bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
NON‐UNION ESTABLISHMENTS IN BRITAIN: THE SPATIAL PATTERN
Authors: Beaumont P.B. , Harris R.I.D.
Published: March 2008

Given the degree of interest which is developing in issues such as the “North‐South divide”, data drawn from recent workplace industrial relations surveys are re‐examined in order to analyse whether there is a regional variation in union recognition. Some evidence is found to support this notion, although that has to be qualified in relation to Scotland and north‐west England. It is hoped this will stimulate further research investigating regional differences.
EMPLOYEE RELATIONS — A FUTURE‐ORIENTED, PROGRESSIVE APPROACH
Authors: Wilson Brian
Published: March 2008

Managements are urged to adopt a more open and participative approach to employee relations, involving not just individual employees, but also their representatives. A key prerequisite for such an approach is the adoption of a longer time horizon than is normally the case in the management of employee relations.
ORGANISATIONAL DESIGN AND MANAGEMENT STYLE
Authors: Fox Alan
Published: March 2008

Since the notion of “management style” can be defined in different ways, I need to make clear at the outset how I propose to use it. It is sometimes meant to refer to no more than the manager's personal mode of behaviour—to the ways in which he conducts his immediate social relations with colleagues and subordinates. How does he give orders, seek advice, bestow praise or blame? There is an abundance of literature devoted to what might be called the tactics of face‐to‐face relationships. Much of it is hardly above the level of Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People, but some provide insight that is valuable for anyone involved in leadership and authority relations. I shall, however, refer to it only in passing, not because I want to disparage it, but because I want to use the notion of management style in the much broader sense of an over‐all strategy for organisational design. Under this usage, style refers to management in one of its most fundamental dimensions—namely its responsibility for the design and mode of functioning of the organisation through which management hopes to achieve its purposes.
Developments in Manpower Planning
Authors: Smith A.R.
Published: March 2008

Work which has attracted the label manpower planning has been developed in many separate areas by people using a variety of distinct techniques or disciplines; these have been applied in widely varying circumstances and on varying time‐scales to classes of people varying appreciably in number, kind and heterogeneity, and with a variety of ends in mind.
PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
Authors: Cherns Albert
Published: March 2008

The topic of this article is the contribution of the behavioural sciences to personnel management. I must confess, however, to a distaste for the term ‘behavioural science’ for two reasons. To begin with, it originated as a paraphrase for ‘social science’ during the McCarthy era in the United States. It was then feared that Congressional backwoodsmen would veto any programme or project labelled ‘social science’ because of their inability to distinguish it from ‘socialism’ But the second reason is the more important. In the eyes of industry behavioural science has come to be identified with a particular set of packages and devices — the T‐group. Blake's Grid, job enrichment, to mention only the most prominent. So I shall use the term ‘social sciences’ and make it clear that I am discussing psychology and sociology, and to a lesser extent anthropology, but excluding ergonomics at one end of the spectrum and economics at the other. Political science is included, but best left to the author of the article on industrial relations and personnel management
Occupational Role Development Part 1
Authors: Gowler Dan
Published: March 2008

Social scientists are able to make, and indeed have made, contributions to the ideas and techniques available to the practising manager. These contributions vary from social scientist to social scientist, depending upon their current theoretical interests and specialisms. They also vary with the nature of the practical problems concerned. For example, social scientists have contributed to the deeper understanding of such complex problems as labour turn‐over, absenteeism, wage and salary administration, job satisfaction, and so on. Naturally enough these contributions have generally been of most direct interest to those managers concerned with the preservation, improvement and economic utilisation of the organisation's human resources.
Cybernetics— A Systems Approach to Management
Authors: Beer Stafford
Published: March 2008

Sociologists are usually seen as the principal developers of organisational theory and it is not always realised that some very convincing explanations of how organisations work and suggestions on how they might work better are to be found in the science of control systems — cybernetics. Cybernetics provides us with a general systems theory; that is a theory which can be applied to any kind of system where there are control functions. The best known and most influential cybernetician in Britain is Professor Stafford Beer. He has made many major contributions to writing and thinking on the theory of organisation. Below are some of his ideas on how organisations work and can be made to work more effectively which he originally put forward in a lecture to the United Kingdom Automation Council.
The relationship between accounting and personnel management — past conflicts and future potential
Authors: Hopwood Anthony G
Published: March 2008

