MEASURING CHANGES IN WORK

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• MEASURING CHANGES IN WORK
• Nathalie GreenanCEE and CNRS

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Work and organisations

• Work productive activity of employees or
  self-employed
• Organisations structures within which this
  activity takes place
• The dynamics of work and organisations can be
  measured at the employer or at the employee level
  .
• Both levels are complementary / it is interesting
  to match them in any possible way

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Employer and employee levels

• In an employer level survey, one (or several)
  person(s) answer(s) in the name of her
  organisation
• ? work synthetic appreciation/estimation
• ? organisation more direct
• ? in general employer surveys exclude
  self-employment, small firms and the public
  service
• In an employee level survey, a person describes
  his/her situation
• ? work direct
• ? organisation knowledge of the organisation in
  general depends on his/her position
• ? employee surveys cover in general all types of
  employers and self employment

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Example 1 Outsourcing

• Employer level description of relationships with
  other businesses
• ? position supplier or customer?
• ? outsource what functions? off shoring?
• ? IT connections with suppliers/customers?
• Employee level description of work with
  suppliers and/or business customers
• ? work on a regular basis?
• ? provide information / help?
• ? participation in the definition /control of
  work?
• ? Exchanges through IT?

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Example 1 Outsourcing

• Employer
• ? easier to describe outsourcing practices than
  the activity of business services suppliers
• ? easier to describe contractual aspects of
  relationships between organisations than to
  describe in general terms work with suppliers of
  business customers
• Employee
• ? difficult to ask for a general picture of
  relationships with other businesses
• ? easier to describe work with distant partners
  

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Example 2 Hierarchy

• Employer level
• ? number of hierarchical layers
• ? average span of control
• ? career prospects of managers
• ? main dimensions of hierarchical responsibility
  
• Employee level
• ? does the employee give information, help,
  control the work of other people?
• ? what does the employees supervisor do?
• ? does the employee have to follow strictly
  orders or may he adapt prescribed work to his
  need?
• ? is the employee a supervisor ?
• ? what does he do for his subordinates?

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Example 2 Hierarchy

• Employer
• ?formal structures of management
• ?difficult to measure informal management
• ?difficult to measure autonomy or scope of
  initiative
• Employee
• ?difficult to ask for a general picture of the
  hierarchical structure
• ?easy to ask employees about their autonomy or
  to check whether they fulfil a management role
  even if they are not in a hierarchical position

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Measuring change panel data

• Whether at the employer of at the employee
  levels, changes can be measured through panel
  data
• Constraint the same question has to be asked in
  several waves of a survey
• Main difficulty most of the time, emerging or
  new phenomena are measured in surveys with a lag
• Stable questions may not be at the centre of the
  issues at stake as far as change is concerned
• But this is not always the case working
  conditions

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Measuring change one survey

• It is also possible to design surveys
  specifically to capture change
• ? employer innovation, C.O.I.? employee
  biographical surveys
• Main difficulties
• ? memory / individual /organisation
• ? changes need to be in an intermediate state of
  diffusion
• ? difficult to follow up changes using questions
  that are stable in time

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Example of the C.O.I. survey

• Matched employer/employee survey on
  organisational change and ICT diffusion
• 1997/2006
• Employer survey one main assumption
• ? New management tools aim at changing
  organisations and work contents
• ? 3 main aims since 1990s knowledge of the
  organisation, management of change and innovation
• ? questions about the use of new organisational
  practices or ICT at two dates 2003 and 2006
• Employee survey some questions on evolutions
  over a period of time, objective or subjective

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Change in European surveys?

• Panels
• ? European panels at the individual level
  (employer or employee) are scarce
• ? possibility to build of a sector based panel
  through the aggregation of data from surveys
  (employer or employee) with homogeneous industry
  breakdowns
• LFS annual survey more focused on employment
  (contracts, mobility) than on workEWCS 1996,
  2000, 2005 focused on working conditions but
  information on work organisationECHP and ESS ?
  
• One survey
• ?CIS 2000 and 2002/2004 implementation of
  new management techniques and other innovation
  indicators

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Analysis of change mapping

• Compare the cross section mapping of work
  organisation in Europe at different dates taking
  the focus given by the surveys LFS,EWCS,
• Map changes in work at the European level
• using the aggregation of different surveys into
  a sector based panel

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Analysis of change drivers

• At the workplace levelare managerial choices a
  main driver of changes in work?
• ?matched employer/employee survey
• At the sector / market level
• influence of international competition,
  technology, regulations
• At the macro level
• influence of demographics, education, labour
  market institutions, policies
• ?sector based or regional indicators from data
  bases produced by international institutions
  OECD, ILO etc.

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Analysis of change consequences

• Employer / meso / macro outcomes
• ? performance / adjustment costs
• ? innovation
• ? employment
• ? inequalities
• Employees outcomes
• ? job satisfaction? health
• ? quality of life

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Analysis of change focus

• Less hierarchy ? Do you have a responsible job,
  in other words, do you supervise other personnel?
  In LFS, EWCS,ESS,ECHP
• ?Evolution of the share of supervisors?Evolution
  of the individual and job characteristics
• ?Methodological dimension
• Growing work insecurity? ?Evolution of average
  job tenure across Europe?Evolution of firing
  hazards
• ?Evolution of the probability to find a new job

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Conclusion

• There is no available survey at the European
  level focused on changes in work and
  organisations whether at the employer or at the
  employee level
• Existing surveys describe contractual and time
  arrangement in more detail than work contents
• Methodological issues in European comparative
  analysis are numerous?
• better to be simple than too ambitious