibility can have on team performance outcomes. In Section 2, we develop a simple, diagnostic framework of the relationship between types of team responsibility and team performance outcomes. After a short presentation of our research methodology in Section 3, and an analysis of the two types of team responsibility structures in our sample (Section 4), we then focus in Section 5 on the impact of team responsibility structures on team performances. In Section 6, we discuss the contribution of our analysis towards achieving a better understanding of how team responsibility structures have an influence on team and organisational performance. Section 2. Team responsibility structure and team performance The human resource-based view of the firm In order to point out the importance of human resources in gaining a firm’s sustainable competitive advantage, HRM literature refers to the ‘‘resourcebased view of the firm’’ (for example, Barney, 1991; Boxall, 1996; Penrose, 1959; Wernerfelt, 1984). While investigating which features of internal resources determine whether or not these resources contribute to the sustainability of rents, the ‘‘resource-based view of the firm’’ points to intangibility, imperfect imitability and imperfect substitutability. These particular features should function as the so-called ‘‘isolating mechanisms’’ or ‘‘barriers to imitation’’, which make it very hard for competitors to copy successful organisational practices. Recognising that intangibility, imperfect imitability and imperfect substitutability are particular characteristics of the human resources in organisations, HRM literature (for overviews, see Beatty and Schneider, 1997;
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Becker and Gerhardt, 1996; Doorewaard and Meihuizen, 2000) emphasises the ability of HRM practices in contributing to organisation performance outcomes in a unique and inimitable way. In analysing the impact of one particular HRM practice (i.e. the team responsibility structure) on team and organisation performance outcomes, this paper fits within the central reasoning of the ‘‘human resource-based view of the firm’’. For the purpose of our analyses, we have developed a simple, diagnostic model (Figure 1) of ‘‘team responsibility structure’’ and ‘‘performance’’. We briefly discuss the elements of this framework. Team responsibility structure In this paper, we focus on the two relevant features found in the team responsibility structure. We analyse both the variety of the job regulation tasks and the nature of the division of responsibilities. Team responsibility concerns three groups of job regulation tasks: (1) Work preparation refers to activities, which have to be carried out before the main task can be executed. Work preparation decisions concern work standards (‘‘What do I have to do? How and when is this to be done? In which order?’’), work material (‘‘Which components or what input do I need? How and when do I check the quality and the quantity of this input?’’) and work equipment (‘‘Which instruments do I need? Do I need to adjust this equipment?’’). (2) Work support refers to regulation tasks, which create the conditions of a smooth job performance. These tasks concern job maintenance, job improvement and an overhaul of the work process (quality check, training, and so forth). (3) Work control refers to the regulation of the work process itself (adjustments of work performance parameters, job co-ordination, and so on).
Figure 1. Team responsibility structure and performance
Apart from the variety of job regulation tasks, the nature of the division of responsibilities is important in order to analyse the influence of the team responsibility structure on organisational and team performance. According to Benders and Van Hootegem (1999), the concept of team responsibility is rather vaguely elaborated. Sometimes, team responsibility is conceptualised as being the autonomy of the team as a whole, whereas at other times the concept strictly refers to the responsibility of individual team members. Bryman’s analysis (1996) of ‘‘leadership’’ appears to be adequate in providing a further elaboration of the concept of team responsibility. His analysis focuses on leadership ‘‘as a process’’, rather than on leadership as a formal position within an organisation. As a process, leadership consists of a set of decisions concerning the coordination and regulation of work processes. Such a decision-making process can be organised in many different ways. In teams with autocratic or participatory leadership, for example, the responsibility for decisions is located within a formal position of ‘‘team leader’’. In teams with so-called ‘‘dispersed’’ leadership (where a team leader appears to be absent), team members themselves make all the decisions. In day-to-day practices, various hybrid structures of team responsibility exist (for example, the team responsibility for work preparation, support and control might be restricted to a few team members only, or responsibilities might be divided among various team members). For the purpose of this paper, we analyse the impact of two extreme types of team responsibility, positioned at the opposite ends of a continuum with regard to the division of regulation tasks. At one end of this continuum, a ‘‘sharedresponsibility team’’ can be found: a team with a high level of responsibility for all team members. In this responsibility structure, team members themselves make decisions concerning work preparation, support and control in an autonomous way. At the other extreme end, we locate ‘‘hierarchical teams’’, in which most responsibilities are assigned to the team leader. The distinction between ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ and ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ is highly relevant, since many team work analyses implicitly assume that team autonomy stands for team member autonomy (for example, Benders and Van Hootegem, 1999). However, many so-called teams (for example, lean production teams (see Womack et al., 1991) do not leave much autonomy to team members, whereas all responsibility remains in the hands of the team leader. Team performance The purpose of our research is to find out whether there is a (significant) difference in impact of ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ and ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ on team performance. For conducting an analysis of the influence of types of team responsibility on team performance, we have concentrated on two groups of outcomes indicators. First, we investigate the influence of the team responsibility
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structure on performance outcomes with regard to the work process itself. We focus on the following issues: . team productivity (the ratio between output revenues and production costs); . the ratio productive labour/non-productive labour; . product development (the team capacity to further develop products and services offered); . product quality (the degree to which product or service characteristics meet the required level of quality); . work process transparency (the predictability of changes in work flow processes); . adjustment time (the amount of time a team needs to adjust work processes and work equipment); . through-put time (the amount of time the team needs to complete a team task); and . delivery time (the amount of time a team needs to deliver a number of products or services). Second, we focus on so-called HRM outcomes, which may contribute to the required performance outcomes of the organisation (Guest, 1997). The wellknown Harvard-list of human capabilities (Beer et al., 1984) identifies core HRM outcomes, concerning competence and commitment. In our research we analyse the impact of the team responsibility structure on personnel turnover, personnel absence, personnel involvement and personnel competencies. Section 3. Methodology In order to investigate the relationship between the team responsibility structure and performance, we carried out extensive research on team-based work in The Netherlands. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected in 1997 in 36 organisations in industry (n = 28) and the service sector (n = 8) via open interviews with managers (line management and HRM staff) in each organisation and via a contents analysis of relevant documents. A total of 57 organisations, recently involved in team-based work implementation, were requested to participate in this research, of which 40 agreed to allow researchers into the organisation in order to gather the data required and from which 36 observations provided valid and reliable information, complete enough to be included in the overall analysis. Since the small number of cases and the complexity of our research make it difficult to carry out elaborated statistical analyses, quantitative data are presented only at a descriptive level. The complexity of the research object and the diversity of organisations involved required a sophisticated research strategy, for which we developed a quick scan-check-list, consisting of an extended number of team-based work-
related issues. In order to assure the comparability of the data of these casecomparisons, factual data concerning team-based work have been recorded in a questionnaire with fixed answer categories. Answers to these questions were gathered in in-depth interviews with line managers and HRM staff in each organisation. In order to analyse the relationship between team responsibility structures and team and organisation performance, we rely, to some extent, on the expert opinions of our respondents. Hence, we report on the perceived influence of the team responsibility structure on team and organisation performance. However, as respondents were protagonists in the implementation and elaboration of team-based work within the organisation, their perceptions of the results are based on the committed and expert opinions which must be taken into account, especially since the future fate of team-based work in the organisation will also be based on such perceptions. In each case, we chose to concentrate on the development and evaluation of team-based work in one particular production department, which is assumed to represent the overall HRM strategy of the organisation. This choice offered us an excellent opportunity for carrying out more in-depth analyses of the actual facets of team-based work in the organisations. In each organisation, the quick scan charts the main characteristics of team-based work, the organisation’s output market strategies, the characteristics of production processes and service flows, personnel flow management and development and implementation of team-based work. Unfortunately, the selection of our research population did not allow us to compare organisations with and without team-based work. Section 4. Team responsibility structures: ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ and ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ In order to address the core research issue on the perceived impact of team responsibility on team performance in Section 5, we will first analyse the differences between ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ and ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ with regard to the team responsibility structure. Although all organisations have recently introduced and implemented teambased work, these implementations differ remarkably in the field of the team responsibility structure. We asked our respondents to indicate who in the teams was responsible for each of 41 regulation tasks concerning ‘‘work preparation’’, ‘‘work support’’ and ‘‘work control’’. Answers to these questions provide us with an in-depth insight into the two types of team responsibility structure under investigation. In order to determine any empirical evidence for the existence of ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ and ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ in our research sample, we have concentrated on two indications: (1) Team responsibility: to what extent is the team as a whole responsible for regulation tasks? (2) Team member responsibility: will it be the team leader’s responsibility to take care of these tasks or will it be the responsibility of all team members?
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Team responsibility Unsurprisingly – since our research concentrates on actual operating teams – 70 per cent of the listed regulation tasks were performed by the teams themselves. Some of the tasks were performed by all of the teams (for example, ‘‘dealing with internal suppliers’’, ‘‘on-the-job-training of new team members’’, ‘‘task exchange schemes’’, ‘‘cleaning up’’, and so on). Seldom did other tasks belong to the team responsibility (‘‘wages auditing’’, ‘‘dealing with external suppliers’’). We analysed to what extent a team is responsible for each of the regulation tasks. Such an analysis enables us to distinguish between 18 organisations, in which teams have ample responsibility (dealing with more than 70 per cent of the regulation tasks which are relevant for the team) versus 15 organisations, in which the teams have only a restricted responsibility, performing less than 70 per cent of team-relevant regulation tasks. Since the list of regulation tasks consists of tasks concerning work preparation, support and control, we are able to investigate the relationship between the extent of team responsibility with regard to these different task categories. Table I shows a remarkable correspondence in the level of regulation: when teams have ample responsibility with regard to work preparation and support, they do so equally with regard to control tasks. The same goes, mutatis mutandis, for teams with restricted responsibility. Our analysis suggests that, in order to deal with work control activities, a team needs to be responsible for sufficient tasks concerning work preparation and support. In other words, a team needs ‘‘something to control’’, in order to be able to perform control activities. Team member responsibility In Table I, we analysed the level of team responsibility (ample versus restricted), as a first indication of the team responsibility structure. A second indication is the division of responsibilities among the members of the team (‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ versus ‘‘hierarchical teams’’). Both indications may vary independently. The distinction between ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ versus ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ is merely based on the internal division of team responsibilities among various team members and does not depend on the level of team responsibilities. Hence, a team with restricted responsibilities may be
Team responsibility Table I. Team responsibility: teams with ample versus restricted responsibility
Restricted responsibility ‘‘work preparation and support’’ Ample responsibility ‘‘work preparation and support’’ Total
Restricted responsibility ‘‘work control’’
Ample responsibility ‘‘work control’’
Total
12
3
15
5 17
13 16
18 33
considered a ‘‘shared-responsibility team’’, provided that all team members are responsible for those few regulation tasks. However, in contrast with the conceptual independence of both indications of team responsibility, our empirical data suggest that both indications might be linked to each other. In our research sample, a significant number of ‘‘sharedresponsibility teams’’, in which most of the team responsibilities are allocated to all team members, also retain an ample number of job regulation tasks at the team level, and vice-versa. Table II indicates this relationship with regard to the division of regulation tasks of work preparation and support and, to a lesser extent, with regard to the division of control tasks. Table II suggests that the teams with a high level of responsibility are also ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’. In other words, the delegation of responsibility tasks to a team as a whole appears to be strongly connected with the involvement in regulation activities of all the team members. Hence, the two indications of team responsibility seem to reinforce each other. In teams with restricted responsibilities, team members are hardly involved in regulation, while in teams with ample responsibilities regulation is part of the job of all the team members.