There is no doubt that personnel management and accounting have traditionally been viewed as separate functional areas of management with only slender and rather tenuous connections. The concerns of the personnel manager have been seen as related to crucial, but limited, aspects of the behaviour and management of people at work, whilst the accountant's role in the provision of financial information has been seen as an impersonal concern, abstracting from rather than enriching the human environment of an enterprise. Moreover, even where the two functions are clearly interrelated, the relationship has all too often been seen in terms of differing orientations and conflicts, rather than a co‐operative concern with the interests of the enterprise as a whole, as is often and so clearly demonstrated by their joint involvement in the setting of performance standards and the subsequent reaction to the reporting of actual results.
The Hunt for Homo Obstreperans
Authors: Eccles Anthony
Published: March 2008

The hunt for Homo Obstreperans — or bloody‐minded man — is one of the great sports of British industry. Ranking as a pastime with promotion politicking, character assassination and competitive ‘perk‐chasing’, it bids fair to rival that old classic called ‘blaming the Government’.
TOWARDS A BEHAVIOURAL VIEW OF MANPOWER PLANNING
Authors: Timperley Stuart
Published: March 2008

Manpower planning is defined in terms of the elements of prediction and control, and certain key aspects of these dimensions are identified. It is suggested that there is scope for integrating what are essentially quantitative and qualitative approaches to manpower planning. At organisational level, manpower planning activities have certain constraints and these must be considered. The question of personnel movement in relation to the organisation is discussed as a manifestation of organisational behaviour, and certain dimensions of organisational control are considered. It is argued that a consideration of the theoretical and practical contributions of behavioural scientists are essential for manpower planning.
Recent Developments in Manpower Research
Authors: Bryant Don
Published: March 2008

The objectives of this article are: 1 to give an overview of some basic ideas that were outlined in an earlier review paper by the author; 2 to bring it up to date by outlining the more important theoretical developments that have been reported since then; 3 to mention briefly some speculations arising from work in progress which has not yet been published.
JOB SATISFACTION: A METHOD OF ANALYSIS
Authors: Mumford Enid
Published: March 2008

Job satisfaction is a nebulous concept. Managers talk about it a great deal, but, if pressed to explain exactly what they mean are hard pushed to provide a precise definition. Vroom had described it as:
Job and Pay Comparisons in Collective Bargaining: A Systematic Procedure
Authors: Lupton Tom
Published: March 2008

The credibility of the comparisons that are made between wage rates and earnings in supposedly similar jobs is frequently a major factor in collective bargaining in an industry or company. This is so, whatever other arguments are used, such as productivity.
European Integration and the Personnel Manager
Authors: Coates Jack
Published: March 2008

This article is based on the report of a research study undertaken within Imperial Chemical Industries Limited (ICI) by my colleague Trevor Owen following my collaboration with John Appleyard of the Institute of Personnel Management in the preparation of an Introductory Information Report. None of us would claim to be experts on the European Economic Community (EEC), but being concerned about the development of industrial relations in the UK we share a conviction that the influence of Europe must be a factor of increasing importance in our forward planning.
AN APPRAISAL OF LABOUR RELATIONS IN SWEDEN
Authors: Gore Thomas
Published: March 2008

Mrs Barbara Castle in her White Paper In Place of Strife, laid emphasis on how ‘the growing independence of modern society means the use of the strike weapon in certain circumstances can inflict disproportionate harm on the rest of society’. The recent strike of the miners, the earlier activities of the electricians, and the activities of the Transport Unions emphasize this point. Some, if not all unions, have power to wreak havoc on the state. Indeed, they indicate their power to threaten the sovereignty of the state. The problem of labour peace is no longer purely an economic one: it is political. In the 19th Century the task of government was to keep clear of intervention in the economic sphere. And this liberal view is apparently still held by some of those in the large trade unions. Nevertheless, one of the indisputable functions of government is to maintain order, and where it fails it is moribund. The problem of the 20th Century is to reconcile the apparently conflicting interests of labour, capital and all the citizens which comprise the state. This is not simply a problem of labour economics but a problem of government, too.
ACTION LEARNING — A MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME
Authors: Revans Reg
Published: March 2008

In responding to the Editor's invitation to offer a précis to this new magazine, I felt it best to play for safety and be less adventurous than some other subscribers. I thus decided to keep to a subject, not only about which I could write something, but about which I also had some practical experiences. Since personnel management is but one aspect of management in its widest context, and management education is passing through a period of some difficulty — as do from time to time all subjects of real importance — I have chosen the behavioural implications of a particular management programme as the subject of my contribution.
MANPOWER AND TRAINING POLICIES IN EUROPE
Authors: Hayes F. Christopher
Published: March 2008

