LEADING THOUGHTS

Music provides an intriguing window on the world of work, says law professor Rafael Gely (U of Missouri).

“Throughout the centuries people have used songs while engaging in working activities,” Gely writes in The International Journal of Comparative Labour Law and Industrial Relations. “Workers have used songs as a form of entertainment, as a way to tell stories, as a means to achieve solidarity and as an avenue of voicing their concerns.”

During the pre-industrial era, when labourers had a high degree of control over work processes, songs were used by weavers, domestics, and sailors to set and respond to the pace of work.

During the Industrial Revolution, workers lost autonomy to machines, and machines then dictated the rhythm of the work day. Management theory also evolved to view music as a leisure activity that had no place on the factory floor.

Over time, management tried to use music to boost efficiency, while for workers songs became tools for class struggle. “Songs became a mechanism to voice the workers’ grievances,” Gely writes, “and also a mechanism to transmit the struggle of workers and develop class solidarity.”

Winnsboro Cotton Mills Blues

Old man Sargent, sitting at the desk
The damned old fool won’t give us no rest,
He’d take the nickels off a dead man’s eyes
To buy a Coca-Cola and an eskimo pie.

In the post-industrial era, iPods and other music-listening devices allow workers to regain a measure of control over their workspace. But managers are still using mood music to structure behaviour for both employees and customers.

Gely offers a host of research questions that he says are worth pursuing. To wit:

• How common is it for employers to allow the use of music in the workplace?
• Do policies regarding the use of music vary by industry?
• In the context of unionized workplaces, have labour organizations negotiated over the use of music?
• Are there cultural differences in the way workers interact with music?
• Are there demographic differences in the use of music at work?

Workplace Songs: Developing a Framework for Research and Teaching, by Rafael Gely; The International Journal of Comparative Labour Law and Industrial Relations 25, no. 1 (2009): 49-58

Email me for a copy of this paper: Alan [at] AlanMorantz.com

photo credit: danceonair1986

Instinct tells you that employee-employer partnerships are usually win-win arrangements. By workplace partnerships I mean: profit and gain sharing programs; policies that maximize employee security; extensive employee and union consultation; joint problem solving and planning; and flexible forms of job design.

The critical view of workplace partnership is that, far from yielding mutual gains, such arrangements inevitably benefit employers more than employees or unions.

While there is anecdotal evidence that employer-dominated partnerships exist, the weight of research over the years shows positive performance outcomes from most forms of employer-employee partnerships. The latest bit of news comes from William Roche, an Irish academic. Roche was commissioned by Ireland’s National Centre for Partnership and Performance to conduct a telephone survey of more than 5,000 employees in Ireland, asking, Who gains from workplace partnership?

Roche found there are indeed mutual gains, with the same results in both union and non-union workplaces.

Employees: Gains in work autonomy, information provision, job satisfaction, and fairness. No gains in employment security or hourly earnings.

Employers: Gains in organizational commitment and quality of managerial/supervisory relations. No gains in employees’ willingness to accept change.

Unions: Gains in member commitment, influence, and likelihood of union membership. No gains in perceptions of union effectiveness. Roche does have sobering news on this front: “Ominously for trade unions, organizational commitment is found to be negatively associated with union commitment.”

Who Gains from Workplace Partnership?; William K. Roche; The International Journal of Human Resource Management (vol. 20, no. 1, 1-33)

Email me for a copy of this paper: Alan [at] AlanMorantz.com

photo credit: dekay

Labour relations in North America’s school systems can be highly political, brutish, blamestorming affairs. Always in the middle are the hapless students who are often used as pawns.

Critics says collective bargaining raises the cost of education, blocks reform, protects incompetent teachers, and increases we-they tensions. Union supporters say bargaining empowers teachers and increases their input in policy decisions. But when you get right down to it, does collective bargaining have any impact on the academic performance of students?

It is a brave research question posed by Robert Carini of University of Louisville, Kentucky. In the Journal of Collective Negotiations, Carini writes that the “thin body of research” linking collective bargaining with academic outcomes is inconclusive and of “widely varying quality.”

As Carini points out, studies on bargaining often analyze only math gains or de-emphasize reading gains by combining math and reading gains into a composite score. In contrast, he used data from the U.S. National Education Longitudinal Study to see whether student gains on standardized math, reading, science, and history tests differed for students in public schools with and without collective bargaining.

His conclusion: collective bargaining is not negatively related to student achievement. Students in schools with and without collective bargaining showed comparable changes in
educational expectations between the eighth and tenth grades.

“Although there is mounting evidence that bargaining shapes the social organization of schools, these effects taken together do not appear to depress student achievement,” Carini writes. “There is evidence that teacher unions are more willing to be at the vanguard of reform than in the past, yet the degree to which unions oppose and effectively block reforms counter to their interests is still open to debate.”

Is Collective Bargaining Detrimental to Student Achievement? Evidence from a National Study; by Robert M. Carini; Journal of Collective Negotiations (2008, vol. 32 [3], 215-235)

Email me for a copy of this paper: Alan [at] AlanMorantz.com

photo credit: Old Sarge