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Section 5. The impact of team responsibility structures on team performance Does team-based work contribute to team performance goals, according to the opinions of line managers and HRM staff? Does this contribution differ according to the level of team responsibilities and the allocation of these responsibilities within the team? We asked our respondents to evaluate the benefits of team-based work for the team performance, concerning a number of evaluation criteria. Figure 2 presents an overview of their opinions concerning the perceived profitability of team-based work. We will focus on the most important outcomes of this analysis. Figure 2 indicates that line managers and HRM managers highly value team-based work for the perceived stimulation of this organisational device for two core SharedHierarchical responsibilityteams (Diverse) teams
Total
‘‘Work preparation’’ and ‘‘work support’’ (a) With restricted responsibility With ample responsibility Total
7 3 10
(5) (9) (14)
3 6 9
15 18 33
‘‘Work control’’ (b) Restricted responsibility team Ample responsibility team Total
9 4 13
(2) (7) (9)
6 5 11
17 16 33
Table II. The level of team responsibilities and the allocation of responsibilities in ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ and in ‘‘hierarchical teams’’
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Figure 2. Evaluation of team based work (n = 28)
HRM outcomes: the development of the competencies of the team members and the stimulation of the involvement of the team members. Apparently, they consider team-based work to be a stimulating environment for personal development and wellbeing. Our respondents do not indicate that team-based work might influence employees’ decisions to stay with a company or leave it (personnel turnover). Apart from human resource management issues, our respondents perceive various positive effects of team-based work on work process outcomes regarding ‘‘product quality’’ and ‘‘team productivity’’. Both criteria are considered to profit optimally from the introduction of team-based work. Fewer
effects, however, are mentioned regarding issues of ‘‘adjustment time’’, ‘‘through-put time’’ and ‘‘product development’’. The overall evaluation is highly positive and our respondents indicate that all organisations under investigation tend to continue the new policy of teambased work. Nevertheless, we noticed a remarkable difference in their evaluations, depending on the level and the internal distribution of responsibilities in the teams. These differences became more visible when we contrasted the evaluations of the teams with ample responsibility with the evaluations of teams with restricted responsibility. First, since team-based work is expected to have a positive influence on performance (see Figure 2), it may be suggested that this positive influence will increase when the level of responsibility of the team increases. Our set of data confirms this hypothesis (Table III). In general, teams with a high level of responsibility are perceived to contribute more to the performance of the team. According to the opinions of the HRM staff and the line management, this holds true for both HRM outcomes and work process outcomes. With regard to the HRM outcomes, the policy of giving team members plenty of opportunities to regulate their own work has a positive influence on the issues of ‘‘personnel involvement’’ and ‘‘personnel competencies’’, in particular. A broad range of team responsibilities also strongly supports the work process outcomes ‘‘product development’’, ‘‘team productivity’’, ‘‘adjustment time’’ and ‘‘throughput time’’ strongly. ‘‘Delivery time’’, however, might be influenced by team member responsibility in a negative sense. This analysis clearly indicates that, in order to improve the effectiveness of team-based work, management should not hesitate to delegate various responsibilities to the teams with regard to work preparation, work support and work control.
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Team responsibility (high versus low) HRM outcomes
Personnel Personnel Personnel Personnel
involvement competencies absence turnover
Work process outcomes
Product development Team productivity Adjustment time Through-put time Ratio productive/non-productive labour Work process transparency Product quality Delivery time
++ + 0 0 +++ +++ +++ ++ 0 0 0 --
Note: The number of signs (+ or –) stands for the difference between the evaluation of teams with a high level of responsibility versus teams with a low level of responsibility: each sign stands for a 10 per cent difference
Table III. Evaluation of the impact of team responsibility on team performance indicators, according to the level of team responsibility (ample/restricted (n = 28))
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Second, since stimulating the team members’ involvement is considered one of the most valued results of team-based work (see Figure 2), it may be suggested that ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ (in which team members are involved only in a minor part of the regulation tasks) have a less positive influence on performance, compared to ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ (in which all team members are involved in a major part of the regulation tasks allocated to the team). Our data confirm this hypothesis. Table IV clearly indicates that line managers and HRM managers hesitate in evaluating team-based work positively in the case of hierarchical teams. This relatively lower evaluation is particularly clear in the criteria directly related to the work process itself (‘‘team productivity’’, ‘‘product quality’’, ‘‘adjustment time’’, and ‘‘product development’’). Less prominent, but likewise visible, is the negative perception of the impact of the team responsibility structure of ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ on HRM outcomes of ‘‘personnel competencies’’, ‘‘personnel involvement’’ and ‘‘personnel absence’’. Hence, if management wants to maximise the contribution of team-based work to performance, it should refrain from allocating most of the team responsibilities to the team leader. Conversely, Table V affirms that, compared with ‘‘hierarchical teams’’, ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ have a more positive impact on team performance. HRM staff and line management highly value the impact of shared responsibility on work process outcomes, such as ‘‘team productivity’’, ‘‘work process transparency’’, ‘‘delivery time’’, ‘‘product development’’, and, in particular, ‘‘adjustment time’’. When it comes to HRM outcomes, our respondents have indicated that a positive effect might be expected with regard to ‘‘personnel absence’’. Apparently, responsibility for more regulation tasks Allocation of the team responsibilities to the team leader (high versus low) HRM outcomes
Personnel Personnel Personnel Personnel
turnover absence involvement competencies
Work process outcomes
Delivery time Ratio productive/non-productive labour Through-put time Work process transparency Product development Adjustment time Team productivity Product quality
0 – – – + 0 – – –– –– –– ––
Table IV. Evaluation of the impact of ‘‘hierarchical teams’’ on team performance indicators, according to the degree Note: The number of signs (+ or –) stands for the difference between the evaluation of of allocation of teams in which team responsibilities are allocated to the team leader versus those in which responsibilities to the team leader (high/low) fewer tasks are allocated to the team leader: each sign stands for a 10 per cent difference
Team member responsibility (high versus low) HRM outcomes
Personnel Personnel Personnel Personnel
absence turnover competencies involvement
Work process outcomes
Adjustment time Product development Delivery time Work process transparency Team productivity Through-put time Ratio productive/non-productive labour Product quality
+ 0 0 – +++ + + + + 0 0 0
Note: The number of signs (+ or –) stands for the difference between the evaluation of teams in which team responsibilities are allocated to the team leader versus those in which fewer tasks are allocated to the team leader: each sign stands for a 10 per cent difference
concerning work preparation, work support and work control affects employees’ decision on whether or not to stay home from work. If we keep in mind that ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ are closely connected to high levels of team responsibilities (see Table II), we may expect a combined positive effect of (a) teams with ample responsibility and (b) ‘‘sharedresponsibility teams’’ on team performance indicators. Our research findings (Tables II and V) suggest that line managers and HRM staff evaluate the effects of team-based work more positively in ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ with ample responsibilities, compared with the evaluation in hierarchical teams with restricted responsibilities. In general, the perception of our respondents leans very favourably towards teams in which all team members have ample responsibilities. Section 6. Team-based work and performance The purpose of this study is to analyse the impact of the HRM-decisions with regard to the team responsibility structure (i.e. the division of job regulation responsibilities between the team leader and the team members) on team performance outcomes. Despite the relatively few cases and the limited opportunities for analysing quantitative data, this study is the most comprehensive study on team-based work perspectives which has been carried out in The Netherlands up to the present date. In 1997, according to the opinions of the line managers and the HRM managers involved in the implementation of team-based work in 36 organisations in The Netherlands, the team responsibility structure seemed to contribute to team performance substantially. Further analysis (not presented in this paper) indicates that there is a high correlation between the anticipated contribution of team-based work
Team responsibility structure 367 Table V. Evaluation of the impact of ‘‘sharedresponsibility teams’’ on team performance indicators, according to the degree of allocation of responsibilities to all team members (high /low)
Personnel Review 31,3 368
and the respondents’ indications of an organisation’s performance criteria. This indicates that team-based work is supposed to support the organisation’s general goal. Most significant is the insight, resulting from our research, that teams with high team responsibility and team member responsibility (‘‘sharedresponsibility teams’’) with regard to decisions concerning ‘‘work preparation’’, ‘‘work support’’ and ‘‘work control’’ have been found to contribute positively to team performance outcomes. In particular, HRM outcomes with regard to ‘‘personnel competencies’’ and ‘‘personnel commitment’’ as well as work process outcomes (‘‘product development’’, ‘‘team productivity’’, ‘‘adjustment time’’) seem to benefit from the HRM policy which stimulates shared responsibilities in team-based work. Less positive effects can be expected from teams with few responsibilities and from teams in which the team leader makes most of the decisions concerning these regulation tasks (‘‘hierarchical teams’’). Hence, according to our respondents, the impact of team-based work depends on the extent to which responsibility tasks form a substantial part of the overall task structure of the team and the team members. From this point of view, we might question the effectiveness of the implementation of teams with a restricted team member responsibility, as is said to be the case in so-called ‘‘lean production’’ teams (Benders and Van Hootegem, 1999). Our research strongly supports the central reasoning of the ‘‘human resourcebased view of the firm’’, which states that the intangibility, imperfect imitability and imperfect substitutability of the human resources in organisations will contribute to gaining and sustaining a competitive advantage. This insight emphasises the potentiality of HRM practices in contributing to organisation performance outcomes in a unique and inimitable way. The HRM policy of stimulating the team responsibility structure of ‘‘sharedresponsibility’’ will bring about the required uniqueness of the human resources and will influence human resources’ contribution to superior organisational performance. ‘‘Shared-responsibility teams’’ will make job regulation decisions concerning work preparation, work support and work control according to their own particular standards of performance. In doing so, they have internalised the competencies and the commitment pattern, which belong to ‘‘entrepreneurship’’. Members of self-managing teams regulate their activities based on the internalised attitude of the archetype of the entrepreneur: someone who takes care of his or her activities according to his or her own standards of what is good or bad for the business (Doorewaard and Brouns, 1999). Entrepreneurship kills two birds with one stone. On the one hand, it stimulates the employees’ loyalty and commitment and the development of personnel competencies, as a matter of course. On the other hand, entrepreneurship allows the team to develop their own specific way of dealing with regulation, which enforces the required uniqueness and inimitability of a team’s performance; these features should function as ‘‘barriers to imitation’’, which (in turn) should provide a steady stream of rents. In terms of the ‘‘human resource-based view of the firm’’, HRM policies which