In February 1972 the British government produced a plan for discussion — ‘Training for the Future’ — and this is likely to be followed by legislation during the current parliamentary session. It is part of the government's reshaping of all its manpower services which has already led to the inauguration in 1972 of a new style employment service and which is also intended to embrace the administration of unemployment benefit, employment services for the disabled and the redundancy payment scheme.
RECENT INSIGHTS INTO THE SELECTION INTERVIEW
Authors: Morgan Terry
Published: March 2008

How do you rate yourself as a selection interviewer? Most people who have to interview job applicants from time to time are usually pretty confident in their ability to spot the ‘right person’. So, if you reckon you are ‘fair to good’, you have a lot of company! Perhaps you are a little suspicious of the ‘I can pick 'em as soon as they walk through the door’ school, but nevertheless, given half an hour's cha with the applicant, you have usually got his measure.
Organizational Development and Industrial Relations
Authors: Molander Christopher F.
Published: March 2008

The purpose of this paper is twofold: firstly to review what appear to be major long term changes in the social system which are likely to require planned reciprocal change in the way large scale corporate enterprises are managed; secondly, to review the ways in which the emerging discipline of Organizational Development may be relevant to organization change, in particular to the development of more satisfactory in‐company Industrial Relations climates.
THE COSTING OF THE EXTRA WAGE‐BILL IMPOSED BY LABOUR TURNOVER
Authors: Pearce F.T.
Published: March 2008

It is some years since I submitted a thesis on The Financial Effects of Labour Turnover, which was subsequently published in abbreviated form. I am obliged to M E Orton, therefore, whose writing in the Summer Journal encourages me to return to this old stamping ground and to clear up a long‐standing confusion — especially as his article in this Review so usefully reviews concepts and does not rehash old figures.
The Determination of Shift Premia
Authors: ApSimon H.G. , Miller S.A.
Published: March 2008

The need for more intensive utilization of expensive and complex equipment has brought about a considerable expansion of shift working. This expansion has been not so much in the number of people on shift work as in the variety of categories of staff who are asked — or required — to work shifts, and in the diversification of patterns of shift working.
Organizational Design in Industry—Towards a Democratic, Socio‐technical Approach
Authors: Gulowsen Jon
Published: March 2008

Industrial engineers have traditionally made an impact upon the behaviour of people in organizations in two ways. Through the design of technology they have established a technical framework to which the social system has had to adapt. Also because a large proportion of supervisory and managerial positions has been held by engineers, they have often had responsibility for specifying the network of roles and relationships which make up an industrial organization. Usually they have approached this task by taking a technological orientation to human beings and human problems. People have been treated like uniform bits and pieces, capable of being split up and put together at the will of the management. Social systems design has been treated as a one‐off job, such concepts as organizational development or stepwise design have been seldom taken into consideration. The goals of the organization and society have been stated in terms of technology and economy; social and psychological aspects of human behaviour have generally been neglected.
THE STRATEGIC ROLE OF MANAGEMENT SERVICES
Authors: Gentle Ray
Published: March 2008

Management Services can be applied to any facet or function of a business. Reducing costs, improving productivity and modernizing methods are its traditional roles. Management Services is increasingly concerned with providing facilities whereby management can be more effective. By modifying their systems and harnessing personal motivation, companies adapt to their changing environment. The paper argues that top management must select a specific strategy from this wide range of options and that systems development and personnel development should be close allies in the process of continuous adaptation.
Manpower Forecasting Techniques: A User's Guide
Authors: Bosworth Derek , Evans Graham
Published: March 2008

The task of this paper is to examine the changes taking place in the skill‐employment mix of 13 industry sub‐groups within the British engineering industry and to propose a suitable projection technique for manpower forecasting.
Means and Ends in Job Restructuring
Authors: Wild Ray , Birchall Dave
Published: March 2008

Most of us have read and thought about job enlargement, job enrichment, job design and restructuring. Much has been said and written on these subjects, and perhaps we may now be forgiven if we are somewhat confused by the differences in methodology, terminology, perspectives, etc presented by authors in this area.
The Anachronistic Factory
Authors: Williamson D.T.N.
Published: March 2008

Industrial manufacture is the principal source of our national wealth, and it supports all our other activities; consequently its wellbeing is of crucial importance to us all. It has been developing in three main streams — process manufacture, flowline or mass production, and batch manufacture — and of these only the first has kept in step with the parallel development of society. In the others, the trends of management organization and the work patterns which this has created have been steadily veering into conflict with the values, aspirations and expectations of the people who have to make the industrial system work. The effects are visible now, and unless the patterns are changed, large sectors of industry could eventually become unworkable, because the qualities and skills needed in an individual are unlikely to be combined with a willingness to do the type of job offered. An account of the present position and possible directions of change in flowline and batch production is given, which satisfy the dual criteria of providing improved efficiency and a better match with society.
A New Approach to Evaluating Management Development Programmes: Some Exploratory Research
Authors: Burgoyne John G.
Published: March 2008

