Enemies, partners or friends? Employers perspectives on conflict management by employee representatives in Europe.

FACULTY OF PSYCHOLOGY AND EDUCATIONAL SCIENCES Research Group Occupational and Organizational Psychology and Professional Learning UNIVERSIDAD DE SEVILLA. FACULTAD DE PSICOLOGIA Grupo de Investigación en Desarrollo de Recursos Humanos y organizaciones (INDHRO) Research Group Human Resources and Organizational Development Enemies, partners or friends? Employers’ perspectives on conflict management by employee representatives in Europe. Doctoral thesis offered to obtain the degree of Doctor of Psychology by the University of Seville and University of Valencia, and the degree of Doctor of Psychology by KU Leuven. Ana Belén García Jurado Supervisor: Prof. dr. Lourdes Munduate, University of Seville Supervisor: Prof. dr. Martin C. Euwema, KU Leuven Co-Supervisor: dr. Patricia Elgoibar, University of Barcelona 2017 ii This thesis is partially funded by the European Commission: Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities DG (Project Ref. VS/2012/041). iii Cover designed by iv Summary Enemies, partners or friends? Employers’ perspectives on conflict management by employee representatives in Europe. Ana Belén García Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Lourdes Munduate and Prof. Dr. Martin Euwema; Cosupervisor: Dr. Patricia Elgoibar In organizations, a constructive dialogue between management and representatives of employees is essential to come to optimal decision making, prevent escalation of conflicts, and find integrative solutions for problems in the organization, related to the interests of employees. This social dialogue is in many countries, and especially within the European Union institutionalized. Elected and protected employee representatives (ERs), engage in social dialogue with management. This relation however is often conflictive. In this dissertation, we aim to gain a deeper understanding on the conflicts and conflict behaviors of ERs, particularly as perceived by their counterpart in the organization, being HR managers. This subject is understudied, however of great interest, both from academic and societal point of view. First, we developed a heuristic model for this dissertation (chapter 1), defining our key variables. We focus on perceived competences of ERs, in relation to task- and relationship conflicts between management and ERs, conflict behavior by ERs, and the perceived influence of ERs on decision making, as well as on the quality of this decision making. We did so through four different studies. Our first study is a systematic literature review on conflict and conflict behavior by ERs at organizational level related to the trust between the parties. We found only a very limited number of empirical studies, and particularly few quantitative studies, investigating these relations in this context. Our second, third and fourth studies are based on a large multi-national survey. This was conducted in 11 EC member states, with 614 HR-managers participating. Study two investigates the relations between perceived competences of ERs, their cooperative and competitive conflict behavior, and the perceived influence on decision making on traditional and innovative issues. Based on theories of competences, conflict behavior and influence, we tested our model, demonstrating that perceived competences are positively related with influence on both types of issues. This relation is partly mediated by conflict behavior. The theory of conglomerate conflict behavior is supported, with cooperative and competitive behavior contributing positively to perceived influence. Study three investigates the relations between task and relationship conflict, conflict behavior and the quality of agreements. We tested hypotheses bases on theories of team conflicts and conglomerate conflict behavior. We conclude that task and relationship conflict are both negatively related to quality of agreements, and that this is partly mediated by conflict behavior. In addition, the study shows that a) both types of conflict are positively related with competitive behavior, and negatively with cooperative behavior; and b) both types of behavior are positive related to quality of agreements. Study four takes a broader approach on the position of ERs in Europe. We elaborate perceptions of management on ERs, analyze differences between countries, and propose possible interventions to improve social dialogue. In our concluding chapter, we summarize our findings, and discuss theoretical and practical implications. v Samenvatting Vijanden, partners of vrienden? Percepties van werkgevers van conflictgedrag van vertegenwoordigers van werknemers. Ana Belén García Promoters: Prof. Dr. Lourdes Munduate en Prof. Dr. Martin Euwema; Co-promotor: Dr. Patricia Elgoibar Binnen organisaties is een constructieve dialoog van management en vertegenwoordigers van werknemers (hier verder ERs; employee representatives) essentieel om tot een optimale en gedragen besluitvorming rond organisatievragen te komen en conflictescalatie te voorkomen. Deze sociale dialoog is in veel landen, zeker binnen de Europese Unie, geïnstitutionaliseerd. ERs worden door werknemers verkozen en hebben doorgaans een beschermde status. Dit mede omdat de relatie tussen management en ERs conflictgevoelig is. Deze dissertatie heeft tot doel om conflicten en conflictgedrag van ERs te onderzoeken. In het bijzonder vanuit het perspectief van de wederpartij in de organisatie, HR-managers. Hoewel van groot maatschappelijk en wetenschappelijk belang, is heeft dit onderwerp tot heden weinig aandacht gekregen in de internationale literatuur. We ontwikkelen eerst een heuristisch model (hoofdstuk 1), waarbij ook de kernvariabelen worden gedefinieerd. We richten de focus op de waargenomen competenties van ERs, en gaan de relatie na met conflicten tussen management en ERs, conflict gedrag van ERs en hun invloed op besluitvorming en de kwaliteit van deze besluiten. Onze eerste studie (hoofdstuk 2) betreft een systematische review van de literatuur over ons onderwerp. Dit levert een zeer beperkt aantal empirische artikelen op, wat nogmaals het belang van ons onderzoek illustreert. De overige studies zijn gebaseerd op een vragenlijst onderzoek in 11 lidstaten van de EU, waar in totaal 614 HR-managers aan deelnamen, en op persoonlijke interviews met 110 van hen. Studie twee (hoofdstuk 3) onderzoekt de relaties van waargenomen competenties van ERs, conflict gedrag, en de invloed op besluitvorming over zowel traditionele als innovatieve kwesties. We testen hypotheses, gebaseerd op theorieën over competenties, conflict gedrag