stimulate ‘‘shared-responsibility’’ will contribute substantially to the organisation’s success, according to HRM staff and line managers involved in team-based work. As a consequence, the HRM practice of implementing ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ with ample responsibilities might place high demands on the HRM approach of human resource mobilisation (Doorewaard and Meihuizen, 2000). Bureaucratic regulation reduces uncertainty using strict orders, contractual arrangements and destruction of the worker’s autonomy. Human resource mobilisation ‘‘mobilises’’ – as opposed to manages – employees’ knowledge, skills and motivation. It reduces uncertainty by appealing to workers’ commitment, responsibility, entrepreneurship and loyalty. The implementation of ‘‘shared-responsibility teams’’ is assumed to rely on human resource mobilisation rather than on bureaucratic regulation. Our research further stresses the importance of integrating HRM practices which concern personnel flow management (recruitment, selection, training, supervision, release) with management strategies with regard to the (re)design of organisational structures. To connect these practices is an important challenge for both HRM literature and literature on organisational redesign (Becker and Huselid, 1998; Kalleberg et al., 1996; MacDuffie, 1995). In the past focusing on organisation behaviour theories, HRM literature and theories of organisation development have often neglected to pay sufficient attention to organisational redesign. For example, the importance of team working has been stressed over and over again in HRM studies, but an in-depth analysis of how to (re)design organisational structures and work processes in order to create different types of team-based working is missing. The same goes – mutatis mutandis – for scientific and management literature concerning organisational redesign. Advocates of team-based work focus on the importance of HRM practices concerning organisational culture, training and workers’ motivation. Nevertheless, the organisational design principles seldom pay attention to the ‘‘design’’ of the diversity of personnel and of organisational (sub)cultures. Our research indicates the need to bridge recent insights from both HRM and organisation design literature. This bridge could form a rich basis for the theory and the practice of designing and implementing team-based work successfully. References Barney, J.B. (1991), ‘‘Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage’’, Journal of Management, Vol. 17, pp. 99-120. Beatty, R.W. and Schneider, C.E. (1997), ‘‘New HR roles to impact organisational performance: from ‘partners’ to ‘players’’’, Human Resource Management, Vol. 36 No. 1, pp. 29-37. Becker, B. and Gerhardt, B. (1996), ‘‘The impact of human resource management on organisational performance: progress and prospects’’, Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 39 No. 4, pp. 779-801. Becker, B. and Huselid, M. (1998), ‘‘High performance work systems and firm performance: a synthesis of research and managerial implications’’, Research in Personnel and Human Resource Management, Vol. 16, pp. 53-101.
Team responsibility structure 369
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Beer, M., Spector, B., Lawrence, P.R., Mills, D.Q. and Walton, R.E. (1984), Managing Human Assets, Free Press, New York, NY. Benders, J. and Van Hootegem, G. (1999), ‘‘Teams and their context. Moving the team discussion beyond existing dichotomies’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 36 No. 1. Benders, J., Huijgen, F. and Pekruhl, U. (1999), ‘‘Group work in the European Union, results from a survey’’, paper presented at the 17th Annual International Labour Process Conference, London, 29-31 March. Boxall, P. (1996), ‘‘The strategic HRM debate and the resource-based view of the firm’’, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol. 6 No. 3, pp. 59-75. Bryman, A. (1996), ‘‘Leadership in organizations’’, in Clegg, S.R., Hardy, C. and Nord, W. (Eds), Handbook of Organization Studies, Sage, London. de Sitter, L.U., den Hertog, J.F. and Dankbaar, B. (1997), ‘‘From complex organisations with simple jobs to simple organisations with complex jobs’’, Human Relations, Vol. 50 No. 5, pp. 497-534. Doorewaard, H. and Brouns, B. (1999), ‘‘Hegemonic power processes in team-based work’’, in Munduate, L. and Gravenhorst, K.M.B. (Eds), Power Dynamics and Organizational Change. III, Proceedings of the 9th European Conference on Work and Organizational Psychology, subtheme ‘‘Power dynamics and organizational change’’, Helsinki, 12-15 May, pp. 55-73. Doorewaard, H. and Meihuizen, M.E. (2000), ‘‘Strategic options in professional service organisations’’, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol. 10 No. 2, pp. 39-57. Guest, D.E. (1997), ‘‘Human resource management and performance: a review and research agenda’’, The International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol. 8 No. 3, pp. 26376. Kalleberg, A., Knoke, D., Marsden, P. and Spaeth, J. (1996), Organizations in America: Analyzing their Structures and Human Resource Practices, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA. Kleinschmidt, M. and Pekruhl, U. (1995), Kooperative Arbeitsstrukturen und Gruppenarbeit in Deutschland; Ergebnisse einer repra¨sentativen Bescha¨ftigungsbefragung, IAT, Gelsenkirchen. Kuipers, H. and van Amelsvoort, P. (1990), Slagvaardig organiseren, Kluwer Bedrijfswetenschappen, Deventer. MacDuffie, J.-P. (1995), ‘‘Human resource bundles and manufacturing performance: organizational logic and flexible production systems in the world auto industry’’, Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Vol. 48, pp. 197-221. Penrose, E.T. (1959), The Theory of the Growth of the Firm, Wiley, New York, NY. Wernerfelt, B. (1984), ‘‘A resource-based view of the firm’’, Strategic Management Journal, Vol. 5, pp. 171-80. Womack, J.P., Jones, D.T. and Roos, D. (1991), The Machine that Changed the World. The Story of Lean Production. How Japan’s Secret Weapon in the Global Auto Wars Will Revolutionize Western Industry, Harper Perennial, New York, NY.
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What do we know about the incidence of group work (if anything)? Jos Benders and Fred Huijgen
The incidence of group work
371
Nijmegen School of Management, Nijmegen, The Netherlands, and
Ulrich Pekruhl University of Applied Sciences, Solothurn, Switzerland Keywords Group working, Self-managing teams, Statistics, National cultures, Evidence Abstract Whereas group work has been much discussed throughout the 1980s and 1990s, there are few statistical studies about its incidence. The available surveys have adopted a variety of methodological approaches. This paper discusses these studies to investigate two questions: Are there differences in the incidence of group work in different countries? Is its popularity indeed increasing?
At the beginning of 1999, at various points it was claimed that in 1998 7 percent of Dutch companies had teams in place. On asking for the source of this wisdom, we were referred to an article by van der Zee (1998). He devoted a few sentences in a ten-page article to the incidence of group work in The Netherlands. His source was an article by Allegro (1998), a professor in van der Zee’s department. Allegro summarised data on ‘‘flexible work’’ and used van Amelsvoort (1994) as a source for group work. van Amelsvoort, whose office was in the same corridor as those of the first two authors, referred to a paper coauthored by this paper’s third author. That paper reported on a survey among German employees carried out in 1993 (Kleinschmidt and Pekruhl, 1994a, b). Apparently, the need for an answer to the question how widely group work is applied was so great that it drove the metamorphosis of German employees into Dutch companies in only five years’ time. Ovid (Metamorphoses) would have been proud. The authors decided not to include data about the automotive industry (Pil and MacDuffie, 1996) and its suppliers (Oliver et al., 1996). Pil and MacDuffie report an increase in the number of employees working in teams in final assembly sections of 43 passenger-car plants between 1989 and 1993-1994. In their questionnaire ‘‘work teams’’ were described as ‘‘formally designated groups of production workers that rotate jobs and hold regular meetings’’. Although this description does not include decision-rights, there was a question on the ‘‘influence’’ of teams on decision making in ten areas. To the authors’ knowledge, cross-national data have only been reported at high levels of aggregation (Japan, North America, Europe and new entrant countries). According to this definition, Japan had by far the highest score on the incidence of work teams. The data of Oliver et al. (1996) concern 71 suppliers of brakes, exhausts and seats to the car industry. The number of cases by country is too small to allow for cross-national comparisons and, in addition, their description of teams as ‘‘small groups of operators under the control of a team leader’’ (Oliver et al., 1996, p. S39) appears to include practically any small hierarchical work unit.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 371-385. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486 DOI 10.1108/00483480210422769
Personnel Review 31,3 372
The anecdote shows that an eagerness for ‘‘hard data’’ easily corroborates academic precision. Whereas the deterioration of such an important value cannot be excused, one may understand this ‘‘7 percent embrace’’. Group work has been much discussed practically throughout the century and the discourse appears to have intensified in the 1990s (Buchanan, 2000). One wonders whether the intense discussions about group work/teamworking have gone along with increasing popularity in praxis. To what extent are groups indeed used as the new competitive weapon? In any case, the question is whether ‘‘talking the talk’’ coincides with ‘‘walking the walk’’. Or are both completely out of line? And are there international differences in the incidence of group work? This paper aims to contribute answers to two questions in this respect: (1) Are there differences in the incidence of group work in different countries? (2) Is its popularity indeed increasing? The plural form ‘‘answers’’ to these questions may need clarification. Our main source for answers to the first question is the data from the EPOC survey (EPOC Research Group, 1997), which was commissioned by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions. The analysis of the EPOC data on group work was published in the report Useful but Unused: Group Work in Europe (Benders et al., 1999). In this paper we set out to check the plausibility of the cross-national differences found by using data from some other sources. Such a ‘‘plausibility check’’ is needed, as no single study can provide an unequivocal answer to such a simple question as ‘‘How popular is group work?’’ One can, however, draw on other studies concerning the phenomenon. Studies on group work have adopted widely varying methodologies and approaches (Huys and van Hootegem, 2000). Yet, if they arrive at similar findings, this lends credibility to the overall directions found in any single study. As Whitfield et al. (1999) pointed out, comparing data from different sources is tricky. Despite this, we decided that it was worthwhile to make the exercise and get several answers rather than just one and thereby not pretend that EPOC’s is the one and only. In providing answers to the second question we draw on the few available studies with longitudinal data. These only concern surveys within countries; cross-national longitudinal data are not available. Given the difficulties in comparing data from different sources, we refrain from using one-off studies. EPOC data on group work The eagerness to learn about hard data appears to stand at odds with an unwillingness to learn how such percentages were obtained. However, as such dry methodological issues are essential for assessing the quality of the empirical indications, we focus on methodological matters as far as is necessary to compare them.