There are very few people in the world of management development who have not acknowledged the need to evaluate their attempts to influence managers. This has led to many research studies which have been useful and interesting to varying degrees in the situations where they were carried out, but there is a general feeling that evaluation research has failed to provide the breakthrough in management development that was expected of it.
Developing Management Skills and Improving Organizational Performance
Authors: ECCLES TONY
Published: March 2008

Attempting to get the best of both worlds is always an elusive goal. Perhaps this is why there has been so much irritable recrimination in the management education world during the past two years.
A Sociologist looks at Induction
Authors: Marriott Dave
Published: March 2008

Induction of new employees is generally held to be of vital importance in reducing labour turnover during the first few weeks of employment. In this paper some widely held views of induction are surveyed in conjunction with the actual problems of adjustment faced by the stranger to any organization, to conclude that there is a need to tailor induction programmes more closely to these problems of individual adjustment than is often the case.
Design, Control, Behaviour and Performance
Authors: Warmington Allan
Published: March 2008

The art of management has been defined ‘as knowing exactly what you want men to do, and then seeing that they do it in the best and cheapest way’. F W Taylor, Shop Management, 1903.
The Contribution of a Business School to Management Education
Authors: Ball R.J.
Published: March 2008

It is a particular pleasure and privilege to be invited to address this conference of the Institute of Personnel Management in its Diamond Jubilee Year. It is an additional pleasure that this should take place during my first year in office as Principal of the London Business School, an honour accorded to my predecessor Dr Arthur Earle who spoke to the National Conference in 1965. A great deal of water has passed under the bridge since that time. Much has occurred in the field of management education which serves as a backcloth to my main purpose which is to make some attempt to delineate what I believe a business school may contribute to management education.
A Company Approach to Industry Manpower Forecasting
Authors: Moss Alan
Published: March 2008

This paper is a summary of the work which the Foundry Industry Training Committee has undertaken in its manpower forecasting activities. It considers the objectives of manpower forecasting and puts forward a sociological definition of manpower planning. Following this, there is a resume of the information system. The use of this system is then examined in terms of short‐term measures, while the latter part of the paper discusses the long‐term research work.
The Measurement of Investment in Human Resources
Authors: Brand A. Martin , Van Der Merwe R. , Boshoff A.B.
Published: March 2008

The broad objective of the study was to develop assumptions and guide‐lines by which the cost approach to Human Resource Accounting could be implemented. The research was specifically aimed at determining the sensitivity of the cost approach for identifying significant differences in the investments made over two years in two comparable groups (16 subjects to a group) and how these differences could contribute towards more effective decision‐making in evaluating the relevant aspects of company policy. Statistically significant differences were obtained at the 5% level for total investments, academic development investments and orientation investments. The latter could not be regarded as material in absolute terms and the difference in total investments could therefore be ascribed mainly to academic development. The extent of investments in training suggests the necessity to optimize training from a cost/benefit point of view. During the initial months of the study, investments accrued at a proportionally higher rate than in subsequent months, eg 75.1% of the total investments were made during the first three months of service. It can therefore be said that relatively high labour turnover during the early months of service would carry a substantial loss potential, especially where there was no evidence of material investments in the orientation of personnel.
Changes in Pension Schemes Following Recent Legislation
Authors: Brunet E.
Published: March 2008

It is no easy matter, at the best of times, for an employer to keep his employees' pension and death benefit arrangements up‐to‐date. The increasing pace of change in recent years has redoubled the difficulties. This article examines the implications for employers of the changes in pension scheme approval, introduced by the Finance Act 1970 and the proposed National Pensions structure introduced by the Social Security Act.
Assessment Centres—a review of research findings
Authors: Ungerson Bernard
Published: March 2008

Assessment Centres are becoming increasingly popular and are being ‘sold’ — both literally and metaphorically — by organizations and individuals on both sides of the Atlantic. It is a matter of concern that none of the companies in the recent IPM Survey had conducted any validation and evidence has, therefore, to be sought from the literature.
Human Resource Accounting—a critical comment
Authors: Cannon James A.
Published: March 2008

