Unions,Flexibility,Team Working and Financial Performance

Abstract

The relationship between unions, new work practices and organizational performance has been the subject of much debate. Some commentators view unions as inimical to new work practices, whereas others see them as offering channels to facilitate their introduction. It has also been suggested that unions might prevent such practices from attaining their full potential and thereby their enhanced organizational performance. Using data from the third Workplace Industrial Relations Survey and the Employer Manpower Skills Practices Survey, a multinominal logit analysis is undertaken involving proxies for the adoption of flexibility and team working as the dependent variable and a vector of variables (including proxies for unionism) as independent variables. The results indicate that the presence of a closed shop at the workplace inhibits the adoption of flexibility and team working but that the presence of a recognized union is beneficial to their introduction. A binomial logit analysis of financial performance also indicates that the joint effect of union presence and both flexibility and team working on financial performance is positive, even though the single effect of union presence is negative.