Definitions The incidence of EPOC stands for ‘‘employee direct participation in organisational chance’’. group work Direct participation (DP) is defined as: . . . opportunities which management provide, or initiatives to which they lend their support, at workplace level for consultation with and/or delegation of responsibilities and authority for decision making to their subordinates, either as individuals or as groups of employees relating to the immediate work task, work organisation and/or working conditions.
A first distinction is made in consultative and delegative direct participation: . consultative participation: management encourages employees to make their views known on work-related matters, but retains the right to take action or not; . delegative participation: management gives employees increased discretion and responsibility to organize and to do their jobs without reference back. A further distinction was made between initiatives directed at individual employees’ on the one hand, and at groups of employees on the other. Group delegation, the focus of this paper, is described as: ‘‘rights and responsibilities granted to groups of employees to carry out their common tasks without constant reference back to managers – most often known as ‘group work’’’. Methodology For the statistical details of the EPOC survey, we refer to the Appendix. Here it is important to pay attention to the operationalisation used. In the questionnaire, group delegation was described as follows: . . . management gives non-managerial employees in the largest occupational group at workplace level increased responsibility to organise and do their jobs without reference back (decision making).
A central question (No. 24d) in this context meant to assess whether or not group delegation was practised (see Morita (2001, p. 182) for a nuanced view): Has the management given formally introduced GROUPS the right to make DECISIONS on how their work is performed on a GROUP basis without reference to the immediate managers for one or more of the following?’’: – allocation of work – scheduling of work – quality of work – timekeeping – attendance and absence control – job rotation – coordination of work with other internal groups – improving work processes.
The total number of positive answers can range from a minimum of one to a maximum of eight. This number was used to assess the intensity of group delegation, which can be seen as an indicator of group autonomy. As becomes clear from the results, including decision rights is an improvement on earlier
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surveys, which just asked for the existence of ‘‘work teams’’. The inclusion of autonomy builds on socio-technically-informed traditions in work and organisational design (Trist and Bamforth, 1951; de Sitter et al., 1997; van Eijnatten, 1993) rather than on Japanese-inspired ‘‘teams’’ of which ‘‘hierarchy’’ is often seen as a main characteristic. The distinction between both forms is also the reason not to use the word ‘‘teamwork’’: this may prevail in AngloSaxon usage, yet in some continental European countries, including Germany, ‘‘team’’ is associated with the Japanese-inspired form, whereas ‘‘group’’ stands for forms in which ‘‘autonomy’’ is the key characteristic (Benders and van Hootegem, 1999). Another aspect to note is that, in contrast with most other studies on the topic, we adopted what one might call a substantive rather than a rhetorical understanding (Benders and van Bijsterveld, 2000): neutral terms were used to describe the phenomenon instead of asking directly for the phenomenon. Asking for the presence of ‘‘teams’’ entails the risk of getting answers that are based on completely different understandings of what ‘‘teams’’ are. The approach described above was chosen to avoid this pitfall. Data on the proportion of employees in the largest occupational group involved in group delegation were used to select the organisations that apply group delegation on a broad scale. We excluded establishments where group delegation was introduced only on a pilot basis, or where the approach was only diffused to a limited number of employees. To be able to estimate the effects of group work, we were particularly interested in those workplaces in which group delegation is the dominant pattern of work organisation. Moreover, in these companies the word ‘‘group’’ must be more than merely a label. In other words, the group must be assigned a minimum degree of discretion. To qualify as a ‘‘group-based’’ workplace, two criteria have to be met: (1) At least four (out of a total of eight) decision rights are assigned to groups; (2) At least 70 percent of core employees work in groups. The first criterion ensures those groups more than minimal discretion, and the second makes sure that group-based work is the norm rather than an exception within the workplace. In 462 workplaces at least 70 percent of the core employees work in groups at some time. Applying the first criterion to these 462 cases leaves 217 cases (about 4 percent of the response) to be used in analyses to characterise the ‘‘group-based’’ workplaces (or organisations). The workplaces with group delegation are split into three subcategories: (1) ‘‘group-based’’ organisations; (2) ‘‘medium GD’’; (3) ‘‘weak GD’’.
As shown in Figure 1, the weak GD cases are located in the upper left corner, The incidence of whereas the group-based cases can be found in the lower right corner. The group work category ‘‘medium GD’’ is a residual category, and its composition is somewhat heterogeneous. Table I lists the criteria, and the number of cases in each of the three subcategories. 375 Where the data are available, these GD subcategories are compared with workplaces without DP and/or workplaces with forms of DP other than group delegation (‘‘other DP’’). The breakdown by GD categories leads to a substantial reduction in the usable response. Specifically, 3,528 respondents answered that they had group delegation in place, yet of them only 1,887 persons specified the decision rights,
Figure 1. The three GD subcategories
Category
Group-based
Medium GD
Weak GD
Criteria
Coverage at least 70 percent Intensity at least four decision rights
Cases not satisfying criteria for either ‘‘weak GD’’ or ‘‘Groupbased’’
Coverage less than 30 percent Intensity less than four decision rights
Number of cases
217
720
467
Note: Weighting = Wtot Source: Benders et al. (1999). used by permission
Table I. Criteria for the three GD subcategories
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whereas 1,748 respondents gave data about the coverage. Data about both variables are available for 1,404 establishments. To avoid speculation and assure the reliability of our findings, we chose not to include the cases with missing data. One consequence of this cautious attitude is that the reported incidences of group may be underestimates. The ‘‘group-based’’ workplaces are roughly 15 percent of the workplaces for which all data are available. This low incidence is consistent with findings of the 1998 UK Workplace Employee Relations Survey. Cully et al. (1999) report that the percentage of workplaces where work takes place in teams drops with increasingly strict criteria. Where 65 percent of their respondents claim that ‘‘working in teams’’ applies to most of their employees in the largest occupational group, this drops to 62 percent when joint work is taken into consideration, to 54 percent when responsibility for a specific product or service is added, to 35 percent when ‘‘joint decision making’’ on ‘‘how the work is to be done’’ is regarded and to only 3 percent when the final criterion, teams ‘‘appoint their own team leaders’’, is considered (Cully et al., 1999, pp. 40-2). Similar drastic drops have been reported in a US study (Bassi and Van Buren, 1999) and in a German study (Kinkel and Wengel, 1999, p. 23). Results One focus of this paper is to present cross-national data on the incidence of group work. For further results we refer to the main report (Benders et al., 1999). Figure 2 contains these for eight of the ten countries included in the EPOC survey (the relevant Portuguese and Spanish response was below 100, and is thus not included here). It follows from Figure 2 that group work is most applied in Swedish workplaces. The second-highest score is the Dutch, but this is to a considerable extent due to the high Dutch score on ‘‘medium GD’’. At the bottom-end of this
Figure 2. International differences in the incidence of group work
group of eight is Italy. In between both extremes there is a group of five The incidence of countries, among which the differences are small. In descending order, these group work are the UK, France, Germany, Denmark, and Ireland. The survey does not contain variables to explain these differences. Such explanations require a more complex and in-depth analysis than is possible with a survey (cf. Cole, 1985). To avoid possible confusion, this listing differs slightly from that in the main 377 report, as the non-response was treated in a different manner. Other cross-national studies A second cross-national survey is the ‘‘Nordflex’’ study. In 1996 and 1997, data were gathered about Nordic workplaces, i.e. covering Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden (NUTEK, 1999) (see Table II). In the report of NUTEK (1996), the questionnaire is included. The key question of interest here is: ‘‘What percentage of the above-mentioned employees are organised in work teams, which are jointly responsible for the tasks and perform them together?’’ The ‘‘above-mentioned employees’’ refers to those working in direct production, and appears equivalent to the notion of core employees used by EPOC. Further questions refer to team size, leadership and areas of decision making. Like the EPOC survey, the NUTEK study concerns workplaces. In all countries, private businesses were studied and, in Norway, public workplaces were also included. Probably more relevant is the minimum
Country Denmark
Percentage of workplaces with Response employees working in rate Minimum size Response teams (employees) Sectors Period (absolute) (percentage) 10 (service) Private 20 (manufacturing)
1996
1,900 (mail)
Percentage of workplaces with X per cent or more employees working in teams
45 (services) 52 (mfg.)
75
At least 50 percent: 10
63 (mail) 83 (phone)
74
At least 50 percent: 30
Finland
10
Private Around 830 (mail) Jan. 1,384 1997 (phone)
Norway
10
Private and public
1996
2,130 (phone)
76
69
–
Sweden
50
Private
1994
707 (mail)
35
91
At least 60 percent: 58
Source: NUTEK (1999)
Table II. Group work in Scandinavia according to the Nordflex study
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establishment size to be included in the surveys: ten employees in Finland and Norway, ten for service organisations, 20 for manufacturing companies in Denmark and 50 for Swedish workplaces. Note also that the methods of data collection differed: postal surveys in Sweden and Denmark, a phone survey in Norway, and both in Finland. The response rates are generally high, with both phone surveys of 76 and 83 percent scoring higher than the postal surveys (between 35 and 63 percent). The incidence rates for workplaces, where at least some employees are involved in teamwork, are fairly similar for Denmark, Finland and Norway. As in the EPOC survey, Sweden holds the highest score yet in the Nordflex study. This may be explained by the considerably larger establishment size, although the EPOC survey did not find a relationship between size and group work incidence. When higher coverage rates are reported, the drops are very significant. While still considerable, the drop from 91 to 58 percent of the Swedish workplaces is smallest, which confirms the Swedish lead. In Denmark, few workplaces remain, once the 50 percent-coverage criterion is applied. Finland occupies a middle position with 30 percent. Manipulating the EPOC data to match them with the NUTEK findings generates a percentage of 58 of Swedish establishments with some form of group work (91 in NUTEK), and 20 percent of the same category with coverage of at least 60 percent of core employees (58 percent in NUTEK). The seemingly small methodological differences between both studies generate substantially different estimates. Note that the Swedish response rates were about the same in both postal surveys. Longitudinal data Longitudinal data on the incidence of group work, which include the 1990s, are available for only two countries, Germany and the USA. There are also some older Dutch data concerning 1977 and 1985, but in both years the number of ‘‘semi-autonomous teams’’ was negligible (Loontechnische Dienst, 1979, 1987). Germany Antoni (1996) reports about a phone survey among the 100 largest German manufacturing companies (in term of sales). The first round was held in 19891990; the second one between mid-1993 till spring 1994. Of the largest companies in the second round 81 had also been part of the population in the first. The response rate in 1993-1994 was 96 percent. All companies cooperated in the first round. The absolute number of companies with ‘‘semi-autonomous work groups’’ had increased from 23 in 1989 to 32 in 1994. The number without such groups decreased from 76 to 48. The number of planned implementations went up from one to 12, while zero companies had abandoned their work groups in 1989 and four in 1994. Half the companies with work groups only used them on a limited scale; at most 13 percent of their employees worked in groups.