Since the time of Adam Smith, economists have grappled with the concept of human capital whilst more recently attempts have been made to assess the rate of return made on the investment in education and training. In the last few years considerable interest has been aroused by attempts to include people in the assets of a company, applying to them accounting conventions and assigning some value to the organization's employees. In the United States, William Pyle and his associates at the University of Michigan, backed by a growing Human Resource Accounting Association, have pioneered a particular method. The publication of the joint working party of the ACMA and IPM favoured a different approach. It is the intention of this paper to review the two approaches, highlighting their similarities and differences and to examine the criticisms that have been levelled against both. Finally, a possible solution will be suggested to the identified shortcomings.
Managerial Evolution in Japan
Authors: Okuda Kenji
Published: March 2008

This paper is concerned with analysing through a historical review some of the salient features of the productivity increase movement in Japan. Toward this end, the author would like to examine first the interrelationship between the so‐called ‘family system’ of labour management in Japanese enterprises and the productivity increase movement, then to consider the uniqueness of the productivity movement that stems from the special structural characteristics of the Japanese trade union organization.
Values, Contracts and Job Satisfaction
Authors: Gowler Dan
Published: March 2008

In 1970, a quite new approach was introduced to the debate about job satisfaction. Briefly, Enid Mumford, who had been conducting research in this field, suggested that,
The Process of Organizational Entry
Authors: Timperley Stuart R.
Published: March 2008

The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of recruitment and selection activities as key elements in organizational entry. In reality, though closely connected, they often operate as separate activities with differing degrees of prestige and status attached to them. In this context Caplow's distinction between prestige and status is relevant, in the sense that it attempts to make clear the boundary between that which is fixed and verifiable (status) and that which is inherently subjective (prestige). Thus, ‘status is a measure of the influence explicitly assigned to a given position in a given organization. Prestige is a composite of opinion about the relative value of an individual or a group or a symbol in a given context.. For our purposes, perhaps more important than the distinctions between status and prestige are, firstly, the relationship between them and, secondly, the fact that the terms are equally relevant to the functional areas within organizations, which we shall term ‘sets of activities assigned formal status’. Status differences are, therefore, closely related to the hierarchical differences between positions and functions within organizations, and the extent to which such differences can be maintained will relate to the stability of organizations.
Behavioural Science and Systematic Management
Authors: Misselhorn H.J.
Published: March 2008

There are two schools of management philosophy which, in the purist forms, appear to be diametrically opposed to one another. On the one hand, we hear the behavioural scientists say of the exponents of systematic management,
Is Industrial Warfare Inevitable?
Authors: Priest A.
Published: March 2008

Generations of British managers have been indoctrinated with a system of beliefs that condition their attitudes to industrial conflict in such a manner as to make most difficult the management of actual conflict situations. To say this is not to denigrate the work that managers conscientiously carry out but to draw attention to a particular aspect of that work that needs particular expertise not always readily available. As far back as 1962 a survey carried out by the Institution of Works Managers stated ‘… our members are saying that the most important factor (limiting productivity in British industry) is that top management, including works managers, is not of the quality required, that we lack the training necessary to do our job effectively’. In the decade that has passed since that was written there has been a great expansion of management training but no discernible change in the ideology of British managers who, like us all, live in a society where class divisions are more deep and sharply drawn than in the United States of America and some countries on the mainland of Europe. The prevailing collection of attitudes held by the typical British manager present a paradox. On the one hand he holds the view that the greater responsibilities inherent in a senior post entitle him to deference and greater than average cash rewards together with job satisfaction. On the other hand he believes that much clerical and manual work can be so organized by modern methods of management as to enormously improve productivity of labour and this is an unfortunate fact of life that the operatives and craftsmen ought to accept even if it means less job satisfaction for them. The dilemma is that the manager wants the worker to accept that polarization and like it and the worker increasingly does not accept it and demonstrates his dislike in conflict situations.
Personnel Management: A Framework for Analysis
Authors: Henstridge John
Published: March 2008

The paper suggests that traditional descriptive approaches to Personnel Management do not successfully answer the question ‘what is Personnel Management?’, nor do they explain the way in which it actually exists in work organizations. A framework for analysis is proposed, looking at work organizations from the perspective of the Personnel Manager; it is suggested that this framework may help to answer some of these questions, provide a means of exploring the phenomenon of Personnel Management and also of studying it as a subject and a meeting point of disciplines.
Research Note: Evaluation of Management Training: Some Aspects of Methodology
Authors: Jones Deborah , Huczynski Andrzej
Published: March 2008

An evaluation of management development courses for senior officers in the Health Service has been sponsored by the DHSS at the Polytechnic of Central London.
Sensitivity Bargaining — An Alternative to Conflict
Authors: Smith Ian G.
Published: March 2008

