Unit 20 Sample Assignment on Employee Relations

Program	BTEC Higher National Diploma in Business
Unit Number and Title	Unit 20 Sample Assignment on Employee Relations
QFC Level	Level 5

Introduction

Employee relation is one of the most important aspects that is attached with every organization. Organizations having positive employee relation sustain in the market and have fewer conflicts. This Sample Assignment on Employee Relations include the information related with employer and employee relationship at the workplace and the role of Trade Union in building positive employer and employee relationship in the market. Case of conflict between British Medical Association, business NHS Employers and Government is undertaken to evaluate the importance of resolving conflict from the organization. Information related with role of negotiation and collective bargaining will be shared to understand their roles in resolving the conflicts and building employee relationship.

Task 1 Reflective  eaasy

1.1 Unitary and pluralistic frames of reference explaining the implications of each of the perspectives for the appropriate means through which conflict is to be resolved.

Unitary Frames:  Unitary frames are the reference to the way in which an individual thinks, it is the mindset of an individual in the way in which assumptions, attitudes, values and practices which are related with the management and to the membership of the organization. These are the perspectives which are based on the perspectives which help in achieving the success of the members or employees working in the organization despite of the role they play, goals they share and objectives and values that are set by them (Samantara, et. al., 2016). There are certain expressions attached with unitary approach these expressions are of implementation of the mission statement and measuring the success by achieving the objectives which are set by an individual. Several aspects are taken into consideration under unitary frames such as loyalty, parental role of management which could help in protecting the interest of an individual at the workplace. It is necessary that loyalty should be there as it is being focused more in unitary frames.

Untarists Perspectives in the Situation of Industrial Conflict: There are certain aspects due to which conflict arises in the organizations which are mistakes, lack of communication and coordination, and cultural conflicts. One of the forms of the forms of conflict is occasional outburst. According to the perspective of untarist workplace is termed as the focus of analysis in which communication is one of the way by which conflict could be minimized, on the other had division between two sides is termed as an unresolved conflict.

Pluralistic Frames: The frames in which powerful and different subgroups are being made are known as pluralistic frames. Authorities of holding legal loyalties consisting of own set objectives are being given to each group leaders who leads the group (Nischal, et. al., 2015). Two major subgroups are formed in pluralistic frames which are management and union. These are the frames in which focus of the management rely more upon developing effective coordination and communication among the employees rather than enforcing and controlling them. In pluralistic frames trade union works as a legal representative of the groups which helps in reducing the conflicts by the mean of collective bargaining. Conflict is not being considered as the drawback because there are various ways available with trade union to resolve the conflict. It tries to modify the conflicts into the positive changes and gets success in resolving them.

Pluralist Perception in the Situation of Industrial Conflict: It is the situation in which organized division gets divided. In these situation chances of conflicts gets increased. Dispute of interest or rights are termed as the main reason for open conflict. Collective bargaining helps in removing the conflict in which analysis of the bargaining contract is being done. Trade union adopts some of the most effective procedures to minimize the conflict (Qasemi, et. al., 2014). Some of the conflicts remains unresolved which are termed as the shop floor level.

1.2 Assess how changes in trade unionism have affected employee relations.

Employee relation is the interrelationship which is both formal as well as informal between the manager and employees working under him. Any change in the organization could affect employee relationship. When changes occur in trade unionism also affects employee relationship. By gaining the information related with the history and changes that have occurred in the trade unionism will help in developing better understanding with its impact on employee relation. The unions of labor which came together to fulfill the common goals such as protecting trade integrity, improving the standards of safety, providing higher pay to labor, and certain other benefits including health care, retirement benefits, employment generation, assignments to be completed and availing better working environment to the labor so that they could work in a proper manner (Tansel, et. al., 2014).

Power of trade union increased in 1901 due to which decision of court was made to sue the trade unions because it was causing damages by striking for taff tale case. A conservative government was faced by Britain during the period of 1923-1929 (Rodin, 2016). It was the period when general stick was held by trade union. In 1920 decline in the coal mining was evaluated by the employers for which decision was made to cut the wages of labor in 1921. Then after in 1926 proposal for the reduction in the wages with increase in working hours was made by the employers due to which miners went on the strikes and appeal was made by them to other miners to unions for their support. Some of the miners died in the stick for which May Day is observed till now. This incident brought the unions together which formed the trade union which shown great impact on employee relation. For some time negative effects were evaluated in the employer and employee relation due to this change. After trade union took the shape relationship between employer and employee relationship started developing.

Business management started changing due to trade unionism. Political parties also started taking interest in the trade union due to which certain policies were formed so as to protect the interest of the labor which helped in their development. Policies helped in the reduction of fraudulent practices which were adopted by the employers (Kim, 2014). Trade union helped in adoption of new technologies with the help of which work process got easy and less time consuming. Social acceptability was facilitated to the labor which helped them in being treated equally by the employers. Some of the major legislations that were introduced like Trade Union Act 1965, Equal Pay Act 1970, Industrial Relation Act 1971, Trade Union and Labor Relation Act 1974, Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, Employment Protection Act 1975 and Sex Discrimination Act 1975, these acts were developed to protect the interest of the labor and to provide them the rights they share at the workplace. After formation of the trade union certain economic changes occur in the marketing principles which helped the trade employees as employment was generated which reduced unemployment (Lazauskaite-Zabielske, et. al., 2015).

