Training at Work

Critical Analysis of Workplace Training and Development

Jeff Hyman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Topic: Business
• eBook ISBN:
  9781351863964
• Subtopic: Human Resource Management
• Index: Business

Training in the workplace can be costly and time-consuming. Consequently it is often neglected. However, it plays an essential part in a company's success, increasing the level of performance, aiding strategic decision-making and maximizing quality and efficiency. Using detailed surveys and encompassing the literature in human resource management, this book, first published in 1992, shows why training is so valuable a tool. The author's critical analysis covers the effects of demographic change and the growing number of women in the workforce as well as issues which reflect the changing patterns of work, such as technology, workplace flexibility, and employee relations. He deals with the increasing stress laid on managerial performance, emphasizing the need for more management training, as well as assessing the role of state-run schemes and the effect of government policies. He concludes with ways to develop successful training patterns and to launch a "skills revolution". This book should be of interest to postgraduates, academics and researchers in the fields of human resource management, industrial relations and organizational behaviour.

Chapter 1

Britain’s economic weakness

Productivity has never been higher.

(Conservative Party radio broadcast, 1982, reported in Nichols 1986: 9)

The British economy is poised on the brink of recession, with output growth stagnating, unemployment in manufacturing set to rise and little sign of a rise in investment in the coming year.

(CBI, reported in the Financial Times, 31 January 1990)

INTRODUCTION

It is widely acknowledged the Britain is failing to keep pace with the economic advances made by other countries (Cassels 1990: 14). A closely related worry has been (as the above quotes indicate) that economic growth has not occurred on a consistent basis; manufacturing industry experienced two decades of slow growth in the 1960s and 1970s followed by a considerable surge in the middle of the latter years of the 1980s, to be followed in turn by a dramatic slow-down in output growth in 1989 and 1990 (Ingram and Lindop 1990: 32–5; Blyton 1990). As suggested earlier, these failings carry considerable political as well as economic significance.

A number of explanations have been offered for Britain’s poor and erratic economic performance, but the constant and dominant refrain has been to cast blame on the poor productivity of the nation’s employed labour force. This chapter considers these alleged failings and suggests that productivity alone does not provide a reliable measure of economic effectiveness; broader aspects of performance need to be examined in terms of the quality of work, the effectiveness of management activities and managerial priorities in realising the potential of their assets through investment in capital and people.

PRODUCTIVITY OR PERFORMANCE?

Productivity can be defined as a ratio expressed between output (in the form of product or services) and inputs employed in order to achieve the output. The fewer the inputs used to produce a given output, the higher the level of productivity. Recognised inputs include the amount(s) of labour, capital and raw materials required as well as less tangible inputs such as standards of organisation and level of innovation (Owen Smith 1971:6, 7).

One problem of measuring productivity is that less emphasis is placed on potential variability in some inputs than in others, possibly owing to the intangible nature of factors such as ‘standards of organisation’ and ‘innovation’. As a consequence, productivity is usually, if not invariably, defined and measured in terms of ‘output per man hour’ (Owen Smith 1971: 6). However, serious consequences stem from this narrowing process; by using labour as the principal source of measurement, productivity variations, perhaps identified precariously through international comparison, are often attributed to deficiencies in the labour input. As potentially or technically the easiest or quickest of inputs to measure, this should come as no surprise. Owen Smith illustrates the focus on labour and the reactions of labour when he asserts that longer hours, more intensive work, better work organisation and capital substitution are the prime factors influencing productivity (1971: 11). Recent interest in increasing the flexibility of labour as a primary source of productivity growth offers a more contemporary interpretation of the same theme, especially when many flexibility trends include: extending the role of craft workers into ‘less specialised elements of other trades … extending craft jobs to include less skilled work … extending the jobs of semi-skilled workers to include some basic maintenance work’ (Ingram and Lindop 1990: 34).

Second, attention is not only primarily focused on labour but, as the prime influences noted above demonstrate, specifically on levels of effort by concentrating on time worked and intensification of work. The reluctance of British engineering employers to reduce the length of the standard working week from its present 39 hours and their refusal to negotiate the reorganisation of work to fit into a shorter working week helps demonstrate how deeply embedded is this concept of time worked as a contributor to productivity. The emphasis on level of output also illustrates a further problem in examining productivity in effort-related terms; the quality of output and its contributory labour inputs is in risk of neglect.