The British industrial relations system has, on the whole, tended to serve the country well, but it has failed to adapt to new conditions in the postwar period and has faltered. More importantly the study of industrial relations has provided a great deal of analysis and a minimum of synthesis of new ideas. The lack of change and adaptation in collective bargaining has increasingly resulted in the failure of the system to cope effectively with the ever changing, and increasingly complex, social, technical and economic forces in our society. Thus collective bargaining has too often been seen to fail in the achievement of orderly settlements to claims, grievances and disputes. One result has been legislation in the shape of the Industrial Relations Act which merely served to inflame collective bargaining. After working for several years in Canada, in the field of labour relations, it is this writer's contention that industrial relations legislation is an unsuitable substitute for management and union jointly solving their problems in an open yet business‐like atmosphere. Legislation is too prickly for the sensitive ears around a bargaining table, and in the last analysis management and unions will do their utmost to avoid any chance of entanglement in the legal web.
A General Guide to Matrix Management
Authors: Hendry W.D.
Published: March 2008

Matrix management is a type of organizational structure that has been evolved in recent years. This paper describes the characteristic features of this type of organization, and examines some of the management problems that have arisen in its application.
‘Automation and Industrial Workers’ ‐An International Study
Authors: Lloyd P. , Mills S.
Published: March 2008

‘Automation’ is a familiar yet ambiguously defined aspect of modern industrial life. It is indeed the advanced state of technological achievement in certain branches of highly mechanized manufacture and fabrication. It is also an absolute in the production process — the final phase of industrial development at current levels of scientific and technical knowledge. Human labour is largely eliminated from production except for the ultimate control of the overall process. ‘Automation’ tends to be viewed both as the process of technical changes as well as the technological terminal point. It will always be viewed from a contemporary standpoint. There will always be relative stages of automation. As such automation is best seen as a continuum of technological change.
The Behavioural Sciences: Their Potential and Limitations
Authors: Sills Patrick
Published: March 2008

There is widespread non‐understanding of the nature, possibilities and limitations of behavioural science among managements and trade unions. There is also considerable misunderstanding — indeed suspicion — between the three parties to behavioural‐science‐in‐industry contracts — the behavioural scientist, the manager and the trade unionist — about the motives for conducting studies and the methods of managing both scientific work in progress and the implementation of results. This lack of clarity among industrialists, incidentally, is by no means only their fault; their confidence has been known to be tricked by behavioural scientists who, for instance, make excessive claims for their product or transgress agreements by failing to provide expected feedback or infringing the principle of confidentiality.
The Company's Role in Society — A Second Look at First Principles
Authors: Molander Christopher F.
Published: March 2008

‘The business of America’, said Calvin Coolidge in 1925, ‘is business’. Such a view, uncompromising and perhaps a trifle complacent, has been consistently reiterated in the West by many others. Such a proposition provided the basis for the protective managerial ideology with which the early English entrepreneurs sought to defend themselves against the Establishment in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. The activities of those industrial pioneers irrevocably changed the society in which they lived. They ushered in not only a new technology upon which we are unalterably dependent, but a new hierarchical ordering of society and a new morality of utilitarianism to go with it. They institutionalized a new form of social conflict and provided the arena in which that conflict could take place.
Towards a Theory of Action
Authors: Egan William
Published: March 2008

We tend to think only in terms of man acting upon the inanimate world. If one is dealing with things or numbers then laws may be deduced, equations derived and, if the right question is asked, the correct answer will come. This is the technology of science, but what one has to remember is that science has for its object — things. It can bring to bear the force of the ‘big machines’, the strength of the trained and gifted individual, but what it cannot do is to unleash power.
Using Repertory Grid Technique to Evaluate Management Training
Authors: Smith M. , Ashton David
Published: March 2008

Many criticisms have been made about the ability of traditional evaluation measures to provide genuinely useful information. They rarely tell the trainer anything he does not already know, and investigation of their objectivity suggests that they frequently do little more than reinforce in the trainer's mind the answers he wishes to hear.
The Creation of an Organization Development Function in a Group of Small and Medium‐sized Companies
Authors: Wellin Michael
Published: March 2008

This paper will present the results of a research project investigating the creation of an ‘Organization Development Function’ in a group of small and medium‐sized companies. After briefly reviewing the concept of organization development, the results and practical implications of this longitudinal study will be considered. The study was carried out by members of the Ashridge Management Research Unit as part of a larger project investigating the management of change in the printing industry. Financial support for the study was provided by the Printing and Publishing Industry Training Board.
A Practical Approach to the Assimilation of Product Change on the Shop Floor
Authors: Seal VA
Published: March 2008