en invloed. Competenties blijken positief gerelateerd aan invloed op beide typen kwesties. De relatie wordt deels gemedieerd door conflict gedrag. Dit ondersteunt de theorie van conglomeraat conflict gedrag. Studie drie (hoofdstuk 4) test de relaties tussen taak- en relationeel conflict, conflict gedrag van ERs en kwaliteit van besluitvorming. We testen hypotheses gebaseerd op de theorie van team conflict en van conglomeraat conflict gedrag. Zowel taak als relationeel conflict zijn negatief gerelateerd aan kwaliteit van besluitvorming, waarbij het verband met taakconflict sterker is. Deze relaties worden deels gemedieerd door conflictgedrag. Beide typen gedrag zijn positief gerelateerd aan kwaliteit van besluitvorming. Studie vier (hoofdstuk 5) geeft een breder perspectief van de positie van ERs in Europa. We presenteren percepties van management in de verschillende landen en voorstellen voor verbetering van de sociale dialoog. In ons afsluitend hoofdstuk worden de bevindingen samengevat, breder gekaderd en bespreken we theoretische en praktische implicaties. vi Resumen ¿Enemigos, compañeros o amigos? Perspectivas de la patronal sobre la gestión de conflictos de los representantes de los trabajadores en Europa. Ana Belén García Directores: Prof. Dr. Lourdes Munduate y Prof. Dr. Martin Euwema; Co-director: Dr. Patricia Elgoibar Un diálogo constructivo entre la patronal y los representantes de los trabajadores (RTs) es clave para alcanzar una óptima toma de decisiones, prevenir el escalamiento de los conflictos, y encontrar soluciones integradoras para los problemas de la organización. Este diálogo social se encuentra ya institucionalizado en muchos países, especialmente en la Unión Europea. Esta tesis pretende comprender mejor los conflictos y comportamientos de gestión del conflicto de los RTs, particularmente desde la perspectiva de los directores de Recursos Humanos (RRHH), sus homólogos en la mesa de negociación. En primer lugar, desarrollamos un modelo heurístico (capítulo 1), definiendo nuestras variables de estudio. Nos centramos así en las competencias percibidas por la patronal de los RTs en relación a: a) los conflictos de tarea y relacionales; b) el comportamiento en el conflicto; c) la influencia en la toma de decisiones; y d) la calidad del proceso de toma de decisiones. Para cumplir dichos objetivos llevamos a cabo 5 estudios. El primer estudio (capítulo 2) consiste en una revisión sistemática de la literatura sobre los conflictos y el comportamiento en el conflicto por parte de los RTs, a nivel organizacional, en relación con la confianza entre las partes. El segundo (capítulo 3), tercer (capítulo 4) y cuarto estudio (capítulo 5) son empíricos y se basan en datos cuantitativos recogidos de 614 directores de RRHH en 11 países Europeos. En el capítulo final (capítulo 6), resumimos nuestros hallazgos y discutimos las implicaciones teóricas y prácticas. El segundo estudio (capítulo 3) analiza las relaciones entre las competencias percibidas de los RTs, su comportamiento de gestión del conflicto (cooperativo y competitivo), y la influencia percibida en el proceso de toma de decisiones tanto en cuestiones de tipo tradicional como innovadoras. El estudio tres (capítulo 4) investiga las relaciones entre el conflicto de tarea y relacional el comportamiento de gestión de conflicto y la calidad de los acuerdos. El estudio cuatro (capítulo 5) adopta un enfoque más amplio sobre la posición de los RTs en Europa; en dicho capítulo profundizamos sobre las percepciones de los RTs por parte de la patronal analizando las diferencias más significativas entre los países participantes. Finalmente, concluímos este estudio con posibles intervenciones para la mejora del diálogo social en la mesa de negociación. vii Acknowledgements viii Table of contents Chapter 1. General Introduction ............................................................................................. 10 1.1 Setting the scene ................................................................................................... 11 1.2 Conflict management: key in the social dialogue in organizations ................. 12 1.3 Objectives and relevance of this dissertation ........................................................ 14 1.4 Heuristic model of the PhD ................................................................................. 15 1.5 Structure of this PhD ............................................................................................. 19 Chapter 2. Trust and Conflict Management in Industrial Relations .................................... 25 2.1 Introduction: trust and conflict management ........................................................ 26 2.2. Trust and conflict management in the context of industrial relations: a review .. 33 2.3 Trust in the context of industrial relations ........................................................... 38 2.4 Conflict management in the context of industrial relations ................................. 39 2.5. Studies addressing both conflict management and trust ...................................... 41 2.6. Conclusions and future research .......................................................................... 44 Chapter 3. Competent or Competitive? How Employee Representatives gain influence in organizational decision-making ......................................................................................... 54 3.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 55 3.2 Method .................................................................................................................. 65 3.3 Results ................................................................................................................... 67 3.4 Discussion ............................................................................................................. 70 3.5 Practical implications ............................................................................................ 74 3.6 Limitations and future research ............................................................................ 76 3.7 General Conclusion ............................................................................................... 76 Chapter 4. Quality of agreements in organizational negotiations: The role of team conflicts and conflict behavior. .................................................. ¡Error! Marcador no definido. 4.1 Introduction ........................................................... ¡Error! Marcador no definido. 4.2 Methods ................................................................ ¡Error! Marcador no definido. 