A second study was commissioned by the Institut Arbeit und Technik The incidence of (Kleinschmidt und Pekruhl, 1994a, b; Nordhause-Janz and Pekruhl, 2000). A group work total of 18 questions were included in an omnibus phone survey among German employees. Unlike the studies reported above, the population consisted of employees rather than organisations. The researchers wanted to identify different forms of group work by distinguishing three dimensions of work: 379 (1) cooperation; (2) participation; (3) autonomy. These were assessed by means of 12 items. The different combinations of the scores, high vs low on each of these dimensions, served to identify eight types of work. Group work, or Gruppenarbeit, was defined as: . a positive answer to the question ‘‘Is the type and way in which you work together in the company officially called Gruppenarbeit?’’ This question was asked after the 12 items mentioned above had been answered; . high scores on the dimension ‘‘cooperation’’; and . the statement ‘‘My chief assigns work, for completion of which my colleagues and I are responsible’’ was found to be more applicable than a similar phrase stating that the individual alone was responsible. According to this understanding, 6.9 percent of the employees surveyed between 7 December 1992 and 13 January 1993 worked in Gruppen. The equivalent figure for 1998 was 11.8 percent. However, when applying a stricter understanding by focusing on ‘‘autonomy’’, in 1992-1993, only 2.2 percent worked in ‘‘semi-autonomous’’ groups or teilautonome Arbeitsgruppen. In 1998, this percentage had risen to 3.2 percent. In addition, compared with 1992-1993, the incidence of restrictive forms of group work had increased faster (by over 100 percent) than the incidence of semi-autonomous group work, which had grown by about 50 percent (Nordhause-Janz and Pekruhl, 2000). The USA Lawler et al. (1998) conducted four studies among US Fortune 1,000 companies. Their postal survey includes coverage and asks the responding managers directly for the presence of ‘‘self-managing work teams’’ as one out of a range of ‘‘types of organisational innovations or programmes’’ (see Table III). The data show that by both measures self-managing work teams became increasingly popular among large US corporations between 1987 and 1996. There remains, however, considerable room for further growth as the 1996 data show that 9 percent of the organisations surveyed used self-managing work teams for at least 40 percent of their employees. Given the considerable sizes of the companies involved and the heterogeneity of the workforce in such large organisations, 40 percent seems rather high. Data on the establishment level
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would have generated a more accurate picture, as the 78 percent (1996) mark for having at least some employees work in self-managing work teams testifies. This comment on the aggregation level leaves unaffected, however, the reported increase in the incidence of self-managing work teams. One could even speculate that their use by large prestigious companies might persuade smaller organisations to follow suit. Probably most widely known are two phone surveys analysed by Osterman (1994, 1998). Respondents were US managers of establishments, who were asked to answer for their ‘‘largest occupational group’’ or core employees. The study covered private, profit-oriented, non-agricultural establishments with at least 50 employees. The data are claimed to be representative for the population studied. The respondents were asked about the presence of four so-called ‘‘high performance work practices’’: quality circles, job rotation, total quality management and ‘‘self-directed work teams’’. In case respondents asked for clarification of the latter term, the interviewers had the following description at hand: Employees supervise their own work, they make their own decisions about pace and flow and occasionally the best way to get the work done.
The first round was held in 1992 and the second in 1997. In 1992, 694 managers responded for a response rate of 66 percent; the 1997 response is not mentioned but can be calculated to be somewhat below 400, based on a response rate of 58 percent. Osterman (1998) reports that in 1992 40.5 percent of the responding organisations had self-managed work teams for at least 50 percent of their core employees. Without restrictions on the coverage (i.e. percentage of employees involved), the percentage was 55 percent. In 1997, the first number had gone down slightly from 40.5 to 38.4 percent. One may conclude that in this population, between 1992 and 1997, the incidence of self-managed work teams remained roughly at the same level. Remarkably, the incidence of the other three ‘‘high performance work practices’’ increased significantly: they roughly doubled from rates around 26 percent to over 55 percent. A critical note concerns directly asking for the presence of practices. Such practices are hardly ever unequivocal. More likely, as Spencer argued for one of Osterman’s ‘‘practices’’, total quality management is an ‘‘amorphous philosophy’’ (Spencer, 1994, p. 448). The same holds for self-managed work
Table III. ‘‘Self-managing work teams’’ in large US companies, 1987-1996
1987 1990 1993 1996 Source: Lawler et al. (1998)
At least some employees involved
At least 40 percent of employees involved
27 47 69 78
1 1 5 9
teams and similar terms. Respondents will answer based on their particular The incidence of understanding of such ambiguous terms, which raises doubts about the extent group work to which these answers capture what the researchers have in mind. Osterman’s clarification of the term may be helpful, but only if actually used by the interviewers. Furthermore, in terms of the EPOC survey, the teams’ decisionrights were not specified. 381 A second significant source concerns data gathered by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The BLS periodically conducts the Survey of Employer Provided Training (SEPT). The population consists of private, non-agricultural establishments with at least 20 employees. The notion of ‘‘largest occupational group’’ is not used. The respondents are asked for the formal presence of a number of practices, including ‘‘worker teams’’: Small, intact groups of workers whose members have the authority to handle internal processes as they see fit in order to generate a specific group product, service or decision.
Data about 1993 (Gittleman et al., 1998) and 1995 (Frazis et al., 1999) are available. In 1993, there were 5,946 respondents (response 54.1 percent); in 1995, 1,062 persons responded (response 74.1 percent). In the 1993 SEPT survey, 14 percent of the establishments investigated were found to have ‘‘work teams’’ in place. When the minimum establishment size is raised from 20 to 50 employees, this percentage increases to 32 percent. Four years later, the latter percentage was 19.9 (the percentage for establishments with a minimum of 20 employees is not reported). The considerable drop from 32 to 19.9 percent suggests that worker teams lost popularity between 1993 and 1995. However, the SEPT data collection method changed from a postal survey to a method in which interviewers submitted the questionnaires to managers responsible for personnel issues within the investigated establishments. The sharp drop may thus be an artefact of the changed procedure of delivering questionnaires. Taken together, the data from Lawler et al. (1998) suggest that the incidence of self-directed work teams increased from the mid-1980s to roughly 1996. Both other studies reported significant incidence levels for 1992 and 1993, respectively. Osterman’s and the SEPT data indicate that, in the USA, teams’ incidence stayed about at the same level or even declined. One would expect that the latter would have been mentioned in the business press, for which there are no indications. Nevertheless, the findings are not conclusive about this issue. There is a remarkable difference between the findings by Osterman and those reported by Gittleman et al. For 1992-1993, the difference between SEPT’s 32 percent and Osterman’s 55 percent is considerable, and may be explained by different approaches, i.e. postal vs phone survey, no use versus use of ‘‘largest occupational group’’, and the framing of the central questions. The Employment Outlook 1998 contains a chapter on the incidence of work practices co-authored by Gittleman. There, it was suggested that phone surveys generate higher estimates than mailings (OECD, 1999, p. 184). If so, Osterman’s findings are too high.
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Implications of the evidence on group work The first lesson from this endeavour is that the simple question as to how popular teams are is surprisingly hard to answer. Various methodologies have been applied on different populations of employers and employees. Only a few studies allow for reasonably reliable comparisons. Given the high costs involved in data collection, there should be more standardisation to make results comparable. Future work should benefit from the advances made so far. More results have become available at the establishment level and for core employees rather than for entire organisations and with the working population left unspecified. Including the coverage, i.e. the percentage of core employees involved in the practice, is a further improvement. The same holds for EPOC’s approach of including decision-rights. To the extent that autonomy, in whatever form, is seen as characteristic for group work, this specification is necessary. Second, we should not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Empirical work is never perfect, and one could also decide to concentrate on what the data do say rather than what their limitations are. One can draw a few crossnational and longitudinal conclusions. Cross-nationally, the EPOC and Nordflex data confirm that group work is rather popular in Sweden. The only other country that these two sources both included is Denmark, but unfortunately the Danish data are inconsistent. When teams only are considered, the Danish organisations score high in the Nordflex study. But when the coverage is included, the Danes score low. That last finding fits with EPOC’s results. Longitudinally, data including the 1990s are only available for two countries: Germany and the USA. The two German studies, using different populations, suggest that the incidence of group work appears to be rather low but on the increase. The US data are more problematic to interpret. While an increase for large companies is reported for the period 1987-1996, Osterman finds that, of four practices studied, self-managing teams are the only ones that do not increase, whereas the SEPT data suggest a decrease. The latter may have to do with a changed way of data collection. In the EPOC review of empirical studies available up to 1994-1995, Fro¨hlich and Pekruhl (1996, p. 188) concluded about possible cross-national differences: . . . we cannot answer these questions on the basis of available research. [. . .] the research is characterised by extreme diversity: in the problems investigated, methods applied and the depth of measurement and analysis.
Since this was published, the situation has improved somewhat but there remains considerable scope for further improvement. The progress that is visible and will hopefully be sustained includes the use of establishments/ workplaces as units of measurement, and within these the notion of ‘‘core employees’’ and coverage. To avoid confusion about what is meant, we recommend using an indirect description of ‘‘group work’’ and a specification of decision-rights in future surveys.