The following notes describe and discuss how an industrial engineering department, in the electronics industry, faced with the challenge of gaining operator acceptance of potentially disruptive product changes, used it as an opportunity to design jobs that would add to, rather than diminish, existing job satisfaction. Two cases are provided to illustrate their approach.
One More Time: Theories of Occupational Choice
Authors: Fairhurst Eileen
Published: March 2008

Occupational Choice Personnel Planning and Occupational Choice The way in which people get into, stay in or leave occupations interests us all. Not least because each and every one of us is part of the work‐world: we have all experienced and gone through the process of entering an occupation. In addition our interest arises from an academic viewpoint. Western industrialized society is characterized by a complex division of labour. Associated with this form of social organization is the principle that types of work are related to the execution of specific tasks. The division of labour depends on the allocation of people into occupations: there must be a match between jobs or tasks and individuals possessing skills appropriate to the execution of such tasks.
The Conflict Resolution Process: The Two‐factor Theory and an Industrial Case
Authors: Donaldson Lex , Lynn Richard
Published: March 2008

This is a case study of an industrial relations situation which had been characterized by strife and where the conflict was substantially reduced through a process which was initiated by the management. As such it provides a case example of the processes involved in the reduction of conflict in industry. The paper first outlines a model of the conflict resolution process and then presents and analyses the concrete events in these terms.
A Strategy for the Redesign of Work
Authors: Mumford Enid
Published: March 2008

The Summer 1972 issue of Personnel Review contained an article by Enid Mumford setting out a framework for analysing job satisfaction. This article presented a theoretical and practical approach for evaluating and measuring job satisfaction, together with a definition which equated job satisfaction with the fit between what an employee was seeking from work and what he was receiving or, in other words, the fit between job needs and expectations and the requirements of the job. This analytical framework has since been used extensively in industrial and commercial organizations as a means for assisting the design of the human part of computer systems. The method has been used in the following way.
Personnel Management within the Employees' Organization
Authors: Margerison Charles J.
Published: March 2008

It is now twenty years since Peter Drucker alleged that personnel management was bankrupt. In the interim, the role of personnel management has developed steadily. It is ironic that today, when many large and small companies are going into liquidation that personnel management is far from bankruptcy and is in increasing demand to cope with business problems. Why should this be? What are the factors that are making personnel management strategically important in today's organizations?
Executive Unemployment and Personal Redundancy: June 1975
Authors: Page N.
Published: March 2008

This report deals with the experiences of a group of men and women who attended one of a series of seven courses at the University of Manchester in the period October 1972 to March 1975. It brings an earlier report published in Personnel Review of July 1975 up to date. The students included in this survey number eighty‐nine out of a possible 130 former students who were sampled. This report cannot be compared directly with the earlier report which stated the position up to November 1974, because both questionnaires were returned anonymously. It must be borne in mind that those returning an answer to our survey may not be typical of the total group of redundant executives as a whole. In this survey members of the two most recent courses replied in a ratio of 2:1 when compared with the course immediately before, and there is a possibility that older students and those who held higher grade employment were more likely to respond. It is also possible that those who are now in employment were more ready to reply. With this caution in mind, it is felt that the information contained in this report is of interest to those concerned with the problems of career change in middle life, particularly when the response rate for our sample was 68%. It is not yet possible to report on the state of the job market during the present recession with more general unemployment and this will be the subject of a subsequent report.
The Cusum Chart: A Supergraph for Personnel Managers
Authors: Mahon B.H. , Jones D.G.
Published: March 2008

The cusum (cumulative sum) chart is a type of graph which takes a little longer to draw than one of the traditional kind but which gives a lot more information. It is particularly useful for plotting the evolution of processes like recruitment, promotion and wastage because it presents information in a way that enables the eye to separate true trends and changes from a background of random variation. It may be used both for retrospective analysis and for monitoring; in the latter role it can give early warning of changes in (for example) wastage rates. Though the technique is not one which demands masses of data as a prerequisite, it offers its richest rewards in the field of large computer‐based data banks.
Life Table Analysis and Manpower Statistics — A Note
Authors: Conway Freda
Published: March 2008

The idea of a life table was first suggested by John Graunt in his Observations on the Bills of Mortality for the City of London, which was published in 1662. A number of these tables were produced in the next century to meet the needs of the growing insurance industry. These companies insured lives and needed to know how long people of various ages could be expected to live to pay premiums or receive benefits.
The Personnel Manager and his Subordinates — What does he Want and What does he Get? A Research Note
Authors: Elliott C.K. , Margerison C.J.
Published: March 2008