4.3 Results ................................................................... ¡Error! Marcador no definido. 4.4 Discussion ............................................................. ¡Error! Marcador no definido. 4.5 Conclusion ............................................................ ¡Error! Marcador no definido. Chapter 5. The tower of power: building innovative organizations through social dialogue .................................................................................................................................... 84 5.1. Introduction .......................................................................................................... 85 5.2 Methods ................................................................................................................ 87 ix 5.3 Results Part 1: Perceptions of European HR managers about ERs ...................... 88 5.4 Results Part 2: Ten practical recommendations and good practices ..................... 95 5.5 Discussion and conclusion .................................................................................. 100 Chapter 6. Discussion and Conclusions ............................................................................... 105 6.1 The importance of quality of agreements and conflict management .................. 106 6.2 Conflict behavior by employee representatives: Main findings ......................... 107 6.3 Theoretical implications ..................................................................................... 109 6.4 Practical implications .......................................................................................... 113 6.5 Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 115 General List of References .................................................................................................... 120 Academic CV .......................................................................................................................... 140 Appendixes ............................................................................................................................. 143 16 competences of ERs, the amount and type of conflicts between management and ERs, and key to our model is the conflict behavior by ERs, which is also related to ER’s competences and the type of conflicts with management. This is a dynamic process, where the outcomes often feed perceptions of competences, new conflicts and conflict behaviors. The feedback loop (arrows at the bottom of Figure 1.1), indicates this. These dynamic processes are embedded in a cultural context of industrial relations. Next, we discuss shortly the key variables and relations presented. Figure 1.1. Heuristic model of the key variables in the dissertation Context of industrial relations At the top, we see the context of industrial relations. This context determines the other focal points in our studies: the prevalence of conflicts between management and ERs, the competences and conflict behavior of ERs, and the quality of negotiated agreements, as well as the influence of ERs on organizational decision making in a broader sense. Labor law, as well as structures at national, sectorial and local level, determine which parties meet, what subjects are negotiated at which tables, and who can be representatives of the parties involves. Also, cultures, national, sectorial and organizational, impact this context. Within the EC, there is specific European law relevant for social dialogue at different levels. Also, European works councils have been institutionalized within the EC, and gain importance (Conchon & Triangle, 2017). Who will be recruited and elected as ERs is often part of culture, in unions as well as locally. And also on management side, culture plays a role. Not only in whom will be at the table, but also the scripts for negotiations and conflict management are culturally bound, reflected in the behavior of parties (Brett, 2007; Poole, 2013). The context also determines the features of social dialogue in the organization (Gilliland, Gross & Hogler, 2014; Pulignano, Martinez-Lucio, & Whittall, 2012). A key characteristic that we consider of this context is the level of trust between employers and ERs (Elgoibar, Munduate & Euwema, 2016). Trust at different levels, varying from society and sector, Conflict Behavior by ERs Context of Industrial Relations in Organizations Competence s of ERs Types of Conflict Quality of Agreement s Influence in Decision M ki 17 to organization and works council. When studying the context of social dialogue, we therefore also take into account the trust between social partners, in our literature review (chapter two). Trust is closely related to a more cooperative climate in organizations, which impacts conflicts and conflict behavior in these organizations (Medina, Munduate & Guerra, 2008). Quality of negotiated agreements Management and ERs meet, discuss and negotiate over a large variety of issues. The quality of decision making, resulting in negotiated agreements, can be measured in terms of outcomes for the individual parties, as well as for the joint outcomes. Negotiation outcomes are usually defined in terms of reaching optimal solutions, where all parties maximize their outcome, and realize a mutual satisfactory result, to which both parties are committed (Lax & Sebenius, 1992; Pruitt & Carnevale, 1993; Sebenius, 2015). This also can be applied for negotiations such as collective labor agreements in organizations, arrangements for health and safety in the workplace, decisions related to restructuring or downsizing, or the implementation of more sustainable production methods and policies. Here, decisions made, preferably meet the interests of the different stakeholders, which typically require innovative and tailor made solutions. In this dissertation, we consider the quality of agreements an outcome of the process of consultations, dialogue and negotiations, between management and ERs in organizations. Influence of ERs Works councils typically have the right for information and consultation, and sometimes co-determination. Particularly in Germany the right for co-determination is strong (Shire, Schönauer, Valverde & Mottweiler, 2009). In such cases, the consent of the works council is a mandatory requirement for undertaking particular measures. In most EC member states, such enforceable co-determination is however non-existent.4 French and Raven (1959) defined influence as a force one person exerts on someone else to induce a change in behaviours, attitudes, and values. So, in the European context, the influence ERs have on decision making, is understood as their ability to change management