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MEASURING CHANGES IN WORK Nathalie Greenan CEE and CNRS

MEASURING CHANGES IN WORK Nathalie Greenan CEE and CNRS. Work : productive activity of employees or self-employed Organisations : structures within which this activity takes place The dynamics of work and organisations can be measured at the employer or at the employee level .

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MEASURING CHANGES IN WORK Nathalie Greenan CEE and CNRS

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  1. MEASURING CHANGES IN WORK Nathalie GreenanCEE and CNRS

  2. Work: productive activity of employees or self-employed Organisations: structures within which this activity takes place The dynamics of work and organisations can be measured at the employer or at the employee level . Both levels are complementary / it is interesting to match them in any possible way Work and organisations

  3. In an employer level survey, one (or several) person(s) answer(s) “in the name of her organisation”  work: synthetic appreciation/estimation  organisation: more direct  in general employer surveys exclude self-employment, small firms and the public service In an employee level survey, a person describes his/her situation  work: direct  organisation: knowledge of the organisation in general depends on his/her position  employee surveys cover in general all types of employers and self employment Employer and employee levels

  4. Employer level: description of relationships with other businesses  position: supplier or customer?  outsource what functions? off shoring?  IT connections with suppliers/customers? Employee level : description of work with suppliers and/or business customers  work on a regular basis?  provide information / help?  participation in the definition /control of work?  Exchanges through IT? Example 1: Outsourcing

  5. Employer:  easier to describe outsourcing practices than the activity of business services suppliers  easier to describe contractual aspects of relationships between organisations than to describe in general terms work with suppliers of business customers Employee:  difficult to ask for a general picture of relationships with other businesses  easier to describe work with distant partners Example 1: Outsourcing

  6. Employer level:  number of hierarchical layers  average span of control  career prospects of managers  main dimensions of hierarchical responsibility Employee level:  does the employee give information, help, control the work of other people?  what does the employee’s supervisor do?  does the employee have to follow strictly orders or may he adapt prescribed work to his need?  is the employee a supervisor ?  what does he do for his subordinates? Example 2: Hierarchy

  7. Employer: formal structures of management difficult to measure informal management difficult to measure autonomy or scope of initiative Employee: difficult to ask for a general picture of the hierarchical structure easy to ask employees about their autonomy or to check whether they fulfil a management role even if they are not in a hierarchical position Example 2: Hierarchy

  8. Whether at the employer of at the employee levels, changes can be measured through panel data Constraint: the same question has to be asked in several waves of a survey Main difficulty: most of the time, emerging or new phenomena are measured in surveys with a lag Stable questions may not be at the centre of the issues at stake as far as change is concerned But this is not always the case: working conditions Measuring change: panel data

  9. It is also possible to design surveys specifically to capture change  employer: innovation, C.O.I. employee: biographical surveys Main difficulties  memory / individual /organisation  changes need to be in an intermediate state of diffusion  difficult to follow up changes using questions that are stable in time Measuring change: one survey

  10. Matched employer/employee survey on organisational change and ICT diffusion 1997/2006 Employer survey: one main assumption  New management tools aim at changing organisations and work contents  3 main aims since 1990s: knowledge of the organisation, management of change and innovation  questions about the use of new organisational practices or ICT at two dates: 2003 and 2006 Employee survey: some questions on evolutions over a period of time, objective or subjective Example of the C.O.I. survey

  11. Panels:  European panels at the individual level (employer or employee) are scarce  possibility to build of a sector based panel through the aggregation of data from surveys (employer or employee) with homogeneous industry breakdowns LFS: annual survey more focused on “employment” (contracts, mobility) than on “work”EWCS: 1996, 2000, 2005 focused on working conditions but information on work organisationECHP and ESS ? One survey: CIS: 2000 and 2002/2004 : implementation of new management techniques and other innovation indicators Change in European surveys?

  12. Compare the cross section mapping of work organisation in Europe at different dates taking the focus given by the surveys LFS,EWCS,… Map changes in work at the European level using the aggregation of different surveys into a sector based panel Analysis of change: mapping

  13. At the workplace levelare managerial choices a main driver of changes in work? matched employer/employee survey At the sector / market level influence of international competition, technology, regulations At the macro level influence of demographics, education, labour market institutions, policies sector based or regional indicators from data bases produced by international institutions: OECD, ILO etc. Analysis of change: drivers

  14. Employer / meso / macro outcomes  performance / adjustment costs  innovation  employment  inequalities Employees’ outcomes  job satisfaction health  quality of life Analysis of change: consequences

  15. Less hierarchy ? Do you have a responsible job, in other words, do you supervise other personnel? In LFS, EWCS,ESS,ECHP Evolution of the share of supervisorsEvolution of the individual and job characteristics Methodological dimension Growing work insecurity? Evolution of average job tenure across EuropeEvolution of firing hazards Evolution of the probability to find a new job Analysis of change: focus

  16. There is no available survey at the European level focused on changes in work and organisations whether at the employer or at the employee level Existing surveys describe contractual and time arrangement in more detail than work contents Methodological issues in European comparative analysis are numerous …better to be simple than too ambitious Conclusion

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