References Allegro, J. (1998), ‘‘Flexibilisering van medewerkers en organisatie’’, in van Gent, B. and van der Zee, H. (Eds), Arbeidsmarkt en competentie, Elsevier Bedrijfsinformatie, The Hague, pp. 117-30. Antoni, C.H. (1996), ‘‘Teilautonome Arbeitsgruppen – Eine Expertenbefragung zu Verbreitungsformen und Erfahrungen’’, Angewandte Arbeitswissenschaften, No. 147, pp. 3153. Bassi, L.J. and Van Buren, M.E. (1999), The 1999 ASTD State of the Industry Report, ASTD, s.l., Washington DC. Benders, J. and van Bijsterveld, M. (2000), ‘‘Leaning on lean; the reception of a management fashion in Germany’’, New Technology, Work and Employment, Vol. 15 No. 1, pp. 50-64. Benders, J. and van Hootegem, G. (1999), ‘‘Teams and their context; moving the team discussion beyond existing dichotomies’’, Journal of Management Studies, Vol. 36 No. 5, pp. 609-28. Benders, J., Huijgen, F., Pekruhl, U. and O’Kelly, K.P. (1999), Useful but Unused; Group Work in Europe, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg. Brewster, C. and Hegewisch, A. (1994), Policy and Practice in European Human Resource Management; The Price Waterhouse Cranfield Survey, Routledge, London. Buchanan, D. (2000), ‘‘An eager and enduring embrace: the ongoing rediscovery of a management idea’’, in Procter, S. and Mueller, F. (Eds), Teamworking, Macmillan, Houndmills/London, pp. 25-42. Cole, R.E. (1985), ‘‘The macropolitics of organizational change; the spread of small-group activities in Sweden, Japan, and the United States’’, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 30 No. 4, pp. 560-85. Cully, M., Woodland, S., O’Reilly, A. and Dix, G. (1999), Britain at Work; As Depicted by the 1988 Workplace Employee Relations Survey, Routledge, London. de Sitter, L.U., den Hertog, J.F. and Dankbaar, B. (1997), ‘‘From complex organizations with simple jobs to simple organizations with complex jobs’’, Human Relations, Vol. 50 No. 5, pp. 497-534. EPOC Research Group (1997), New Forms of Work Organisation; Can Europe Realise its Potential?; Results of a Survey of Direct Employee Participation in Europe, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg. Frazis, H., Gittleman, M. and Joyce, M. (1999), ‘‘Correlates of training: an analysis using employer and employee characteristics’’, unpublished paper, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Washington, DC. Fro¨hlich, D. and Pekruhl, U. (1996), Direct Participation and Organisational Change: Fashionable but Misunderstood? An Analysis of Research in Europe, Japan and the USA, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg. Gittleman, M., Horrigan, M. and Joyce, M. (1998), ‘‘‘Flexible’ workplace practices: evidence from a nationally representative survey’’, Industrial & Labor Relations Review, Vol. 52 No. 1, pp. 99-115. Harzing, A.-W. (1997), ‘‘Response rates in international mail surveys: results of a 22-country study’’, International Business Review, Vol. 6 No. 6, pp. 641-65. Huys, R. and van Hootegem, G. (2000), ‘‘The measurement of teamwork in organisations’’, paper presented at the Workshop Research Methodology, Team-based Work, Performance and Stress, Nijmegen Business School, University of Nijmegen, Nijmegen, 7-8 September. Kinkel, S. and Wengel, J. (1999), ‘‘The diffusion of new production concepts in Germany’’, in Lay, G., Shapira, P. and Wengel, J. (Eds), Innovation in Production: The Adoption and Impacts of New Manufacturing Concepts in German Industry, Physica-Verlag, Heidelberg, pp. 19-30.
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Kleinschmidt, M. and Pekruhl, U. (1994a), Kooperative Arbeitsstrukturen und Gruppenarbeit; Ergebnisse einer repra¨sentativen Bescha¨ftigungsbefragung, Institut Arbeit und Technik, Gelsenkirchen. Kleinschmidt, M. and Pekruhl, U. (1994b), ‘‘Kooperation, Partizipation und Autonomie: Gruppenarbeit in Deutschen Betrieben’’, Arbeit, Vol. 4 No. 2, pp. 150-72. Lawler, E.E., Mohrman, S.A. and Ledford, G.E. (1998), Strategies for High Performance Organisation; The CEO Report, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, CA. Loontechnische Dienst (1979), Werkoverleg en werkstructurering in Nederland 1978, Loontechnische Dienst, The Hague. Loontechnische Dienst (1987), Werkoverleg en werkstructurering in Nederland in 1985, Loontechnische Dienst, The Hague. Morita, M. (2001), ‘‘Have the seeds of Japanese teamworking taken root abroad?’’, New Technology, Work and Employment, Vol. 16 No. 3, p. 178-90. Nordhause-Janz, J. and Pekruhl, U. (2000), ‘‘Managementmoden oder Zukunftskonzepte? Zur Entwicklung von Arbeitstrukturen und von Gruppenarbeit in Deutschland’’, in Nordhause-Janz, J. and Pekruhl, U. (Eds), Arbeiten in neuen Strukturen? Partizipation, Kooperation, Autonomie, und Gruppenarbeit in Deutschland, Rainer Hampp Verlag, Munich/Mering, pp. 13-68. NUTEK (1996), Towards Flexible Organisations, NUTEK, Stockholm. NUTEK (1999), Flexibility Matters – The Flexible Enterprises in the Nordic Countries, NUTEK, Stockholm. OECD (1999), Employment Outlook, OECD, Paris. Oliver, N., Delbridge, R. and Lowe, J. (1996), ‘‘Lean production practices: international comparisons in the auto components industry’’, British Journal of Management, Special Issue, Vol. 7, pp. S29-44. Osterman, P. (1994), ‘‘How common is workplace transformation and who adopts it?’’, Industrial & Labor Relations Review, Vol. 47 No. 2, pp. 173-88. Osterman, P. (1998), ‘‘Changing work organisation in America: what has happened and who has benefited?’’, Transfer, Vol. 4 No. 2, pp. 246-63. Pil, F.K. and MacDuffie, J. (1996), ‘‘The adoption of high-involvement work practices’’, Industrial Relations, Vol. 35 No. 3, pp. 423-55. Spencer, B.A. (1994), ‘‘Models of organisation and total quality management: a comparison and critical evaluation’’, Academy of Management Review, Vol. 19 No. 3, pp. 446-71. Trist, E.L. and Bamforth, K.W. (1951), ‘‘Some social and psychological consequences of the longwall method of coal-getting’’, Human Relations, Vol. 4 No. 1, pp. 3-38. van Amelsvoort, P. (1994), ‘‘Hoe ver zijn zelfsturende teams in de praktijk?’’, Panta Rhei, Vol. 4 No. 2, pp. 6-8. van der Zee, H. (1998), ‘‘Het heilige geloof in zelfsturing’’, Opleiding & Ontwikkeling, Vol. 11 No. 9, pp. 7-14. van Eijnatten, F.M. (1993), The Paradigm That Changed the Workplace, van Gorcum, Assen. Whitfield, K., Delbridge, R. and Brown, W. (1999), ‘‘Comparative research in industrial relations: helping the survey cross frontiers’’, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol. 19 No. 6, pp. 971-80. Appendix. Statistics of EPOC Survey The survey was planned to be representative of workplaces (all sectors, with the exception of agriculture) in as many EU countries as the budget would allow, taking into account a range of different populations and geographical positions. Unless stated otherwise, the data reported
below concern the average workplace in the ten countries included in the survey: Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, The Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the UK. Respondents were workplace (establishment) general managers or the manager s/he felt was the most appropriate. Respondents were asked to answer the questions for their establishment (called ‘‘workplace’’) and, within that, the largest occupational group, i.e. the largest number of non-managerial employees at the workplace. The questionnaire was pre-tested in the ten countries in the winter of 1995 and in the spring of 1996. The mailing for the main survey was carried out in the period June-October 1996. The gross sample of workplaces differed for the ten countries according to population size, the number of employees in industry and services, and the number of workplaces with 20 or more employees (for the smaller- and medium-sized countries) and 50 or more employees (for the larger ones). For the larger countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the UK), the gross sample was 5,000 workplaces; for the medium-sized countries (Denmark, The Netherlands, Sweden) 2,500 and for the smaller countries (Ireland, Portugal), 1,000. The total number of respondents was 5,786. The overall response rate was almost 18 percent, varying between 9 percent (Spain) and 39 percent (Ireland). Overall, these response rates are about the same as in two other postal surveys involving different countries (Brewster and Hegewisch, 1994; Harzing, 1997). Appropriate weighting was applied to make the data representative for the average establishment in the ten countries or, in the case of national data, for the countries investigated.