behaviors, attitudes and values on different issues, will vary, depending on the legal rights, on the issues at stake, and certainly also on the relations between ERs and management. In this dissertation, we differentiate between influence in traditional issues; topics which have been on the table for a longer time, and are more rooted in legislation, such as working conditions, working hours, and wages (Guest, 2016), as well as the organization of jobs (Van der Brempt, 2014; Van der Brempt, Boone, van Witteloostuijn & van den Berg, 2017). Other issues have developed more recently and are therefore referred to as innovative issues. These often are less evident to discuss, and putting these on the agenda might depend more on the relationship between management and ERs. For example, when relations are cooperative, management might 4 For an overview see: https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/9-503- 2690?transitionType=Default&contextData=(sc.Default)&firstPage=true&bhcp=1 18 be more open for initiatives to discuss employee-related issues such as inclusive HR, sustainability issues, or training and support, referred here as innovative issues (Van Gyes, 2010). Coming back to our heuristic model, we investigate the relation of these two outcomes with competences and the conflict behavior of ERs, and we analyze if the type and frequency of conflicts between management and ERs will have an impact on these outcomes. Competences by ERs The role of ER is considered generally as challenging and stressful (Elgoibar, 2013; Munduate et al, 2012), requiring a large variety of competences. The notion of competence is defined as the capacity to adequately perform a task, duty or role in the context of a professional work setting. Thus, a competence is understood to integrate knowledge, skills, personal values and attitudes, and to be acquired through work experience and learning by doing (Bartram & Roe, 2008). In the same direction, Spencer and Spencer (1993, p. 9) define competence as: “the underlying characteristic of an individual that is causally related to criterion-referenced effective and/or superior performance in a job situation”. So, what characteristics determine the effectiveness of ERs? Soares and Passos (2012) describe different qualities to perform adequately the role of ERs which are seen as key competences for this role. Munduate et al (2012) developed a measure to assess such competences for ERs, these include both ‘hard skills’, such as knowledge about labor law and business finance, and ‘soft skills’, such as competences to communicate, negotiate, and manage conflict. In this dissertation, we focus on ERs´ competences as perceived by management. Types of conflicts between ERs and management Conflict is daily business in most organizations. Conflicts between the interests of departments, teams, and between the interests of management and employees. Social conflict has been defined in many ways. In this dissertation, we use the definition by Van de Vliert, Euwema and Huismans (1995) who consider a conflict between two or more parties, when at least one of these parties is frustrated or annoyed by the other party. Conflict management is the response to this experience, per the same authors. Social dialogue is designed to signal such conflicts in early stage, or event prevent conflicts. Within this social dialogue however, also conflicts can occur between ERs and management. We use in this dissertation the well-known, and extensively studied, differentiation between task and relationship conflicts (Benitez, Medina, & Munduate, 2012; Guerra, Martinez, Munduate, & Medina, 2005; Jehn, 1995; Medina, Munduate, Dorado, Martínez, & Guerra, 2005). Task, or cognitive, conflict is defined as the perception of disagreements about the content of the decisions and involves differences in viewpoints, ideas, and opinions (Jehn & Mannix, 2001). Examples of task conflict between management and ERs are conflict about distribution of resources, about procedures and policies, and interpretation of facts (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003). Relationship conflict is defined as the perception of interpersonal incompatibilities and 19 typically includes issues of personal preferences, values, and interpersonal style (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003). Conflict behavior by ERs Conflict behavior can be defined as “a parties’ reaction to the perceptions that one’s own and other party’s current aspirations cannot be achieved simultaneously” (Rubin, Pruitt, & Kim, 1994, p. 20). We classify conflict behavior as cooperative or competitive. Cooperative behaviors are those in which a party considers the interests of the other party in relation to the conflict issues. Competitive behaviors on the other hand refer to parties striving toward their own goals and interests, on the expense of the other party (Carnevale & Pruitt, 1992). Walton and McKersie (1994) acknowledged that in industrial relations, competitive and cooperative behaviors both have their merits. In their work, they emphasize the importance of combining both behaviors. This is since most negotiations in this context are complex and multi-issue, with integrative potential requiring cooperative and creative problem solving behavior, as well as with distributive elements also requiring competitive behavior (Euwema et al., 2015; Sebenius, 2015; Van de Vliert et al., 1995). Therefore, in this dissertation we focus on the combination of cooperative and competitive conflict behaviors. This combination of conflict behaviors is the essence of the theory of conglomerate conflict behavior, or CCB (Munduate, Ganaza, Peiro, & Euwema, 1999; Van de Vliert et al., 1995). 1.5 Structure of this PhD To gain a deeper understanding of the research problem, we investigated the presented relations in three different ways. First, we conduct a systematic literature review, focusing particularly on the relations between context, conflict and conflict management, trust and outcomes of these dynamics, presented in chapter 2 of this manuscript. Next, we develop an empirical study among HR managers, where we focus on the relation between perceived competences, conflict behavior of ERs, and influence of ERs on organizational decision making. This study is presented in chapter 3 of this manuscript. Our next empirical study investigates the relation between types of conflict, conflict behavior of ERs, and the quality of negotiated agreements. This study is presented in chapter 4 of this manuscript. In chapter 5 we present the results of a broader analysis of perceptions by management on competences and attitudes of ERs, and the relations with management. Also, we take a closer look at differences between the 11 countries in the study, as these have rather different cultures when it comes to industrial relations, as well as different legal positions. 