Strategies for Improving the Workplace: Costs and Benefits As the talk turned more to strategies for change and improvement in the latter stages of the conference, controversy of two kinds arose. One point for debate was whether methods for improving the quality of work experience should concentrate on individual jobs or job categories, or whether instead the approach should emphasize work systems, work groups, and the development of the organization as a whole. Stanley Seashore (The University of Michigan) summed up the difference of opinion this way: If we focus on improving a particular job, that is, the relation between a person and his particular duties, you can get results of one kind or another. In contrast to this is the notion of dealing with whole systems of jobs, interrelated by promotional sequences or around multiple tasks, and limiting your concern to the set of tasks one person does as being less important. The problem of how to proceed is complicated by the almost total failure to develop complete and realistic cost data on the two approaches, Mr. Seashore continued. Even without dramatic increases in productivity following a job redesign or organizational development program, side benefits (such as less scrap, lower turnover and hence less training costs, more flexibility in job assignments, and acquisition of broader skills) can accrue without being noticed. The whole debate about costs struck some as sterile and timewasting. To these members of the conference the desirability of improving worklife quality as an end in itself was obvious, and would quickly pay for itself directly and indirectly. "If we sit here and talk about whether it's more costly [to put in job enrichment], we might as well adjourn," one conferee grumbled. Mr. Davis, a persistent advocate of the organizational approach, said that the matter of redesigning individual jobs no longer held interest for him. He drew attention to large-scale problems such as: The social and organizational implications of a particular design of plant technology. - Lack of congruence between engineers' designs and managements' objectives. -The meaning of work under high technology conditions when most of the effort expended is in diagnostic judgment and work groupings are fluid. - The problem of diffusing and getting wider experimentation with what is already known. But few wanted to approach work improvement strategy on this level. Instead, as discussion turned to recommendations for change and institutional approaches to improving the quality of work, most participants focused on the enlargement, enrichment, or redesign of individual jobs, and a parallel emphasis on person-centered approaches such as training and new careers. Some remarks by Mr. Pearson seemed to express the majority view: There's been a lot of consensus here on three points: First, people are alienated; and second, some of it is due to their work; and third, there are some bad jobs. The problem is that each company or work establishment has to work on job enrichment in ways that are right for it there are different conditions elsewhere. . . . And we need to put concepts into four- and five-letter words that managers, foremen, and employees can understand. They can buy the idea that there are bad jobs — that they don't give consideration to human factors. Hal Sheppard's findings show what these things are. People want change, movement, interaction with other people, being able to see the end product, choices, learning, and growth. In promotion, these concepts can be sold, like we've sold health, safety, and hirethe-handicapped. Institutional Approaches to Improving On the final morning of the conference more concentrated attention was devoted to desirable next steps, both within the separate institutions represented at the meeting (business, labor, academic researchers, and government) and among the various interested groups, in some kinds of joint ventures that might be particularly appropriate because of the scope and complexity of the issues involved. The industrial management representatives present all said in one way or another that companies need to take action, but how much and what kind were less clear. And some roadblocks and unknowns seem to be strewn on the road ahead. Robert Middlekauff from the Ford Motor Company made these comments at the end of the meeting: We don't have the answer. But it's clear that we're dealing with the consequences of lack of job content and enrichment. Absenteeism has doubled in the last 10 years; so has turnover; and disciplinary cases have perhaps more than doubled. Until the midsixties management has not had to be concerned with what I would have to refer to as the people problem. Union attention has been directed to getting people away from work, rather than improving the work, through such means as the shorter workweek, earlier retirement, and more relief time. Most management people would think a Herzberg was a city where they manufacture rental cars. Industry is basically wary because it's locked into some work processes by technology that is heavily capitalized. It takes lots of money to design, install, or rearrange the equipment and the line. Yet ways of structuring the work are substantially the same as they were 10 years ago, when management considered them satisfactory. With workers' reactions and behavior now unacceptable, and work conditions essentially the same, what has made the difference? The plant is a piece of the society. The worker now has new expectations and choices more leisure other kinds of jobs available. There's something about the nature of work that we have to deal with. But I'm leery of it because I don't know how much will be enough, or what the costs will be. Unions are beginning to bargain work environment and quality-ofworklife issues along with the traditional items such as wages and fringe benefits. But, as was noted earlier, those union representatives present at Williamsburg were quick to say, except for Mr. Gotbaum, that they did not represent the part of union leadership with bargaining responsibility. One member of this group said outside the meeting itself that the conference had revealed: ...there are real