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Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 386-393. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486
Book reviews Organizing and Organizations, 2nd edition Y. Gabriel, S. Fineman and D. Sims Sage London 2000 388 pp. ISBN 07619 6280 8 £19.99 Keywords Organizations, Organizational behaviour The topics encountered in an organizational behaviour text are relatively predictable. The apparently tried-and-true narrative we find in organizational behaviour textbooks have one major problem – they simply do not reflect the situation’s people experience each day in organizations. The issues an actor within an organization faces are not arranged in the orderly fashion of an average organizational behaviour textbook. Rather, they appear as fundamentally disorganized, inter-woven, and in process. If there is one lesson that many studies of organization during the last 15 years have taught us, it is that issues in organizations are not simply rational arrangements of resources. Rather, organizations are sites of continual human interaction characterised by a complex range of overlapping, intertwined, and hopelessly interconnected issues. Attempting to pick a particular issue within an organization such as personality (for instance) usually invokes the many other strands connected with issues of personality such as ethics, groups, culture and so on. Given the cross-cutting and complex nature of organization, why is it that organizational behaviour textbooks are usually written as if organizations can be carved up in neat analytic divisions? This is a question that seems to lie at the basis of the second edition of Organizing and Organizations. Instead of giving into the hopelessly outdated orthodoxy of the common organizational behaviour text, Organizing and Organizations attempts to present some of the intertwined complexities involved in organizational life. It then uses a cache of some of the most recent research in organization behaviour and organization studies to make sense of this complexity. This is a notable reversal from the common approach to textbooks, which usually begins with the theoretical tools, and then goes in search of issues within organizations to which these tools can be applied. The issues to which established theoretical tools are applied are usually rather artificial examples to prove the wisdom of the theories contained therein. They rarely aim to present the messy nature of organizational life with which organizational actors are faced. Organizing and Organizations begins with the new orthodoxy among many researchers of organization today – that we should not look at an organization as a stable object, but understand organizations as a social process. The authors suggest that we should fix our attention on the process of organizing, rather than the object organization. In order to understand this complex and
intertwined process of organizing, they examine a series of 19 issues that are commonly encountered in the process of organizing today. These chapters deal with issues including entering and leaving, rules, making deals, morals, greening, dealing with problems, learning, machines, leading and following, and judging others. A series of interesting and important issues encountered in this text, which are sorely lacking in other organizational behaviour texts, include feelings, sex, joking, ‘‘us and them’’, diversity and difference, careers, consumption, working and living, and uncertainty in organizations. Each of these chapters can be read in any particular order, with the introduction and conclusion serving as the hub to the whole book. The complex links between each of the chapters are highlighted by cross-references, and common theoretical tools are used to understand the differing issues in each chapter. A comprehensive ‘‘thesaurus’’ of the theoretical terms used throughout the text is included at the back of the book. Just like the organizational world that Organizing and Organizations examines, this book is a complex, intertwining process rather than a single, linear thing. Organizing and Organizations is a refreshing change from the organizational behaviour texts commonly used, which amount to little more than a report on what North American behaviour scientists have learned from the reactions of a managerial e´lite in large North American corporations. What we have here are issues that cross a broader range of levels of the organization, and examine a more specifically UK or European context. Throughout the text we find a keen flavour of the impact that sweeping changes in organizations have had not just for top managers, but for many organizational actors from the call centre functionary to the police officer to the nurse. Engaging with Organizing and Organizations from the Asia-Pacific, however, throws a slightly different light on the text. Although the issues dealt with present a significant insight into how organizing takes place in a (post)modern world, the text still falls prey to that most widespread of academic sins – Eurocentricism. Although Organizing and Organizations spoke about experiences of organizations shared by many of those who work in broadly modern organizations, wherever they may be in the world, it does not capture many of the significant issues that are faced in specific localities. To use the strictly Australian perspective as an example, this text does not deal with issues of indigenous ways of organizing (something quite different from diversity), social processes in family business, and small business. It would also be possible to advance the argument that many of the key issues dealt with here work very differently in a context outside the UK or Europe. If we take emotions, for instance, we could see quite clearly that differing cultural contexts would have very different experiences and regulation of emotions within the workplace. To be sure, Organizing and Organizations is not irrelevant beyond the European context – it does open up important issues in modern organizations. The answers given, however, may not reflect the experience in Melbourne, Calcutta, or Sa˜o Paulo. This is a vital fact on which both teachers and students should reflect, given the international audience of organizational behaviour texts. The key strengths of Organizing and Organizations – its complex and overlapping nature – are also one of its key weaknesses. In approaching each
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issue and highlighting the many other issues intertwined, the text may distract the reader from developing an understanding of the core theoretical concepts it is trying to communicate. This line between developing a mastery of the core theory and developing an understanding that organizations are complex and that many issues cut across our theoretical toolbox is tough to tread. It is a large risk to take in providing the reader with little more than a very superficial understanding of the core theoretical concepts. Also text does not succeed in explaining the significant tradition of scholarship that underpins each of the theoretical tools a reader is asked to use. It could be argued that the lineage of these theoretical tools is of no consequence to the practice of applying theoretical tools to complex situations within an organization. However, to be able to understand how and why one knows and may use a particular theoretical approach, it is vital to develop at least some understanding of the significant debates that lie behind each theory. By understanding at least the basics of these debates a reader is invited to understand why a theory is so, how other researchers have seen it, and see that it is possible to challenge these theories. The extensive and well-crafted thesaurus towards the end of the book partially redresses this issue by providing an overview of a concept and key references, but it inevitably suffers the fate of being a marginal aspect of the core text. Organizing and Organizations is an engaging, novel and interesting text. It brings into textbook form many of the lessons of contemporary organization studies and organization behaviour research. The text also highlights the important lesson that to understand organizational behaviour is not just to understand it from the perspective of managerial e´lites. Finally Organizing and Organizations treads a difficult line between highlighting the complexities and interconnections of contemporary organizational issues and the theoretical tools we can use to make sense of this world. Andre Spicer University of Melbourne
Living Strategy: Putting People at the Heart of Corporate Purpose L. Gratton Financial Times/Prentice-Hall Harlow 2000 256 pp. (pbk) ISBN 0 273 65015 7 £19.99 Keywords Human resource management, Strategic planning, Corporate culture, Corporate planning There is a plethora of books which consider the development of strategy within organisations, the management of human resources within organisations, changing culture within organisations or planning for the future of such
organisations. There are very few books that attempt to deal with all of these issues and to show that they are inter-related. Equally, many books deal with techniques for management which are based on the premise that people are the most important asset of an organisation without showing why and how this is so. This book is therefore different in that it attempts to deal with all of these issues to show that the strategic development of an organisation must be based on the people within the organisation. Moreover, this book does not just use research and practical experience to demonstrate this but also provides a blueprint upon which managers can act. The book is focused on both the development of business strategies for success in the long term and the management of people as the major asset to a business. Indeed its thrust is that the development of long-term strategies for business success must be based around the management of people as the major resource of a business. It aims to set out the rationale for this argument in a clear and logical way and then to show how this idea can actually be implemented. The book starts by setting a context for its message of the importance of people by drawing upon the practical experience of the author in a variety of organisational settings before proceeding to identify what the author describes as the three tenets of sustainable competitive advantage, namely: we operate in time; we search for meaning; and we have a soul. Associated with these three tenets is a set of nine capabilities, three for each tenet. The first third of the book is devoted to an explanation of these tenets and the author makes good use of her experience of working with companies to provide practical examples to support her message. Indeed the book in general is well researched and substantiated from the experience of the author. The main part of the book is devoted to the implementation of a strategy based on these tenets, which the author describes as a journey which has six steps. These steps, in the view of the author, should be followed in sequence to arrive at the desired results. Each of these steps is underpinned by some guiding principles and has some tools associated with it which will guide a manager through its being actioned. Indeed the whole tone of this part of the book is that it is a blueprint for practical action and, as such, is reminiscent of a DIY manual or a New Age self-help manual. Some of the language used is drawn from the language of such New Age material, such as when the author describes ‘‘the sustaining of the energy of the journey’’ or ‘‘engaging in collective dreaming’’. The language of the book is that of a visionary juxtaposed with practical business language and some people may find that this approach jars, while others will find it highly appropriate. In some respects therefore the book is in the genre established by Peters and Waterman (1982) and followed by a large number of authors thereafter. The author has also taught extensively on MBA programmes and the design of this book is based on her experiences leading to a format which would be attractive to such an audience. In this I am sure that she is correct and this book would be a suitable book for an MBA module in strategic development or human resource management.
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The primary target audience for the book, however, would appear to be practising managers, together with consultants working in this area. Thus the six steps towards implementation give practical advice, again making good use of examples. Each step finishes by outlining separately the role of the line manager and the role of the human resource professional in its completion and finishing with a summary of specific actions that need to be taken. The explanation of these six steps finishes with a call to action for business leaders to support the message that ‘‘building human potential demands a new agenda, a new set of challenges for leaders, and a redefined set of managerial capabilities’’ and the whole of the book supports this assertion. The target audience seems to be not just managers responsible for strategic development but also line managers and human resource professionals and each is specifically catered for in the outline of the various steps. Moreover, the book finishes with what is called a workbook, which contains ‘‘exercises and discussion pieces to take you and your team through a set of experiences’’, which is again reminiscent of a New Age manual. This workbook is quite short but of obvious relevance and practical use for anyone seeking to develop a vision of the future for their organisation. The book is clearly written and well presented and my remarks about the approach should not be taken as derogatory, merely as an observation that the style will not appeal to everyone. It could equally be argued that the content will not appeal to everyone – although in my opinion it should, as its message is both timely and important – and that those interested in the message should find the style appealing. I did, however, find the list approach – with tenets subdivided into capabilities and steps backed up by guiding principles and tools – to make for a somewhat disjointed narrative at times but do accept that this kind of approach is necessary to provide an actionable programme to stem from the thrust of the book. Indeed this practical approach could be regarded as one of the strengths of the book. As stated several times, the book is well researched and the author makes good use of examples and her obviously extensive practical experience. Moreover, the author provides copious (but not excessive) notes to substantiate her data and a good bibliography for those interested in further study of the various topics covered. The book has a clear message to organisational managers and human resource professionals as well as being suitable for use on an MBA programme. Moreover, it has a message which would be of interest and relevance to everyone interested in strategic planning and corporate performance management. It is a book which I expect will find its way on to the bookshelves of many human resources professionals, managers, students and academics but will not be read and then forgotten. Instead it will be used on a regular basis to provide some guidance for planning the future. David Crowther University of North London Reference Peters, T.J. and Waterman, R.H. (1982), In Search of Excellence, Harper & Row, New York, NY.