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García and Pender are joint first authors of this chapter. 32 This model is used both as a contingency model: describing under what condition what conflict management strategy is used best (Van de Vliert et al., 1995); however also as a normative model: promoting the idea that “integrating or problem solving ” is the most effective strategy to manage conflicts , particularly for joined outcomes and long term relations (see more in Tjosvold, Tang and Wan, chapter 4 in this volume; De Dreu et al., 2001; Tjosvold, Wong & Feng Chen, 2014) . Conglomerate Conflict Behavior theory In industrial relations and in negotiations more generally, integrative solutions not necessarily imply also a strong impact on the decision making by both parties. Particularly when it comes to negotiations and decision making on conflictive issues between management and employees, competitive actions sometimes are needed to achieve a power balance. This was already recognized by Walton and McKersie (1994) and developed in the theory of Conglomerate Conflict Behavior (CCB) (Van de Vliert, Euwema and Huisman, 1995) Tjosvold, Morishima, and Belsheim (1999), define forcing and problem solving strategies as opposed. Other authors (Thompson & Nadler, 2000) argue that parties in a conflict, in order to achieve their own outcomes and reach mutual agreements at the same time, try to combine both types of conflict behaviors (cooperative and competitive) (Elgoibar, 2013). This is the basic assumption of the Conglomerate Conflict Behavior Theory (Van de Vliert, Euwema, & Huismans, 1995; Munduate, Ganaza, Peiró & Euwema, 1999). This theory states that most conflicts and negotiation situations are complex and mixed motive.Therefore, the combination of different conflict management strategies is most common, and can be beneficial. Strategies, being either cooperation and competition, or forcing, avoiding and problem solving, are combined sequentially or simultaneously, or both. Several studies have demonstrated that competing behaviors (such as forcing), and cooperative behaviors (such as problem solving) do not necessarily exclude one another, however the combination of strategies contributes to effective outcomes (Euwema, Van de Vliert & Bakker, 2003; Euwema & Van Emmerik, 2007; Komorita & Parks, 1995; Munduate et al., 1999; Sheldon & Fishbach, 2011). Most of these studies were conducted in organizational conflicts, however not related to industrial relations, including worker representatives and management. 33 2.2. Trust and conflict management in the context of industrial relations: a review Trust and conflict management have received a lot of attention in the academic literature during the past 20 years, particularly in the field of organizational behavior. Surprisingly however, the organizational behavior studies focus on direct relations within organizations, while industrial relations typically focus more on trust and conflict between employers and unions. In this search, we focus on the organizational level, and see what empirical studies one side, and worker representatives on the other. We conducted a systematic literature review8. We reviewed the literature of the past 20 years. The criteria for inclusion of papers were published in peer reviewed journals and papers referring to the organizational level. We included in our search both qualitative and quantitative studies. We found in total 11 papers addressing trust, 5 papers addressing conflict management, and 14 papers addressing both topics simultaneously. The studies using quantitative data are summarized in Table 2.1.. The studies analyzing qualitative data are summarized directly in the text. Table 2.1. Overview of the studies found in the systematic literature review 8 We searched Psychinfo, Business Source Premium and Web of Science. We searched for papers reporting studies that clearly aimed to investigate the different roles of trust between partners in industrial relations (e.g. managers, union representatives, employee representatives, union negotiators…) conflict management, conflict behaviors and grievance resolution. We used the following search terms for the systematic review: industrial relations, organizational level / organizations, trust. conflict management, bargaining, indirect participation, employee representative, union representative, shop steward and works councils. In addition, we used a snowballing method to find relevant publications, and included academic publications in books, and dissertations. 34 Author and year of publication Topic Sample Findings Trust in Industrial Relations Bartram, Stanton, & Elovaris (2008) Trust as a motive for becoming a representative. Members of the Australian Nursing Federation (n=1020) -Union commitment and low trust in the employer were positively associated with becoming a representative. Guest, Brown, Peccei & Huxley (2008) Does partnership at work increase trust? Union representatives (n=656) and nonunion representatives (n=238) in Great Britain -There is no association between representative participation and trust. -Lower employee trust in management where there is representative participation. -Direct participation is associated with higher trust. Holland, Cooper, Pyman & Teicher (2012) Relationship between employee voice arrangements and employees’ trust in Management. Australian employees (n=1,022) -Employee trust in employers increased with a more direct voice. -Where employees perceived that management attitudes were opposed to unions, trust in management was likely to be lower. -Union voice was associated with lower trust in management. Kerkhof, Winder & Klandermans (2003) Instrumental and relational determinants of trust in management among members of works councils. 108 works councils in The Netherlands -Works council members who think that the council is influential or effective, and those who think that decision-making procedures are fair and that they are respected, report more trust in management. -Over time, the only predictor of trust in management is procedural justice. 35 Nichols, Danford & Tasiran (2009) The relation between tenure and employee trust in management. 