1.3   Explain the role of the key players in employee relations.

Some of the key players who plays a very vital role in maintaining employee relation in the organization which helps in maintaining the decorum of the organization. These key players are workers, managers, organization, government agencies (concerned with the workplace) and communities.

Manager’s Role in Employee Relation: Manager works as the link between the employees and the organization. There are various responsibilities that are followed by the manager. For a good manager one of the most important aspects is building positive relationship with the employees and provides them all the facilities that are required at the workplace. For a manager it is necessary to understand the importance of conflict resolution and to minimize the occurrence of the conflict in the organization because conflicts are just a mere waste of time. Understanding the importance of team work will help the manager to manage the work because team work brings quality at work and leads to reduce the chances of occurrence of conflict (Williamson, et. al., 2015). Working environment should be developed according to the workers so that they could work comfortably in the organization. Employees should be motivated by the employees by indulging them in the decision making aspects, such types of activities helps the manager to build positive employee relation.

Trade Union’s Role in Employee Relation: Trade union works towards to provide help and support to the employees; it is working since 1930 to protect the interest of the labor. Domination of the employers over employees is being resisted by trade union. There were various benefits that were availed to the workers after trade union started working towards their welfare, some of the benefits are equality, better pay, better working conditions, etc. Grant for equal bargaining with the employer was given to the employees, union worked towards to provide better working conditions for the employees. Trade Union helped in the development of employee employer relation as with the efforts of trace union workers were able to get higher wages, work life balance, job security and protection from arbitrary action (Felbermayr, et. al., 2014).

Government’s Role in Employment Relation: Government plays a very vital role in employee relation and it is really hard to explain the role of government because there are various departments that are encompassed by the government to provide help and support to the employees. Main objective of government in intervening in the employee relation is to attain the economic and social goals for the nation. There are certain prime targets that were set by the government to obtain its goals and one of them is to manage the economy. There are four economic policies that were set by the government to meet the objectives these are:

• To maintain the high level of employment
• To stabilize the price
• To maintain the balance of payment and to achieve the surplus
• To protect exchange rate (Milne, 2016)

Task 2

2.1 Explain the procedures an organization (NHS employer) should follow when dealing with different conflict situations (such as with a single employee, between employees, with a group of employees).

Whole working environment gets affected when any conflict occurs in the organization. Employer of NHS plays a very important role and has certain set of responsibilities which are necessary to followed. In the same manner adopting certain set of procedure which could help in removing conflict will help the employer of NHS to minimize the chances of occurrence of conflict from the workplace. Sometimes conflicts are treated as positive or sometimes as negative force. When conflict occurs to bring positive changes at the workplace then it is treated as positive conflict, on the other hand conflicts which continues to remain in the organization for the long period of time are termed as the negative conflict (Larsen, et. al., 2015). It is termed as negative conflict because it has the negative consequences on the workforce; they remain stressed and de-motivate them which affect the productivity as well as income generation. These are the conflicts are termed as the ongoing conflicts which results in disruption to the organization.

There are various natures of conflict at the industrial level such as interpersonal conflict, intrapersonal conflict, structural conflict and strategic conflict. Certain procedures that can be adopted by the employer of NHS to reduce the conflict are:

• Compromising: Compromising is the conflict management strategy in which a solution is provided to the parties involving in the conflict, in this parties compromise with the solution as none of the party faces loss in the situation of not getting the whole benefit.
• Avoiding: Some of the conflicts which do not have much impact on the organization, workforce and productivity are being ignored and gets resolved on their own (Brander, et. al., 2016).
• Forcing: Forcing is the process of resolving the conflict which is adopted by the organization when avoiding and ignoring the conflict doesn’t works. In this supervisor directly deal with the conflict so that it could get resolved. Outcomes are decided by the supervisor only as he has the power to make decisions in such aspects.
• Resolving: One of the direct methods of resolving the conflict is resolving. Certain set of strategies are prepared by the management which helps in dealing with resolving the conflicts. In this issues of both the parties involved in the conflicts are being listened by the management on which final solutions are provided which is acceptable to the parties. Fair solutions are being provided so that both the parties could get benefits from the solutions provided by the management and chances of reoccurrence of the conflict in near future could get reduced (Tansel, et. al., 2014).

Following these procedures will help NHS employers to reduce conflict and to maintain the decorum of the organization.

2.2 Explain the key features of employee relations (ideological framework, conflict and cooperation, consultation, negotiation etc) with reference to the above conflict situation.