Human Resource Management, 8th edition G. Dessler Prentice-Hall Englewood Cliffs, NJ 2000 699 pp. (hbk) ISBN 0-13-0141240 £31.99 Keywords Human resource management, Personnel, Performance, Strategy Human Resource Management is divided into six parts. Part I, ‘‘Introduction’’, defines human resource management (HRM) as ‘‘. . . policies and practices one needs to carry out – the ‘people’ or human resource aspects of a management position, including recruiting, screening, training, rewarding and appraising . . .’’ and outlines the context of HRM and its strategic role in building the ‘‘highperformance organization’’. This chapter also offers an overview of HR activities and responsibilities, as well as giving pointers to research linking HR to organizational performance. The next chapter on ‘‘equal opportunity and the law’’ will be mostly inappropriate for those practising HRM outside the USA. Part II, ‘‘Recruitment and placement’’, takes us through job analysis in great detail, though it relies heavily on the Dictionary of Occupational Titles, a US Department of Labor publication. The chapter on planning and recruiting has some useful guidelines for using HR information systems, and forecasting labour supply and demand, though again some of this information is not appropriate for non-US practitioners (guidelines on US Privacy Acts, reference to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and other US agencies). The chapters on selection and interviewing are comprehensive, and cover a range of techniques and devices, as well as offering brief examples of guidelines or pro formas which could be of immediate, practical use to HR practitioners. Again, however, these refer to US legislation and US regulatory bodies. Part III, ‘‘Training and development’’, includes sections on the training process, individual development schemes and management development. The (largely revised) chapter on organizational change includes sections on TQM, business process re-engineering and running teams. The next chapter on appraisal in this section is likely to be a useful, quick reference guide to those conducting appraisals regularly, as well as outlining a wide range of techniques and methods (graphic rating, paired comparison, forced distribution, MBO, critical incident, etc.) allowing more experienced practitioners to broaden their skills, or experiment with new ways of appraising. There is also a chapter on ‘‘managing careers and fair treatment’’, which made for interesting reading, although, again, some of this is irrelevant for those working in a European legal context. Part IV, ‘‘Compensation’’, offers comprehensive coverage of pay issues, from setting up pay plans, and benefit schemes, to different methods of incentivising work. Part V ‘‘Labor relations and employee security’’, is largely irrelevant outside the USA, as it focuses on the history of the US union movement and US employment law in relation to health and safety. The final, briefest section, Part
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VI, ‘‘International HRM’’, is more concerned with how multinational companies can work outside the USA than with offering in-depth comparison of HR practice in different countries. The main differences from earlier editions are the ‘‘first fully developed online course for HRM’’, and an appendix on HR and information systems. One chapter, ‘‘Managing organizational renewal’’, has been revised, and this edition claims (p. xxiii) to offer an integrating theme, ‘‘The high-performance organization: building better, faster, more competitive organizations through HR’’. A second organising theme (p. 26) is that HR is not the job of the HR department, but ‘‘. . . the responsibility of every manager . . .’’ and the book is indeed set out in such a way that ‘‘every manager’’ could quickly find a section relevant to their particular problem, together with a case study or two, cluster of definitions and check-list of dos and don’ts. Pro forma examples, such as the job analysis questionnaire (pp. 89-90), applicant interview guide (pp. 217-18) or sample career-planning workshop (p. 367), would also help increase someone’s basic understanding of key HR functions, and help in drafting personnel documents. There are also brief snippets on ‘‘small-business applications’’ of HRM ideas, and recurring references to managing diversity (‘‘diversity counts’’). Both these themes are highlighted in the contents pages. The layout is, on the whole, very reader-friendly. One particularly helpful device is the brief definitions of key terms in the left margin. I also liked the emphasis on learning objectives at the beginning of each chapter, and the way that each chapter ends with a brief summary to test understanding. There is a choice of case-study exercises, which could form the basis for a discussion or seminar, though I felt that some of these were a bit thin. There is no overall bibliography, and in the text a variety of different sources is anonymously referred to as ‘‘experts’’. Personally, I disliked having to constantly flick to the end of the chapter to see who the ‘‘experts’’ were. Students would probably appreciate the many references to Web sites, and the site accompanying the book is user-friendly and easy to navigate. Human Resource Management itself is very well laid out, and designed in such a way as to make it easy to skim through, or revise after more careful reading. There are also many glossy tables, figures and photos to keep the eye interested, though at times this can be distracting and leave you wondering where the in-depth content actually is, particularly if you are after any remotely critical analysis of the impacts of changing work practices on individual employees. Much of the book is list-like, and this is a limitation, because, to my mind, there is no coherent body of propositional knowledge when it comes to managing people. It is perhaps unfair to criticise the book on this point, as this may simply reflect a difference of opinion, given that Dessler’s preface emphasises his view that ‘‘. . . all managers . . . need a strong foundation in personnel management concepts and techniques . . .’’ It is fair to say that one limitation of a list-like, ‘‘how-to’’ approach means that it could be unwise to recommend Dessler to students, who are often understandably keen to see ‘‘the answer’’ to a problem or question in terms of simple frameworks or unqualified, reductionist models of complex behaviours. Anyone who has marked undergraduate essays on motivation will testify to this. A cynical point is that this approach does make it a lot easier to design ‘‘. . . the first fully-developed online course for HRM . . .’’,
because, if you assume that you have a codified body of knowledge, this means that it is far easier to remotely administer self-test questions. Dessler’s book is not likely to be top of a must-buy list for practitioners outside the USA, who may well find the constant references to US law and US bodies tiresome. Nonetheless, he does provide a useful summary of a large range of other management theorists. There are also references to real-world cases of HR in action, which are likely to spice up a lecture or attract the attention of flagging listeners at a presentation. At times it was difficult to tell the difference between the opening one-paragraph ‘‘vignettes’’ and a press release. For example, the first ‘‘vignette’’ relates how ‘‘Mead corporation wisely built their design and installation around the needs of the plant’s employees . . .’’ and you might find your hackles rising when you come across the example of Union Carbide (of Bhopal infamy) as a ‘‘progressive multinational’’. A quick trip to the Web site reveals other PR plugs, masquerading as test questions. One which caught my eye was ‘‘How does Philip Morris try to be a model corporate citizen of the world?’’ – how indeed? There is no doubting that this is a very comprehensive outline of the kinds of things HR people do, and Dessler covers a wide range of topics which other HRM textbooks do not, for example, the section on how to manage videoconferencing (pp. 262-3). There are also many sections on the impact of the Internet and related technologies on core HR functions (e.g. recruiting on the Internet: pp. 153-4). Overall I found the book interesting but, perhaps because of its comprehensive scope, no coherent message emerges. Dessler’s claim that ‘‘the high-performance organization’’ is the integrating theme to this edition seemed empty. After all, isn’t HRM supposed to deliver that anyway? It also seems circular or tautologous, where case studies show a ‘‘best practice’’ organization, to use the ‘‘high-performance’’ label. Nonetheless, the goal of offering a ‘‘. . . foundation in personnel management concepts and techniques . . .’’ is consistently followed through. The book offers ‘‘how-to’’ tips, case studies and lists on a wide range of topics. These all have the potential to be of immediate practical use, or to be a springboard for further research. Still, I would have reservations about someone relying solely on Human Resource Management (or in fairness any single book) as their guide when it comes to ‘‘policies and practices one needs to carry out – the ‘people’ aspects of a management position’’. This is because it would be all too easy for someone to apply the Dessler tool-kit without thinking critically about what they are actually doing. It offers a ‘‘plug and play’’ approach to HRM, which is consistent with the formidable multi-media battery of tools (video, manual, Web site) accompanying this text, but not consistent with the most important aspects of the ‘‘. . . ‘people’ or human resource aspects of a management position . . .’’, which take shape in complex social interactions. Even so, the book is a useful addition to any HRM mini-library, partly because it offers an archetypal, no-nonsense, US approach to managing people at work, but mainly because, as a reference text, it covers a wide range of contemporary HR themes. It could also form part of a course on HR (if complemented by other, more critical texts), though the continual references to US law might make this difficult to administer. Kevin Morrell Loughborough University Business School
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About the authors Jos Benders Jos Benders is Senior Research Fellow at the University of Nijmegen. Graeme Currie Graeme Currie is a Senior Lecturer in Organisational Behaviour at the Business School at the University of Nottingham. His recent research projects have included knowledge management in the pharmaceutical industry, organising doctors to share learning, the role of the middle manager in the NHS and the role of the human resource function in the NHS. In a ‘‘previous life’’ Graeme was an organisation development adviser for a health authority and worked in personnel for the Rover Car Group. Jan de Leede Jan de Leede is Assistant Professor of Human Resource Management in the Faculty of Technology and Management at the University of Twente. Hans Doorewaard Hans Doorewaard has been Professor of Organisation Development at the Nijmegen School of Management, University of Nijmegen since 1999. He obtained his PhD in Policy Sciences from the University of Nijmegen in 1989, based on a study of hegemonic power processes in organisations. His research interests include power processes, gendering processes, organisational development, job redesign, research methodology and emotions in organisations. Fred Huijgen Fred Huijgen is a professor at the University of Nijmegen and affiliated to TNO Work and Employment, Hoofddorp. Rik Huys Rik Huys obtained his PhD at the Catholic University of Leuven with a dissertation on ‘‘The structure of the division of labour in the Belgian car assembly industry’’. Currently, he fulfils a post-doctoral mandate at the department of Sociology of Labour and Organisations in the Faculty of Social Sciences of the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium). His research is focused on organisational learning, the organisation of labour and its consequences for the quality of labour.
Personnel Review, Vol. 31 No. 3, 2002, pp. 394-396. # MCB UP Limited, 0048-3486
Ma´ire Kerrin Ma´ire Kerrin is a Lecturer in Organisational Psychology at the Institute of Work, Health and Organisations, where she teaches training, organisational
development and change and organisational behaviour. Her previous research and practice have involved the study of continuous improvement (CI) activities within the automotive industry. She is currently researching the role of information technology in supporting shared learning and problem solving within both public and private sector organisations. She is a Chartered Occupational Psychologist. Jan Kees Looise Jan Kees Looise is a Professor of Human Resource Management in the Faculty of Technology and Management at the University of Twente. Kate Mulholland Kate Mulholland has until recently taught the ‘‘Sociology of work and industry’’, ‘‘Theories of industrial society’’ and ‘‘Qualitative research methodology’’ modules at The Queen’s University of Belfast. Her research interests include call centre employment and the ‘‘new managerialism’’ in the utilities. Currently she is also working on a book that examines the politics of entrepreneurialism, gender relations and notions of ownership/class relations in the family business. Nick Oliver Nick Oliver is a Professor of Management at the Judge Institute of Management Studies at Cambridge, where he teaches organisational behaviour and operations management. He is co-author of The Japanization of British Industry (1992), which examined the spread of Japanese management practices to the UK. His recent research includes benchmarking studies of automotive manufacturing operations in Japan, Europe, North America and China; an international comparison of product development performance in the consumer electronics sector; and research into interfirm networks for innovation in the biotechnology and automotive industries. Ulrich Pekruhl Ulrich Pekruhl is Senior Researcher at the University of Applied Sciences, Solothurn, Switzerland. Stephen Procter Stephen Procter is Alcan Professor of Management in the School of Management at the University of Newcastle. He is co-founder and joint organiser of the International Workshop on Teamworking and (with Frank Mueller) is joint Editor of the title Teamworking (Macmillan, 2000). Diana Rosemary Sharpe Diana Rosemary Sharpe is a Lecturer in Organisational Behaviour at Warwick Business School. Her research interests include the international comparative study of organisations and multinationals, focusing on comparing how
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organisations manage their subsidiaries, and how practices are transferred, sustained, adapted and contested in different contexts. Her other related interests include the comparative analysis of shopfloor work organisation, control processes and methodological issues in undertaking international comparative studies of organisations.
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Geert Van Hootegem Geert Van Hootegem obtained his PhD at the Catholic University of Leuven with a dissertation on ‘‘The bearable slowness of management: trends in production and personnel management’’. Currently, he is working as a professor at the Department of Sociology of Labour and Organisations in the Faculty of Social Sciences of the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium). His research is focused on teamwork, human resources management and the flexibility of organisations and workers. Maarten Verkerk Maarten Verkerk is factory manager at Philips Components B.V., Roermond in The Netherlands.