3,037 British employees -Association between unions in workplaces and low trust in management. Nienhueser & Hossfeld (2011) The effects of trust on the preferences for decentralized bargaining. Personnel managers (n= 1,000) and works councilors (n= 1,000) in Germany -Mutual trust doesn’t affect the managers’ preference for decentralized bargaining. -Mutual trust is positive related to the preference for decentralized bargaining and for bargaining at the plant level for the WCs. Yoon-Ho, Dong- One & Ali (2015) Effects of trustworthiness on the adoption of high performance work systems. 1,353 ERs and managers in Korea -Mutual ability, benevolence and integrity had a positive relationship with the adoption of high performance work systems. Conflict Management in Industrial Relations Bacon & Blyton (1999) Implications of cooperation and conflict for employees and trade unions. ERs in the UK -The study didn’t find evidence of any association revealed between cooperation and a greater role for trade unions. -Workplace co-operation (in the steel industry) remains part of a traditional gainsharing package and an 'alliance of insiders' than an HRM partnership or union incorporation. -The study’s results suggest questioning the ability of cooperation to deliver important aspects of organizational competitive advantage. 36 Bacon & Blyton (2007) Conflict for mutual gains? Negotiation patterns of union negotiators. 21 departments across two integrated steelworks -Managers secured lower manning and increased productivity in negotiations both in departments characterized by cooperation and by conflict. -Mutual gains were secured only where union negotiators pursued conflict tactics during bargaining. -When union negotiators adopted more conflictual bargaining tactics, more employees reported pay increases and greater satisfaction with team working agreements ‘Mixed’ bargaining approaches in other departments were less successful. Elgoibar (2013) Conflict behavior of ERs’ in Europe 2,304 European ERs -ERs use conflict patterns rather than single behaviors. -Spanish ERs use mostly competitive patterns while Belgium, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands use mostly cooperative patterns. -ERs’ commitment to the company and to the union affects perceptions of cooperative management differently in Spain than in Germany. -Perceived social support is negatively related to accommodating behavior for female ERs in Spain but not in The Netherlands. Tjosvold, Morishima & Belsheim (1999) Complaint handling on the shop floor: cooperative relationships and open-minded strategies. Supervisors and union employees in British Columbia. -Cooperative goals, compared to competitive and independent, promote open-minded discussions of complaints that result in efficient resolutions benefiting both parties. Tjosvold & Morishima (1999) Grievance resolution: perceived goal interdependence and interaction patterns. Management & union representatives -Cooperative goals promote the direct, open-minded consideration of opposing views which leads to quality solutions efficiently developed -Need to structure cooperative interdependence and guide skill training in grievance handling. 37 Trust & Conflict Management in Industrial Relations Elgoibar, Munduate, Medina, & Euwema (2013) Trust in management, union support and conflict behavior in ERs in Spain. 719 Spanish representatives -Representatives use mostly a competitive conflict pattern in Spain combined with cooperative behavior-Trust is negatively related to competitive conflict management. -Union support is positively related to competitive behavior by ERs. Euwema, Munduate, Elgoibar, García & Pender (2015). Managers’ perceptions of conflict management and trustworthiness of ERs, and trust between both. 614 European managers -Cross-cultural differences among European ERs trustworthiness, conflict management and trust perceived by the management. -Competitive conflict management by ERs is related to more influence on traditional issues; while cooperative conflict management is related to more influence on innovative issues. -Trust between ERs and management, and ERs’ cooperative conflict management are related to more satisfactory agreements - ERs’ abilities perceived by the management are positively related to their influence on decision making, however nor integrity neither benevolence. -Industrial relations climate of trust is strongly related to cooperative conflict management style, however not related to competitive conflict management by ERs. Van der Brempt (2014) Opening the black box of works council effectiveness: the role of group composition, trust and perceived influence. Management and ERs in a works council setting in Belgium. -Cooperation between social partners is promoted if there is less difference in ideological characteristics. - Procedural justice and perceived organizational support may positively affect trust within works councils. - As the distance in ideology increases, ERs’ trust in management and group effectiveness decreases. - Distance in education does not have a negative impact on trust in management or works council effectiveness. 38 2.3 Trust in the context of industrial relations The empirical literature on trust in the context of industrial relations is surprisingly thin and are mostly case studies. We describe shortly the papers presented in Table1. Bartram, Stanton and Elovaris (2008) used a sample of Australian nurses to study how trust in management and union commitment affected the likelihood of becoming an ER, amongst other relationships. They found that low trust in the employers’ good will made it more likely for employees to become representatives. Union commitment was also found to be positively related to the likelihood of becoming an ER. Guest, Brown, Peccei and Huxley (2008) explored in the UK if partnership at work led to increased trust at different levels of the organization. The results indicated that representative participation was not associated to any of the measures of trust. Employees reported lower trust when these types of representation were present compared to the organizations in which they were absent. Direct participation however did relate positively to higher levels of trust. Holland, Cooper, Pyman and Teicher (2012) used Social Exchange Theory to examine the relationship between direct and union voice arrangements, perceived managerial opposition to unions and employees’ trust in management. Using crosssectional data from a sample of Australian employees. They found a positive relationship between direct voice and employees’ trust in management. They also found that union voice and perceived managerial opposition to unions were negatively related to employees’ trust in management. Kerkhof, Winder, and Klandermans’ longitudinal study (2003) explored the antecedents of trust in management among works council members in The Netherlands. ERs were more likely to trust managers who provided them with fair treatment, whereas providing them with influence in the decision-making processes was deemed less important. Nichols, Danford and Tasiran (2009) analyzed the data from the British 2004 Workplace Employment Relations Survey to see what factors affected trust in management. Following their expectations, they found that employee trust in management deteriorates with greater length of service (that is, years of workplace exposure). 