Abstract
Welcome to the first issue of 2013! The articles contribute to a number of important research areas, such as the role of the unions, temporary work, job insecurity, workplace bullying, the rise of the service sector and workplace partnership, with research conducted in a number of countries.
The first article in this issue entitled ‘Workplace partnership and employee involvement – contradictions and synergies: Evidence from a heavy engineering case study’ by Peter Butler, De Montfort University, UK, Olga Tregaskis, University of East Anglia, UK, and Linda Glover, De Montfort University, UK, discusses workplace partnership. The authors suggest that partnership can be associated with employee involvement, but also used by management in order to facilitate workplace cooperation. Using a case study from heavy engineering in Great Britain, the authors conclude that workplace partnership initiated by the management might be successful, but certain conditions must be at hand, e.g. trust, and strong local unions.
The second article, by Petri Böckerman, Labour Institute for Economic Research, Finland, Pekka Ilmakunnas, Aalto University School of Economics, Finland, Markku Jokisaari, Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Finland, and Jukka Vuori, Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Finland, ‘Who stays unwillingly in a job? A study based on a representative random sample of employees’, investigates intentions to quit and actual job switches. The authors examine the interaction with working conditions, work organization and factors increasing mobility. The findings suggest that adverse working conditions, and a work organization associated with mental stress, discrimination, etc., increase the likelihood of increased intentions to quit. However, the actual job switches remain unaffected. The authors suggest that there might be a lock-in effect for some workers, where the employability and the chance to get another job is lower due to adverse and harmful working conditions.
The third article, ‘The impact of employer ascendancy on collective bargaining style: A review of the New Zealand experience’, by Ian McAndrew, Fiona Edgar and Alan Geare, University of Otago, New Zealand, discusses the declining trend of union density in New Zealand. The nature of collective bargaining is especially discussed. The collective bargaining strategies by the employers were observed, and the authors conclude, despite significantly lower levels of collective bargaining coverage, that changing employer strategies could not be observed in the data used.
The article ‘Testing the strain hypothesis of the Demand Control Model to explain severe bullying at work’, by Guy Notelaers, Maastricht University School of Business and Economics, The Netherlands and University of Bergen, Norway, Elfi Baillien, HUBrussel, Belgium and Research Group Work, Organizational and Personnel Psychology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, Hans De Witte, Department of Psychology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, Ståle Einarsen, University of Bergen, Norway, and Jeroen K Vermunt, Tilburg University, The Netherlands, discusses severe bullying. The authors found that there was a higher probability for severe bullying at the workplace if there were very high or high job demands. Also, a higher risk for severe bullying was noted with a low degree of job control. A high degree of job control could function as a buffer towards bullying.
Edoardo Lozza, Chiara Libreri and Albino Claudio Bosio, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy, discuss atypical employment conditions in their article ‘Temporary employment, job insecurity and their extraorganizational outcomes’. They find in their exploratory study that insecure employment conditions affect private consumption, as well as the possibilities for getting married and having children. Both subjective and objective factors were studied in relation to extraorganizational outcomes of insecure working conditions.
Jörg W Kirchhoff and Jan C Karlsson, Østfold University College, Norway, argue in their article ‘Expansion of output: Organizational misbehaviour in public enterprises’ that employees might produce more than expected in some circumstances in order to resist control from the managers. The authors suggest that, for example, workers in the service sector might do more work, e.g. for elderly persons and service recipients, than required by managers. The results from the study are discussed in terms of organizational misbehaviour and responsible subversion, respectively.
The article ‘Job satisfaction, flexible employment and job security among Turkish service sector workers’, by Işık U Zeytinoglu, McMaster University, Canada, Gözde Yılmaz, Marmara University, Turkey, Aşkın Keser, Uludag University, Turkey, Kıvanç Inelmen, Bogazici University, Turkey, Duygu Uygur, Istanbul Bilgi University, Turkey, and Arzu Özsoy, Kocaeli University, Turkey, discusses service sector workers (call centres, hotels and cabin crews) in Turkey in relation to job security issues. The authors show that perceived job security is positively correlated with job satisfaction among the service sector employees. They also found that fixed-term contracts, on-call work and other aspects of flexible employment were not associated with job satisfaction in the study.
Another article based on Turkish data, titled ‘The impact of perceived organizational support on work–family conflict: Does role overload have a mediating role?’, by Sait Gurbuz, Turkish Military Academy, Ankara, Turkey, Omer Turunc, Turkish Military Academy, Ankara, Turkey, and Mazlum Celik, Ankara, Turkey, analyses work–family conflicts based upon a study of employees in small and medium-sized companies in Turkey. The role overload did not have any positive effects.
The final article in this issue, ‘More than a “humpty dumpty” term: Strengthening the conceptualization of soft skills’, by Scott A Hurrell, University of Stirling, UK, Dora Scholarios, University of Strathclyde, UK, and Paul Thompson, University of Strathclyde, UK, discusses the concept of skills. The authors especially discuss the concept of soft skills, associated with service sector work, with interactive dimensions. The results, which are based upon a case study, suggest that the concept of soft skills is important to discuss and develop further. The authors also found various degrees of skills in seemingly similar service work.