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SOCIAL DIALOGUE IN THE IT SECTOR
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SOCIAL PARTNERSHIP
People and organizations from some combination of
public, business, and civil constituencies who
engage in voluntary, mutually beneficial,
innovative relationships to address common
societal aims through combining their resources
and competencies (a Copenhagen Centre definition)
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SOCIAL DIALOGUE
Attempts that aim to touch differing opinions and
interests in order to solve common problems or
efforts to explore and appoint common targets
regarding related issues or simply procedures
that help distinct social groups to exchange
ideas (Greek ???)
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SP/SD PROCEDURES

• SP/SD procedures have been a vital precondition
  for the success of economic and social policies
• Several studies have found that when a
  decision-making organisation wishes to assure
  that the continuous involvement of the parties
  concerned is maintained, it has to convince those
  parties that its policies have taken into account
  their interests/ opinions

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SP/SD FORMS

• SP/SD main forms in the EU are information,
  consultation, negotiation, bipartite, tripartite
  or multipartite collective bargaining and
  agreement, and co-decision
• SP/SD can take part at the plant/ company level,
  and/or the region, sector, inter-professional,
  national, European or international levels

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Benefits and advantages

• SP/SD procedures can enhance the performance
  of mainstream, economic and welfare measures,
  foster innovation and experimentation and create
  added value by applying resources more
  effectively (EFILWC, 1998)

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Preconditions for Success

• social partnership and tripartism work best
  when there is an open agenda to the partnership
  system, balancing the interests of employers and
  unions with a perspective on the overall
  interests of society and particularly where there
  is a degree of mutual trust between the
  participants(EFILWC, 2002)

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More SP/SD Benefits

• Kjaer and Tennyson (2001) pointed out that the
  main benefits from social partnership could be
  found in the development of new skills, the
  obtaining of know-how on conflict resolution, the
  access to different people etc

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Main pillars of SP/SD

• Context (socio-economic cultural and political
  environment, drivers and triggers, historical
  time)
• Purpose (building and working with common
  agendas, scope and complexity, evolving purpose
  and scope)

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Main pillars of SP/SD

• Organization (organizational and legal structure,
  governance, communication)
• Participants (leadership, people and their
  organizations, resources, skills and capacities)
  
• Outcomes (measurement and evaluation, ability to
  adapt).

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Prerequisites for Tripartism
Clear Goals Tripartism requires targets, aims and objectives e.g. economic stability, competitiveness, security at work, income policy
Visible Results Delivery of measurable results is necessary for the agendas of the social partners, e.g. safety and health at work, vocational training, employment creation, income guarantees
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Prerequisites for Tripartism
Bipartism Well-functioning bipartism is seen as essential for building tripartite structures.
Multi-level approach The diffusion of national models down to regional , local, municipal and enterprise levels is important.
Civil Society Further discussion is needed on where the involvement of civil society is necessary and desirable, and on the representativeness of civil society organizations
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Prerequisites for Tripartism
Monitoring Institutions and models need constant review and must develop the ability to adapt, change and be flexible
Responsibility It is important to adopt a problem-solving approach, accept compromises and trade-offs and create a shared understanding of each others difficulties
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Main Benefits of Social Partnership
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Main Benefits of Social Partnership
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The Greek Experience

• 1994 Economic Social Committee (a social
  partners tripartite forum at the national level)
  
• Social Dialogue Procedures through collective
  bargaining at the sector level

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An evaluation of social dialogue in GREECE

• SD procedures are ineffective
• There is a lack of commitment to specific goals
  and agreements by social partners
• A paternalistic approach of social dialogue by
  the government is usually existed

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An evaluation of social dialogue in GREECE

• There is a lack of strong and powerful
  organizations
• SD procedures have to face political factionalism
• There is no appropriate support of SD procedures
  with documentation and services of experts

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SD in the IT sector

• There are no collective bargaining procedures in
  IT sector, due to the fact that a vast majority
  of the companies are small (less than 20
  employees)
• Works councils are inexistent
• Trade union density is very low, especially
  within small and medium-sized enterprises

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SD in the IT sector

• There are two employer organizations
• - the Association of Information Technology
  Companies of Northern Greece
• - The Federation of Hellenic Information
  Technology Communications Enterprises
• There are several company trade unions in some
  big companies
• The Federation of Private Sector Employees covers
  IT employees

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SD in the IT sector

• There are several collective agreements at the
  company level
• Apart from several state companies, there is no
  strike activity
• There are various forms of work flexibility in IT
  sector
• A representation of workers at the European level
  through European Works Councils is existed