39 Trust was seen as an antecedent of preference for decentralized bargaining in a study by Nienhueser and Hossfeld (2011) among 1000 personnel managers and work councilors in Germany. They found no effect of trust from the management’s perspective. However, for works council members mutual trust had positive effects on the preference for decentralized bargaining and for bargaining at the plant level. Yoon-Ho, Dong-One and Ali (2015) collected surveys from 1.353 Korean labor representatives and managers to examine weather mutual trustworthiness - ability, integrity, and benevolencebetween employee representatives and management is an important antecedent for the adoption of high performance work systems (HPWS). The results indicated that all three components of mutual trustworthiness had a positive relationship with the adoption of HPWS. In addition, Timming carried out two qualitative studies in this topic. In the first one (Timming, 2006) he addressed trust in a European work councils and found that trust relations were characteristically sub-optimal both between worker and employers' representatives and among the workers themselves. The second case study explores the dynamics of cross-national trust relations between workers' representatives, finding a low level of trust between the two delegations of workers –one in the UK and one in The Netherlands- of the case (Timming, 2009). 2.4 Conflict management in the context of industrial relations Conflict in the context of industrial relations in organizations can be related to a variety of issues. As we observe in the studies found, these issues include: reaching agreements, the compliance to agreements, negotiating working hours or policies on inclusion. Handling complaints that the agreements on working hours are not respected by management, or grievances about injustice in the workplace, are however also classic conflictive issues related to formal industrial relations in the organization (Gordon & Miller, 1984; Euwema et al., 2015). Bacon and Blyton (1999) surveyed British union representatives to explore the different outcomes resulting from cooperative vs. competitive industrial relations. They found that cooperative relations were related to some positive outcomes for employees, such as better conditions and involvement. However, they didn’t find a link with other HRM aspects nor with a greater role of trade unions. 40 Bacon and Blyton (2007) studied among twenty-one departments (across two integrated steelworks) conflict for mutual gains and negotiation patterns of union negotiators. They concluded that when union negotiators adopted more conflictual bargaining tactics, more employees reported pay increases and greater satisfaction with team working agreements. ‘Mixed’ bargaining approaches used in other departments resulted to be less successful. Another key finding was that managers secured lower staffing and increased productivity in negotiations both in departments characterized by cooperation and by conflict. Mutual gains were secured only where union negotiators pursued conflict tactics during bargaining. A recent study (Elgoibar, 2013) among 2,304 European ERs explored the antecedents and conflict behaviors of European ERs. ERs use conflict patterns rather than single behaviors, supporting the CCB theory (Van de Vliert et al, 1995). More specifically, in Spain ERs use mostly competitive patterns while Belgium, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands’s ERs use more cooperative patterns. ERs’ commitment to the company and to the union showed to affect cooperative conflict management differently depending on the industrial relations system, this was showed in a comparison between Spain and Germany. Based on the theory of cooperation and competition, Tjosvold Morishima and Belsheim (1999) explored whether cooperative goals promote open-minded negotiations between employees and supervisors, which in turn lead to better resolutions for both parties. To do so they carried out interviews with supervisors and union employees in British Columbia. The hypotheses were supported and the authors concluded that cooperation and open-minded negotiation skills can facilitate integrative solutions to workplace conflicts. The study by Tjosvold and Morishima (1999) on grievance’s resolution between management and union representatives concluded, that cooperative goals promote direct, open-minded consideration of opposing views which leads to quality solutions. Cooperative goals also induced an open-minded discussion of diverse views resulting in high-quality and integrative solutions. When management and ERs perceive competitive goals, this leads to close-minded interactions, defaulting efficient agreements. This study signaled the need to structure cooperative interdependence and guide skill training in grievance handling. Regarding qualitative studies, Cutcher-Gershenfeld (2011) studied escalated collective labor conflicts, through a case study method where more than 300 negotiators 41 were involved in negotiations on how to bargain, and first reach agreement on this to overcome intractable conflicts. This study focused on the importance of being able to differentiate between intractable and manageable conflicts. Lewin, Keefe and Kochan (2012) also carried out a qualitative study, in this case to focus on what makes dispute resolution procedures work. Based on process and outcome assessments, they argue that public sector labor and management best use mutual gains negotiations. Dennison, Drummond, and Hobgood (1997) studied collaborative bargaining in two public universities through the follow up of the development of interest-based bargaining. Process and outcomes were assessed. In doing so they adopted a process which enabled them jointly to: identify the issues, analyze the interests underlying those issues, develop options reflecting those interests, evolve the means of assessing the options, and finally articulate outcomes deemed efficient, legitimate, mutually acceptable, supportive of collaboration, and worthy of joint commitment. 