Relying upon effort and output as the major productivity variables can point to serious consequences in pursuing organisational objectives, which might be downgraded in search of accessibly cheap markets rather than face quality-based competition. In the developed world, however, products and services are not purchased merely or even principally on the basis of price; quality, value and reliability are increasingly promoted as the prime features of product or services provision. Under these conditions, to measure productivity in terms of effort and of output becomes both meaningless and harmful. It is meaningless because unless measurement and evaluation criteria expand and deepen beyond the narrow limits imposed by assessing an effort-output relationship, then organisational competitiveness can suffer. An obvious example of the meaninglessness of these variables is provided by the service sector, where output and effort could both be seen as elusive targets for attainment. For this reason, productivity measurements are invariably conducted in manufacturing industry. Even in manufacturing, relying upon these criteria can have damaging effects, because productivity measurement risks neglecting vital quality-based contributors to organisational growth or even survival.

Emphasis on labour effort also helps to deflect attention from the responsibilities of management We shall see later that in its treatment of training and development management has shown commendable consistency in its neglect of training provision among its own ranks. It is recognised by many contemporary observers of the management scene that performance productivity weaknesses are attributable in a considerable measure to the performance capabilities of British managers.

It would seem that the limitations of emphasising worker output as the main focus for productivity measurement are beginning to have some effect in industry. In particular, two trends are slowly, and perhaps uncertainly, beginning to emerge. First, attempts at assessing attainments of organisational objectives in terms of performance are increasing. Second, performance pertains to the entire organisation, to all employees, rather than being confined to a narrow focus on the labour of manual workers. Concentrating upon performance can also be undertaken in service industries in both public and private sectors.

It is possible that a coalition of factors is currently leading management toward the adoption of a widening range of assessment criteria based upon principles of target setting, performance monitoring and associating rewards with performance achievement. Performance appraisal is acknowledged to have increased in coverage, both in terms of the expanding number of organisations which use the technique and also by extending the range of occupations concerned to include non-managerial employees (Long 1986). Appraisal has also changed in approach from a generally indeterminate ‘trait-based’ system to one in which individual performance is matched against behavioural and measurable task-based criteria. The incidence of performance-related pay, typically based upon techniques of appraisal, is also generally held to have increased over the past few years (see, for example, Fowler 1988; Kinnie and Lowe 1990).

An example of changed emphasis is provided by recent interest in the concept of ‘performance management’, a relatively new approach which reflects and embraces these broader performance concerns of management by translating organisational objectives, policies and priorities into individual accountabilities, goals and plans.

A recent practitioner guide, published by a local authority, demonstrates how these aims might be achieved in operation through the introduction of five tiers of management practice geared to ‘monitor the effectiveness of organisation’. The performance relationship is openly stated through:

1 Function and target setting, which identifies main areas of activity and the ways in which individuals contribute to them.

2 Pyramid performance monitoring, involving performance assessment at all levels, based upon identifying ‘key tasks’ at each level.

3 Structure and communication geared to ‘discuss progress, solve operational problems and develop group awareness’ at the lower level and ‘concentrate … on performance trends, policy and direction’ at more senior management levels.

4 Staff development and appraisal, to be established on a systematic basis and conducted regularly.

5 Management Information Systems, to facilitate performance measurement against pre-set targets.

(Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead 1986)

Several implications arise from this shift in emphasis from effort-linked to broader-based performance productivity. It indicates that systems of management control in terms of remuneration policy, discipline and areas of responsibility are all likely to come under growing managerial scrutiny. In particular, we see that a change of this nature puts far more emphasis upon the management of the employment relationship, as reflected in the much discussed shift toward a ‘human resource’ centred approach of employee relations, which purports to treat employees as organisational assets whose potential for contribution to the organisation is shaped and developed through regular and systematic interaction with management

Most crucially, emphasis on performance highlights the importance of training and development of staff. Part of the rationale for performance appraisal is to identify weaknesses correctable through training as well as to illuminate employee potential for enhancement, to develop performance rather than to assess and comment upon it (Randell 1989: 161). Individuals can expect to realise their optimal performance-related pay levels by achieving established (and frequently mutually agreed in advance) targets and are consequently likely to welcome or insist upon training opportunities which assist them to meet their targets and objectives. Similarly, the performance management approach outlined above is unambiguously contingent upon continuous employee development for its operation and success.

An additional weakness might be overlooked by allocating responsibility for the growth of productivity to individual effort-related inputs. What is also important, though again difficult to specify, is the degree of integration or synergy exerted between different inputs. Advanced technology introduced by an authoritarian management to an unprepared workforce may have deleterious effects on performance as well as upon morale; bearing in mind our earlier points about the labour focus of productivity, in such circumstances it would be most likely that workforce ‘shortcomings’ would be identified as the source of emergent problems. And attributing responsibility in this way certainly has been the tradition in Britain. As mentioned above, the efforts of both governments and employers have concentrated on gaining employee and union compliance to initiatives designed to increase levels of effort or to reduce unit labour costs; invariably, these initiatives affect the terms and conditions of employees. Hesitation by employees, and particularly by their unions, to accept new and possibly adverse work arrangements can be interpreted as raising the costs of the input side of the productivity equation, either through directly blocking a clumsily introduced change or through increasing the cost of its implementation. The line of responsibility, from uncompetitive economic performance, to low productivity, to ‘poor employee attitudes’ and ‘obstructive’ unions can be all too readily, if inaccurately, traced.

