Tonight is my first class for MGT 4223 - Labor Management Relations. Welcome to all my students!
Feel free to comment on any post you find interesting (I know, I know, that's probably none of the posts - please expand your definition of "interesting" to include something here). As I say in the syllabus, in lieu of quizzes (which are probably a bigger pain for me than they are for you) I will post at least a couple of times a week a question or two out of the readings and you are expected to comment at least once per week on a post. You don't HAVE to comment on the topics from the text and I'll be most impressed if you can work in something you read to one of the current event posts.
The first thing I'd like to get your thoughts on comes from our text, John Budd's Labor Relations: Striking a Balance (a great book with a somewhat unfortunate title). In Chapter 1, on page 7 there is a section called "The Objectives of the Employment Relationship" where professor Budd discusses three objectives of the employment relationship: efficiency, equity and voice. These form the foundation of professor Budd's analysis of our topic.
Do you agree that efficiency, equity and voice encompass the core aspects of the employment relationship? Why or why not?
What other objectives might there be to employment?
Do you think any of the three (or more) objectives are more important than any other? How would you evaluate conflicts between the three?
Thursday, January 13, 2005
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3 comments:
I would agree that efficiency, equity, and voice are the core aspects of the employment relationship because any organization or company would want to be productive and efficient. Employees would also want to know they are contributing to the success of an orgnization. Employees would need to ensure they are being treated fairly, and have a voice in their workplace. I don't think any is more important than the other. They complement one another. I can't think of any other objectives to employement at this time, but I may have an opintion as time goes by in this course.
i would agree that efficiency (which speaks to the wants of the employer) and equity (which speaks to the needs of laborers) are reasoned by the power of voice. thus voice is the key to having a share in the debate at the capitalist table of democracy.
for the purpose of this course, i cannot think of any additional objectives of employment other than the continual "ordering of one's life" spoken of in the federalist papers.
i would hold to the importance of voice as primarily the negotiator in any struggle between equity and efficiency which refer to the position of the employer and employee.
As I said in more detail on my blog (George's Employment Blawg), there's a common sense answer that can get lost when people get too academic and caught up in social science (or B-school) double-speak: the core objective of the employment relationship is to make money (duh!) And this is the shared objective of both employer and employee. To the extent efficiency, equity and voice contribute to making money, they're also important. There are other reasons people choose to work one place or another, but that choice is not always available. . .
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