Employee Relations:Understanding the Employment Relationship

Description

Features

• Extensive coverage of such important employee relations topics as power, culture, the psychological contract, reward, discipline, downsizing and termination of employment;
• Make links to national, EU and international contexts explicit throughout;
• Present material in a lively, accessible and enjoyable way;
• Self-check questions and case studies in every chapter;
• Extensive glossary of key terms.
• This is a modern book that covers historical, cultural, individual and collective perspectives, and is suitable for undergraduate, professional and masters students.

Table of Contents

Introduction
Part One Understanding the employment relationship
1 What is the employment relationship?
1.1 Introduction
1.2 The contract of employment
1.3 The psychological contract
1.4 Differing perspectives on the employment relationship
1.5 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 1: The arrival of Zonka in the UK
2 The changing context and nature of the employment relationship
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Changes in the wider environments within which work takes place
2.3 Changes in the organisation of work
2.4 The nature of the employment relationship
2.5 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 2: Ben's Garage
Part Two Regulating the employment relationship
3 The role of power, justice and culture in the regulation of the employment relationship
3.1 Introduction
3.2 The role of power in the regulation of the employment relationship
3.3 The role of justice in the regulation of the employment relationship
3.4 The role of culture within the employment relationship
3.5 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 3: Power, justice and culture in Publicservice.org
4 Managerial approaches and the role of managers in regulating the employment
elationship
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Management control strategies
4.3 Management styles in employment relations
4.4 Managing without unions: small and medium-sized non-union employers
4.5 The factors that influence the choice of strategy and style adopted by managers
4.6 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 4: Prosperous Life
5 The role of trade unions and employers' associations in regulating the employment
elationship
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Defining the purpose of trade unions
5.3 The functions of trade unions
5.4 The changing structure of trade unionism in Britain
5.5 Trades Union Congress and European Trade Union Confederation
5.6 Employers' associations and the Union of Industrial and Employers' Confederations of Europe
5.7 Trade union membership and recognition
5.8 Partnership approaches in the workplace: the way forward?
5.9 Union officials and workplace representatives
5.1 Health and safety committees and union representation
5.11 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 5: The TUC Partnership Institute
6 The role of government in regulating the employment relationship
6.1 Introduction
6.2 An overview of government's roles and basis of power
6.3 Political ideologies, trade union power and the employment relationship
6.4 The postwar settlement, 1945-79
6.5 The new relationship, 1979-97
6.6 The Third Way, 1997 onwards
6.7 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 6: Employee relations at Vertex
7 Regulating the employment relationship through collective bargaining
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Collective bargaining: definition and purposes
7.3 The collective bargaining agreement
7.4 The structure of collective bargaining
7.5 Coverage of collective bargaining in the UK and other developed economies
7.6 Legal issues relating to collective bargaining
7.7 Major changes in the collective bargaining levels
7.8 Collective bargaining and the process of negotiating
7.9 Industrial action
7.1 Third-party intervention: the role of ACAS
7.11 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 7: Bargaining for change at Magnox Electric plc
8 Regulating the employment relationship through employee participation and involvement
8.1 Introduction
8.2 Understanding the terminology of and philosophical differences between employee participation and involvement and their differing aims
8.3 Employee participation
8.4 Employee involvement
8.5 Common terms but different intentions: differing roles for communication, information and consultation
8.6 The role of the European Union for the future of employee participation and involvement
8.7 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 8: Participation and involvement at The Grange Community School
9 Regulating the employment relationship through grievance and discipline
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Grievance and discipline defined
9.3 Origins, legal background and causes of grievance
9.4 Grievance procedures
9.5 Discipline
9.6 Grievance and discipline in practice
9.7 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 9: Sexual harassment in the school science laboratory
10 Rewarding the employment relationship
10.1 Introduction
10.2 The objectives of reward for the parties to the employment relationship
10.3 When differing objectives are not met: industrial action over pay
10.4 The changing nature of reward management
10.5 Team- and organisation-contingent pay
10.6 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 10: UtilityCo’s new reward strategy
Part Three Ending the employment relationship
11 Terminating the employment relationship
11.1 Introduction
11.2 Dismissal, fairness and procedures
11.3 Potentially fair reasons for dismissal
11.4 Unfair dismissal
11.5 Wrongful dismissal
11.6 Employees' resignation and retirement
11.7 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 11: Discipline, capability and dismissal at Halcrow
12 Ending the employment relationship: organisational downsizing and workforce redundancy
12.1 Introduction
12.2 Defining downsizing and redundancy
12.3 Recent trends in organisational downsizing and workforce redundancy
12.4 Outlining the stages of and regulatory framework for redundancy
12.5 Choice of downsizing and redundancy strategies and methods, and their implications
12.6 Evaluating the impact of downsizing and redundancy on survivors and the employment relationship climate
12.7 Summary
References
Answers to self-check questions
Case 12: Downsizing at BT
Glossary
Abbreviations
Statutes, regulations and EU directives
Index

Back Cover

This exciting new text is different from many of the employee relations textbooks currently available because it takes as its central theme the employment relationship between the employer and the employee. This reflects one of the major changes in employee relations over recent years: the increasing extent to which the individual relationship each of us has with our employer is central in shaping our working lives.

Lewis, Thornhill and Saunders:

• provide an important and contemporary approach to employee relations;

• include extensive coverage of such important employee relations topics as power, culture, the psychological contract, reward, discipline, downsizing and termination of employment;

• make explicit links to national, EU and international contexts throughout;

• present material in a lively writing style in an accessible and enjoyable way;

• include self-check questions throughout each chapter in order that readers may test their understanding of key concepts;

• conclude each chapter with a case study which highlights important points from the chapter;

• include an extensive glossary of key terms.

Employee Relations: understanding the employment relationship

is a modern book that covers historical, cultural, individual and collective perspectives, and is suitable for undergraduate, professional and masters students. Accompanying supplementary material is available for lecturers to download at www.booksites.net/lewis_er.

"Employee Relations covers areas from a critical perspective not always included in ER and HR textbooks and this is to be welcomed. It also contains a wealth of student activities including recent and relelvant case studies. This is an invaluable addition to any business school's courses and resources." - Dr. Len Holden, De Montfort University.