Employee Involvment and Participation in the Organisational Change Decision: Illawarra and Australian Patterns.

This paper analyses the patterns of employee involvement in organisational change decisions using data from the 1995 Australian Workplace Industrial Relations Survey and a parallel survey conducted in the Illawarra Region of NSW in 1996. The initial results suggested that there appeared to be a stronger preference for mechanisms involving direct negotiations with employees in the Illawarra region than for Australia as a whole. This may be a reaction to the militant reputation of unions in that region. However, there was no evidence from the Illawarra survey that local union delegates or officials had more negative attitude to organisational change than employees directly affected by these changes.DECISION MAKING ; MANAGEMENT ; EMPLOYEE

The Industrialisation Process of Asian Small and Medium Firms

National governments throughout the Asia-Pacific Region have identified small and medium enterprises as an important source of economic growth and employment. In the past, SME business strategies have focused on production, relying on their subcontracting and sales contacts with large firms for technological innovation and marketing and on abundant domestic labour forces for comparative advantage. Recently, structural problems in the region arising from the Japanese recession, currency appreciation and rising labour costs have upset these relationships forcing SMEs to move offshore (DFI) to restore cost competitiveness and to upgrade their internal technological and organisational capacities to international standards in order to compete for contracts within more open, international markets. This paper analyses this process of change, analysing the development of SMEs within four Asian countries using a six stage evolutionary model. The majority of SMEs in these countries are still in the earlier second (dependency) or third (internalisation) stages. The more advanced SMEs have moved into the fourth (externalisation) stage, where firms develop independent technology and marketing capacities. To the extent that localisation (stage five) had occurred, it involved local embedded relationships which had limited scope for further internationalisation. Little evidence of regional integration or networking among SMEs was found.Asia-Pacific, industrialisation process, Asian small and medium enterprises

The Impact of Different HRM Regimes on Labour Productivity: National Results and a Regional Perspective

This paper uses AWIRS 95 and IRWIRS 96-7 data to test whether workplaces which used ‘soft’ versus ‘hard’ Human Resource Management (HRM) policies an practices experienced significant differences in labour productivity improvements. Generally, the results support the proposition that management attitudes, policies and practices which aim to develop workforce skills, commitment and motivation were positively associated with improvements in labour productivity. Very few ‘hard’ practices other than performance pay had the same effect. EEO/AA and maternity leave policies were strongly correlated with improved productivity

Gender, Part-time Employment and Employee Participation in the Workplace: Comparing Australia and the European Union

The international trend in the growth and incidence of 'no n-standard employment', and its highly gendered nature, is well documented. For ease of definition, and because of the nature of the available data, we focus upon part-time employment in this paper. Employee participation may be defined as any workplace process which 'allows employees to exert some influence over their work and the conditions under which they work' (Strauss 1998). It may be divided into two main approaches, direct participation and indirect or representative participation. Direct participation involves the employee in job or task-oriented decision-making in the production process at the shop or office floor level. Indirect or representative forms of participation include joint consultative committees, works councils, and employee members of boards of directors or management. In the EU context statutory works councils are the most common expression of representative participation, but in Australia, consultative committees resulting from union/employer agreement or unilateral management initiative are the more common form. All of these forms of employee participation raise important issues concerning part time employees. Effective participation has two further major requirements which also may disadvantage part timers. First, there is a ge neral consensus in the participation literature that training is required for effective direct or representative participation. Secondly, effective communication between management and employees is required for participation, preferably involving a two-way information flow. The issue is of further significance since it has decided gender implications. This paper seeks to redress this relative insularity in the literature by examining some broad trends in this area in Australia and the EU. It analyses survey data at a national level in Australia and compares with some survey data generated in the EU by the EPOC project and analysed by Juliet Webster along the lines which we suggest here. It tests the hypothesis that the growth of one non-standard form of employment, part-time employment, diminishes the access to participation in the workplace enjoyed by female workers in comparison with their male colleagues, and finds that the hypothesis is strongly confirmed. This has major implications for workplace equity, and for organisational efficiency.gender, part-time employment, employee participation, Australia, European Union

Stone City and Cook Mountain (middle Eocene) scaphopods from southwest Texas

26 p., 8 pl., 9 fig.http://paleo.ku.edu/contributions.htm

Solid-state NMR and computational investigation of solvent molecule arrangement and dynamics in isostructural solvates of droperidol

13C, 15N and 2H solid-state NMR spectroscopy have been used to rationalize arrangement and dynamics of solvent molecules in a set of isostructural solvates of droperidol. The solvent molecules are determined to be dynamically disordered in the methanol and ethanol solvates, while they are ordered in the acetonitrile and nitromethane solvates. 2H NMR spectra of deuterium-labelled samples allowed the characterization of the solvent molecule dynamics in the alcohol solvates and the non-stoichiometric hydrate. The likely motion of the alcohol molecules is rapid libration within a site, plus occasional exchange into an equivalent site related by the inversion symmetry, while the water molecules are more strongly disordered. DFT calculations strongly suggest that the differences in dynamics between the solvates are related to differences in the energetic penalty for reversing the orientation of a solvent molecule

Design and analysis issues of integrated control systems for high-speed civil transports

A study was conducted to identify, rank, and define development plans for the critical guidance and control design and analysis issues as related to economically viable and environmentally acceptable high-speed civil transport. The issues were identified in a multistep process. First, pertinent literature on supersonic cruise aircraft was reviewed, and experts were consulted to establish the fundamental characteristics and problems inherent to supersonic cruise aircraft. Next, the advanced technologies and strategies being pursued for the high-speed civil transport were considered to determine any additional unique control problems the transport may have. Finally, existing technologies and methods were examined to determine their capabilities for the design and analysis of high-speed civil transport control systems and to identify the shortcomings and issues. Three priority levels - mandatory, highly beneficial, and desirable - were established. Within each of these levels, the issues were further ranked. Technology development plans for each issue were defined. Each plan contains a task breakdown and schedule

The Illawarra at Work: A Summary of the Major Findings of the Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey

This paper summarises the main results of the Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey (IRWIRS). The data is unique in that it provides the only comprehensive and statistically reliable source of information about workplace employee relations at the regional level in Australia, and compares regional patterns with national trends. The data collected relates to industrial relations indicators, workplace ownership, market conditions, management organisation and decision- making in the workplace, among other things. The results reveal a positive pattern of employment relations in the Illawarra, distinctive in many respects from national trends.Illawarra Regional Workplace Industrial Relations Survey, workplace employee relations, Australia