During the last few years, most personnel departments have expanded rapidly. The importance of sound personnel policy and practice within a company in now increasingly recognized, due largely to the substantial rise in industrial disputes and to the increasing amount of legislation dealing with employee relations. For example, during the last ten years the number of working days lost through industrial disputes increased approximately tenfold. Alongside this there has been an increasing move to codify and provide a statutory basis for people at work, covering things such as health and safety, equal pay, redundancy provisions, training, employee protection and other similar legislation.
The Radicalisation of Industrial Relations Theory
Authors: Wood Stephen
Published: March 2008

It is now widely accepted, perhaps with some qualifications, that the dominant British school of industrial relations in recent years has been the liberal‐pluralist or volutaristic‐pluralist school. Its centre has been Oxford and its main members have included Hugh Clegg, the late Allan Flanders, W E J McCarthy, G S Bain and A Fox. The influence of this group has been exhibited in its impact not only on industrial relations teaching and research, but also on policy, especially through the Donovan Report. Indeed, several writers have chosen to characterize it as a problem‐solving rather than a theoretical approach. However, it is important to acknowledge that a practical orientation may not in itself constitute an a‐theoretical position. Hyman and Fryer thus, for example, use the label ‘pragmatism’ to describe a component of the theoretical orientation of the ‘Oxford school’, thus recognizing that while its ‘theory may be only semi‐articulated and ….. partially developed’, the work of the school is not a‐theoretical.
The Nature, Use and Acquisition of Managerial Skills and other Attributes
Authors: Burgoyne John , Stuart Roger
Published: March 2008

This paper is concerned with two questions: 1 What are the kinds of skills and other qualities in managers that contribute to managerial success and performance in various forms? 2 To what extent are these acquired by learning, and what are the sources of such learning? The aim is to propose and test a general framework or taxonomy describing what managers might need to learn, and to understand from where existing managers have acquired the skills and qualities they currently use. This further allows us to draw some conclusions about the part played by deliberate training and education activities, in comparison with ‘natural’ ones, in the development of managers. The paper considers and reports in turn on existing theories and research relevant to managerial qualities, a hypothetical model of such qualities, an empirical test of the models, and the results of a study of the sources involved in the acquisition of specific qualities contributing to successful management actions in a sample of managers.
Work Research Group, Administrative Staff College, Henley‐on‐Thames, Oxfordshire
Authors: Wild Ray
Published: March 2008

The research group is collaborating with several industrial organizations in an action research programme aimed at examining the potential for improvements in the quality of the working life of shop‐floor employees and developing change programmes where appropriate.
The Learning Goals and Outcomes of Management Development Programmes
Authors: Stuart Roger , Burgoyne John
Published: March 2008

In our previous paper we developed a taxonomy of managerial skills and qualities; reported a modest research study giving some evidence for the validity of the taxonomy; and presented some further empirical evidence about the sources from which the managers we have investigated acquired these skills and qualities.
Regional Management Centres: An Interim Appraisal
Authors: Nelson John
Published: March 2008

The creation of a limited number of Regional Management Centres (RMCs) in England and Wales was an institutional innovation without precedent in British further education. It was the creation of a group of new academic institutions based on a single subject — management studies. It was a major policy initiative to enhance the credibility of management education in further education, and thereby to enable that system to complement the national Business Schools in meeting the management education needs of the business community. It was a political decision with far‐reaching consequences for management and for British industry as a whole.
Executive Redundancy: The Situation in Early 1976
Authors: Page N.H.
Published: March 2008

In two previous papers, published in Personnel Review, Summer 1975 and Spring 1976, the histories of students attending courses to assist redundant executives held at the University of Manchester have been described. The present report describes the situation up to February 1976 and introduces new data about unemployed people who are not classified as executives.
Implicit Learning Theories as Determinants of the Effect of Management Development Programmes
Authors: Burgoyne John , Stuart Roger
Published: March 2008

In this paper we are concerned with the question: what is it about management development programmes that determines what effect they have, in terms of the learning that people take away from them? This question, and our attempt to contribute to an answer to it, will be of interest to all those who are directly or indirectly concerned with designing such programmes (we use the term ‘management development programmes’ to denote any form of event intended to influence management performance through a learning process).
Management Development and the Middle Aged Manager
Authors: Molander Christopher F.
Published: March 2008

In recent years, the problems of men as they pass through the period of ‘middle age’ have gained prominence in both the behavioural science literature and the general press. This article seeks to outline the nature of the ‘mid life crisis’, to examine some of its major symptoms in managerial behaviour and to explore the implications it has for management development.