Despite the emerging trends noted above, it will perhaps not come as too much of a surprise, therefore, that still the most common and persistent reason offered in explanation for Britain’s flagging economic performance is that workers in Britain are not prepared to work as hard, as flexibly or as enthusiastically as their Continental, American or especially, Japanese counterparts (Nichols 1986). Shared and promoted by employers, public and to varying degrees by governments of all persuasions (Nichols 1986: 15–20), this popular and simple image has been enlarged, and frequently distorted, by a media and consultancy network only too eager to hold collective worker activity responsible for low productivity and, by extrapolation, for poor national economic performance.

With the source of Britain’s economic ills pointed squarely, if not entirely fairly, at worker limitations, prescriptions as to remedies have unfailingly tended to rely on and gravitate toward the reform of industrial relations and, specifically, of union behaviour. As economic difficulties multiplied in the post-war years, successive governments attempted to apply their cures for what became known as the ‘British disease’, portrayed as demonstrations of worker intransigence, greed and resistance to change.

Consequently, from the 1960s onwards, governments grappled with multiple and complex problems of maintaining high levels of employment, restraining inflation and achieving a healthy balance of payments by attempting to shackle the bargaining influence of trade unions through incomes policies, restrictive legislation or both. Governments sympathetic to organised labour might attempt to move toward the same ends through different means, perhaps by endeavouring to secure formal union commitment to bargaining restrictions in exchange for involvement in economic and industrial policy-making and membership of prestigious government-sponsored bodies, such as the National Economic Development Council.

Hence, a recurring priority for government in their endeavours to reform union behaviour has been to concentrate on reductions in labour costs. Incomes policies which limit the growth of pay have been common features of government economic regulation. However, these policies have often expressly excluded ‘self-financing’ productivity deals in which workers agree to concede defensive practices in return for increased pay.

Legislation has been passed to encourage workers to accept job loss by offering statutory minimal payments for redundant skills. In practice, these minimal levels are often exceeded by agreements jointly negotiated between managements and unions or by superior redundancy terms offered by management alone. Employer emphasis on worker productivity has been further channelled through remuneration practice which aims to link elements of pay directly to output by the use of incentive bonuses and value-added pay schemes.

As we advance into the new decade it is becoming apparent that with insufficient attention paid to the wider factor inputs noted above, the problems of performance productivity have not been resolved through reliance upon labour cost reduction. As the relative inefficiency of British industry continues to dominate economic and political thinking it is unlikely that attempts to restrict labour costs will slacken. Conversely, we would expect that Britain’s uncomfortably tight squeeze into the European Exchange Rate (ERM) mechanism will increase pressures on employers to maintain a tight rein on their costs. Whilst no-one would dispute that it is in an employer’s best interests to maintain control over costs, if this overlaps into a neglect of longer-term investment needs, the implications for future prosperity would be serious. Evidence suggests that many employers in Britain continue to treat training expenditure specifically as a labour cost and under these conditions we can anticipate an intensification of the problems of the post-war years. Recent responses from employers to the disciplines imposed by ERM membership makes for all-too familiar and dismal reading:

ECC International, the china clay producer … stopped taking on apprentices at a time when it is cutting 750 of its 5,000 workers. Last year 24 apprentices began training with the company. This year, there are none.

(Financial Times, 3 December 1990)

The same article also highlights the vulnerability of both training budgets and personnel manager influence to cost considerations, points which will be taken up in greater depth in Chapters 6 and 7. Given a training budget at the start of the year, the personnel manager of a printing company has subsequently seen the sum peremptorily removed by senior management His comments illuminate a pervasive occurrence in British industry when faced by economic downturn: Training has been slashed and we have not taken on any apprentices this year. Two years ago we had half a dozen’ (Financial Times, 3 December 1990).

The failure of attempts to improve labour productivity through concentrating on reducing labour costs should not come as a surprise. In a broader context, workers do not readily embrace the reality of redundancy however ‘generous’ the payments, when alternative work is unlikely to be available, when transferable skills and the opportunities to apply them are lacking and when the existence of job loss procedures coupled with management readiness to use them provide stark confirmation and formalisation of the precarious security provided by the contractual employment relationship.

Indeed, we would contend...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Foreword
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 Britain’s economic weakness
• 2 The response of the State: Reforms of industrial relations and education
• 3 Manpower policy
• 4 Training policies and practices in other countries
• 5 Training provision in Britain
• 6 Training and the personnel function
• 7 Training in practice
• 8 A way forward? The market approach
• 9 A way forward? Government intervention
• Notes
• References
• Index