legitimate differences of interest here. Organized labor has to take the lead in a way that makes things happen from below, so that [the job enlargement trend] won't be a new Taylorism. Academic people drew attention to the problem of finding better ways to disseminate the findings of research and their implications. Mr. Turner remarked wryly: ... it seems academic people are literally incapable of communicating in any effective way except by means of writing books and making speeches at each other on this subject. . . . Mr. Sheppard agreed: We are prisoners of the 18th century notion that if you have something to say you put it in a book; and at best, pray that some decisionmakers will read it and act upon its applied implications. Mr. Davis took a harder line: We have to go back to lesson one with managers and union leaders. We must break up the concrete of the conventional wisdom that evolved from the industrial era. And we have to diffuse the learnings that have taken place, not only in terms of examples, which can be misleading, but in terms of the assumptions and generalizations made in each instance. [These questions] have to be raised to the level of public debate. The quality of working life is too important to be left to managements and unions alone. Mr. Rosow discussed current and prospective government interests in the field of improving the quality of work. In a recent paper for the President he had sketched a threefold problem in the area of worklife. One aspect is economic- the issue of take-home pay and what it will buy. This is certainly important, though far from the whole story, but in a sense it creates the other problems. These are: the situation in the workplace itself, and the quality of life at home and in the community. These three kinds of problems are interacting in the lives of many workers. The response to George Wallace can be seen in a statement that they felt themselves to be politically voiceless, and sought to create awareness of their plight. As vice chairman of the National Productivity Commission, to convene in June 1971, Mr. Rosow planned to propose a fund for retraining of displaced workers or those in a career change by choice or necessity. He suggested to the conference that it would be good if this fund included support from industry as well. Instead of going to income maintenance, the money might be used for lump-sum payments or long-term loans, increasing the chances that these resources would be used at least in part to acquire new or more advanced skills. The vetoed 1970 Manpower Bill contained a title dealing with midcareer training as well; this legislation may be revived. More significant, however, are the implications for manpower and job development that come out of pending welfare legislation. With the emphasis on stronger motivation of those who can work to seek jobs to become gainfully employed, an effort is being made to reduce the rapidly rising welfare rolls. But all such potential workers, until now not counted in the employment census, will henceforth be sampled. The most immediate result may be a jump in the unemployment rate of as much as 2 percent. And to make this back-to-work movement take hold, attention will have to be given to more supplementary training and workplace improvements. Who Does What? Mr. Herrick summarized a proposal which had been circulated in advance of the meeting for institutional approaches to improving the quality of work. This paper called for joint action by industry, unions, government, foundations, and universities on a variety of fronts: Channeling technological change in the direction of humanizing work. - Applying new technology to bad jobs either to automate them or make them more worthwhile. - Education in work-fulfillment techniques for a much wider number of consultants, and increasing the repertoire of those already in the field. - Consultative help, particularly to smaller employers. - Promotion of work-fulfillment techniques and concepts by publications and other means. - More emphasis on work-content issues in collective bargaining. (About half the unions have bargained along related issues, but the matter needs attention at the international union level. There is no evidence that the AFL-CIO — the federation of international unions sees quality-of-work issues as a goal or need.) Comments on Mr. Herrick's proposal were solicited from government, industry, and union representatives at the conference. Charles E. Odell from the U.S. Department of Labor felt that real progress cannot be achieved until management and labor jointly show workers the rights and benefits that will result from job enlargement and associated training. Furthermore, employers and unions need to convince educational institutions that training opportunities must actually be available. Mr. Odell did not address himself very much to any activist role by government, which was a major theme of Mr. Herrick's proposal. For Mr. Odell, government must not be too much in the middle here. It might seek a neutralist, facilitating role "but could turn out to be a heavy-footed Big Brother, with both sides throwing rocks." The main problem, Mr. Odell concluded, "is reaching the worker on the job and convincing him that job enrichment is to his interest." The government, apparently, should not do the "reaching." In the case of bargaining on pre-retirement education at Scovill and Chrysler, the union (UAW) felt at a disadvantage when sitting down to talk about a formally-sponsored employer program. Yet without joint sponsorship, the program would not get worker credibility or participation. The traditional management-labor arm's-length situation of the bargaining table had to be overcome. Both sides realized that credibility would depend on what they could both do to structure and deliver the program. Mr. Odell thought that this experience might be a precedent for trying to improve the content of work experience elsewhere. But to repeat, Mr. Odell, as a government representative, was reluctant to advocate a more positive role by government. John Moore, a member of Scovill management, thought that the theme and the cause of improving the quality of worklife, as discussed at the |