I see that the legislation
enabling the employee/shareholder contract has been defeated in the House of
Lords. The proposal
involved employees waiving some employment rights in return for shares in the business
they work for.
As these rights included unfair dismissal rights, statutory
redundancy pay, the right to request flexible working and training, and the
time limit for giving notice of a firm date of return from maternity or
adoption leave, I can’t help but be pleased that it has been defeated. It will go back to the House of Commons,
where I hope it will be quickly forgotten because the Government has bigger
fish to fry.
Workers might well be confused. While one part of the Government is reducing
the period of collective consultation by half, asking employees to sell their
right to redundancy pay, and increasing the fee for bringing employment
tribunals, the other is banging on about engagement, and the vital need for
employees to bring enthusiasm to do more than is in the job description.
Despite it all, I am a supporter of engagement –
indeed, much of it is such common sense it would be hard not to be. Who wouldn’t want a workplace where people
were challenged, supported, respected and developed. Although
the right to ask for training would have been one of things given up, had the
employee/shareholder contract become law….
No, what I’m suspicious of is the motive. Engagement emerged out of the depths of
recession, suggesting that employers could and should arrange the working
relationship so that more was done for and with less. Unions at the time of the first Engagement
report, notwithstanding the potential well-being benefits for employees, were
wary.
And the other thing I’m suspicious of is the almost
Nazi-like commitment to engagement as a concept. This blog doesn’t have masses of followers, but
I’m prepared to be screamed down by enthusiasts waving “evidence” at me and
asking how very dare I. The quality of
the evidence is really not very good (and believe me, I have looked HARD at it)
but is being touted like the answer to all organisational prayers.
And indeed, engagement MIGHT just be that.
But not if the motive is wrong. Employees aren’t daft. They can work out soon enough if the benefits
of engagement are shared , or why engagement programmes are being
implemented. Employee well-being used to
be the raison d’etre of engagement. Now
it’s profit, productivity.
And, given the workplace environment at the moment –
weak and divided unions who CAN’T call management to account in the way they
ought to be able to; the weakest employee legislation in Europe; and employees
being offered bright new shiny contracts for 30 pieces of silver and important
employment rights – I’m not convinced of the current mode of “engagement” being
a good thing for employees.
I think the motive is suspect. And should - at least for now - be questioned.
http://kcdcoaching.moonfruit.com/#/momentum-blog/4573395166
Most of the proposed changes to employment law have little or no chance of being enacted. And they would have little of no effect on employee relations, anyway. The driving force for these changes seem to me, at least, to be trying to appease the Tory right wing who are always pushing for business to be freed from legal constraints so they can create the wealth the country needs. Until they fail, when they are the first in the queue for taxpayer handouts. (See banks, construction companies, defence contractors).
ReplyDeleteOn the subject of engagement, this is, to me, a separate issue from employment legislation and cannot in fact be legislated. Anyone who sees how the legal responsibility to consult with staff is too often executed as a tick box process is only too aware of this. Engagement, consultation, this is how we treat our work colleagues, how managers manage and comes from a driving idea that we speak to people, not at them, we have conversations, that we know people's names, we listen, we give a tiny bit of ourselves to the people that work with us and that we could not do our jobs without. Its a bit like love, difficult to define, but you know it when you see it, and you know it when it isn't there. And so do the people who we work with. You can't fake it.
Actually, I disagree. I think employment legislation at least as it affects the strength of Trades Unions, has a direct impact on engagement, not least because the best Trades Unions keep management from taking liberties. And if employers have to behave reasonably, I think engagement has a better chance of following.
ReplyDeleteBut as always, your comment welcome - much appreciated!
Karen, on that point, it might be interesting to attempt to compare engagement levels here with those in countries where employment law equips employees with more standing in the life of the business - Germany, for example - and those in which it establishes less - eg, the USA. Not sure how we'd factor out cultural differences, but I'm sure you could nail that!
ReplyDeleteI don't think engagement is such an ephemeral beast as David begins to suggest. It's a quality of a particular kind of relationship, one in which both parties are attentive to the others' needs, and work to meet those needs. The crucial thing to remember is that the manager is not one pole of this - the organisation is. If the organisation can't accommodate a healthy, mutually-interested relationship, no amount of good intention on the managers' behalf will realise this quality.
Hmmm. Leave it with me, Adam about the international stuff. I expect Hay has something....
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree about the manager not being the pole. There's not much in the literature about the duality of the relationship, rather the manager asking and the employee giving - but it is of course a joint endeavour. It might actually be interesting to see about levels of engagement in organisations where there's a partnership approach to union activity - which is possibly quite close to your mutual interest relationship?