The case is related with the conflict between British Medical Association (BMA), NHS Employers and government over the new junior doctors. Strike was voted by the members of British Medical Association in relation with the continuing disagreement with the government. In May 2016 new contract was agreed after occurrence of various strikes. In this a contract was formed for which voting was done and junior doctors voted against the contract. Ideological framework, conflict and cooperation, consultation and negotiation are some of the conflicts that will help in understanding the nature of conflict between British Medical Association, NHS employers and government. Understanding the nature will help in providing corrective measures to resolve the conflict.

Effective communication is the main source of managing the conflict. Creating an open communication environment helps in reducing the chances of occurrence of the conflict. In the case it is required that new junior doctors should have access to communicate directly with the management so that positive relation could be developed between the management and new junior doctors. Situation could be fostered by listening and understanding the requirements of the junior doctors (Samantara, et. al., 2016). Honesty is another aspect that plays a very vital role in resolving the conflict. It is necessary that in the case of conflict between British Medical Association, NHS Employers and government transparency should be adopted so that better and effective solutions could be presented. Mediation will be considered in this case because grievance has been filed by the junior doctors. However, mediation do not provide a formal venue for the resolution but it include involvement of the department management, and labor and employer analysts who could help in understanding the issues and providing effective solutions to resolve the same. To stop the clock on the grievance processing, agreement of both the parties is important (Nischal, et. al., 2015).

2.3 Evaluate the effectiveness of procedures followed so far from both parties in this conflict situation.

It is necessary to resolve the conflict constructively because unresolved conflicts could affect the employer and employee relation and also the organization. In the case of BMA, NHS employers and new junior doctor, government is playing a most important role as it is trying to resolve the conflict. Government adopted the voting system for the acceptance of the new contract that was formed to resolve the conflict. In voting 68% of the eligible candidates participated in which, 42% voted to accept the contract and 58% voted to reject it. Finally contract was announced to be agreed by health secretary (Qasemi, et. al., 2014). It could be said that adoption of such type of agreement was really a good option to resolve the conflicts. The process was transparent as all the members who were eligible and were facing the issues had participated in the decision making aspects on behalf of which decisions were made and conflict was resolved. It was the effective decision to introduce the contract in relation with the conflict which helped in resolving the issue and suspend the further strikes.

Hence, it could be concluded that procedure followed by the government was effective because of the transparency and the fair decisions that were made in relation with resolution of the conflict. Compromising was adopted so as to resolve the conflict as the solution which was provided was beneficial for both the parties involved in the conflict. After presenting the solution parties refused for which forcing was applied with the help of which government succeeded in suspending the strikes (Rodin, 2016).

Task 3

3.1 Explain the role of negotiation in collective bargaining as in the above conflict.

Negotiation between employer and the group of employees aimed at providing the agreement which could help to regulate the working wages, working conditions and several other benefits and rights. Negotiation is strategy applied to resolve the conflict between employer and the group of employees. In this solution is provided which includes certain benefits on which both the parties agree. Negotiation in collective bargaining helps in resolving the conflicts by involving the parties in decision making process (Kim, 2014). Freedom of Association and Collective Bargaining are the two aspects which help in promoting decent working conditions. Collective bargaining helped in resolving the conflict between BMA and NHS employers. Consultation and cooperation was promoted between BMA and NHS employers. Discrimination at the workplace was prohibited which helped in providing the assurance that the association should allow the doctors to join representative organization. Collective bargaining aims at providing the provision to bring settlement of the disputes arising over the interpretation and application and to introduce the mutually accepted rights and responsibilities (Lazauskaite-Zabielske, et. al., 2015).

3.2 Assess the impact of the negotiation strategies adopted by both parties in the above conflict situation and comment on other negotiating strategies and the potential impact it could have.

Negotiation helps in delivering positive results in solving the conflicts. In the conflict between British Medical Association, NHS employers and government negotiation helped in providing the solution to the problem in the same manner adopting the negotiation helped others to resolve the conflict but it has a set process which is:

This is the process that is being adopted, all the aspects were being analyzed before indulging in such type of process, first step is to prepare for the negotiation, then contract was made for the negotiation, after preparation of contract agreement is made then if parties agrees on the agreement then the agreement is sent for union rectification in case if parties disagrees with the agreement then the contract is being re developed, after union rectification is done than it is being sent to contract administration in case union rectification do not pass the agreement then the process is to be restarted and evaluation of all the aspects is being done in more clear form. Then contract administration prepares for the next negotiation and process helps in resolving the conflicts. To manage the conflict negotiation process that was being adopted in which compromising was done. Contract was formed to ensure that both the parties could get benefited from the availed solution. Adoption of this strategy helped in resolving the conflict between British Medical Association, NHS employer and government (Felbermayr, et. al., 2014)

Conclusion

In relation with the process of employee relation in NHS, it could be clearly stated that employee relation in this organization is distinctive and complex which involves interaction of both internal as well as external variable. No organization is free from conflicts but it is necessary that organizations should work upon developing the strategies which could help in the reduction of conflict and could help the organization to take a control over the conflict situations which could affect in near future. Trade Union again one of the most important part of the organizations. Trade union helps in reducing the conflicts by applying the employees’ welfare policies in the organization. These policies help in reduction of the unfair practices from the organization.

References