Effectiveness of Employee Involvement

美国商业的最新发展之一是员工参与（EI）计划的使用——我们指的是一套多样化的人事和管理实践，如自我指导的工作团队，全面质量管理，或质量圈，等等，这些给了工人更多的权力。现有的关于EI的研究没有解决这些实践是否提高了特定部门的组织绩效，是否有任何绩效提高与组织变革或人力资本增强有关，或者EI给工人带来的好处。他们提出了一些问题，如工会是否提高了EI项目的有效性，为什么一些机构有EI而另一些没有，最关键的是，关于企业必须采用的一系列新实践才能使EI项目取得成功，以及这些实践可能是什么。为了解决这些问题，将对20个机构进行一系列案例调查，包括对有EI项目的机构和没有EI项目的机构进行配对比较，以及对这些项目失败的机构进行配对比较。此外，将在数百个机构中编制关于雇员参与方案的新数据；研究EI项目和生产率之间的关系，使用来自人口普查局制造商LRD调查文件的纵向数据。最后，将使用工作场所代表和参与调查来检查员工的结果。这项研究将为企业、劳工和政府提供有价值的信息，说明员工参与创造和维护高绩效工作场所的重要性。

One of the newest developments in American business is the use of employee involvement (EI) programs-- by which we mean a diverse set of personnel and management practices such as self-directed work teams, total quality management, or quality circles, and the like that give workers more authority at workplaces. Existing studies of EI have not addressed whether these practices enhance organizational performance save in particular sectors, whether any performance gain is do to organizational change or human capital enhancement, or the benefits that flow to workers from EI. They have raised questions as to whether unions increase the effectiveness of EI programs, why some establishments have EI and others do not, and most critically, about the set of new practices that firms must adopt for EI programs to succeed, and what those practices might be. To address these questions a series of 20 case investigations of establishments, including some paired comparisons of establishments with EI programs and those without, and of establishments where these programs have failed will be undertaken. In addition, a new data on employee involvement programs in several hundred establishments will be developed; examine the relationship between EI programs and productivity using longitudinal data from the LRD Survey of Manufacturers files of the Census. Finally, employee outcomes using the Workplace Representation and Participation Survey will examined. The study will provide valuable information to business, labor, and government on the importance of employee participation in the creation and maintenance of high performance workplaces.