2.5. Studies addressing both conflict management and trust The number of quantitative studies addressing the relationships between different levels of trust and conflict management in the context of industrial dialogue appear to be scarce. Elgoibar, Munduate, Medina and Euwema (2013) used the Spanish industrial relations context for exploring the conflict pattern from worker representatives and the relation to trust in management and union support. Surveys among 719 representatives showed that Spanish representatives use mostly a competitive conflict pattern combined with a cooperative behavior, and that the low level of trust in management is related to a greater use of the competitive behavior. Additionally, the high level of union support in Spain seems to stimulate competitive conflict behavior. 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The Effects of mutual trustworthiness between labor and management in adopting high performance work systems. Relations Industrielles/Industrial Relations, 70(1), 36-61. 54 Chapter 3. Competent or Competitive? How Employee Representatives gain influence in organizational decisionmaking9 9 This chapter is published as: García, A B, Munduate, L, Elgoibar, P, Wendt, H, & Euwema, M. (2017). Competent or competitive? How employee representatives gain influence in organizational decisionmaking, Negotiation and Conflict Management Research, 10, 2, 107-125 55 3.1 Introduction “In our company, we have a works council of 11 employee representatives. They are entitled to involvement in decisions on strategic issues, but they usually don’t fully understand the issues and tend to respond in a defensive manner. However, when they are supportive towards our plans, it will certainly help implementation. Therefore, my dilemma really is: to what extent and at what moment should I involve them?” (HR director of a large financial institution in Belgium). This quote addresses the core issues of this article. Employee Representatives (ERs) can play a crucial role in organizational decision-making. However, to gain influence they need to be taken seriously by management. The HR director in the above example needs ERs as competent partners, who are willing to cooperate; otherwise, they are at risk of being marginalized and minimally involved in decisionmaking. Thus, the implementation of the decisions may be jeopardized. ERs are agents on behalf of their coworkers and are supposed to defend their interests, for example, when it comes to issues such as working conditions, health and safety, pay, restructuring, job security, and inclusion. This article focuses on the influence of ERs on organizational decision-making, exploring the role of perceived competences of ERs and their conflict behavior. This issue is relevant for any agentic role in decision-making. Within organizations, for example, we often find committees with employees, academic staff, student representatives, or representatives of clients or patients, to be consulted on a variety of issues. Are they taken seriously enough in decision-making? And what contributes most to their influence? With addressing the role of competences and conflict behavior, this study contributes to the existing literature in four ways: (a) It offers unique data on perceptions of HR directors on antecedents and consequences of conflict behavior by ERs, a subject hardly studied and also relevant for other agentic roles, (b) It investigates the relation between perceived competences, conflict behaviors, and types of conflict issues, thereby extending the framework of competences and testing this in a context of representatives, (c) It examines the conglomerate conflict behavior theory (CCB; Van de Vliert, Euwema, & Huismans, 1995) that links the combination of different behaviors to different types of conflictive issues in the context of industrial relations, and (d) It aims to contribute with practical tools for agents in conflictive decision-making, particularly in industrial relations. 56 Employee Representatives Participating in Organizational Decision-Making Collective conflicts are part of organizational dynamics, particularly when the interests of management and employees are not aligned (Lewicki, Elgoibar, & Euwema, 2016). To promote integration of perspectives, quality of decision-making and support for organizational decisions, employee participation in decision-making has been a cornerstone of recent management theories (Markey & Townsend, 2013). Kallaste and Jaakson (2005, p. 5) define employee participation as: “his/her opportunity to participate in a company’s decision making regardless of his/her position”. Employees can exert influence by two types of participation. Direct participation, meaning the influence employees exert at the shop or office floor level (Markey, Ravenswood, Webber, & Knudsen, 2013). This involves employees directly, particularly at shop floor level (Kallaste & Jaakson, 2005). Indirect participation means the influence exerted through representatives of employees (Markey et al., 2013; Wilkinson, Gollan, Marchington, & Lewin, 2010). This type of participation aims for a fairer division of power within the organization (Summers & Hyman, 2005) on a structural level. It also impacts a broader range of decisions (Knudsen, 1995), including health and safety, inclusion policies, and downsizing and restructuring (Van den Berg, Grift, & Van Witteloostuijn, 2011; Van der Brempt, 2014). The articles composing this dissertation focus on such indirect participation. One of the institutionalized forms of indirect participation is often referred to as social dialogue, and defined as: “discussions, consultations, negotiations, and joint actions involving organizations representing the two sides of industry, both employers and workers. It is a process by which relevant parties seek to resolve employmentrelated differences via an information exchange” (Bryson, Forth, & George, 2012, p. 5). Social dialogue as a formal platform for consultation and participation in decisionmaking has a long tradition, particularly in Europe. HR managers and works councils generally represent the two sides of the table of these joint actions. The European Union legislation requires a works council in organizations with 50 or more employees. Employees of the organization elect their representatives for this works council. ERs are typically elected for a period of four years and have a protected position (Stegmaier, 2012). ERs are normally employed in the organization and have a part-time or full-time role representing their coworkers in negotiations, different types 57 of organizational conflicts, and decision-making processes with management (Conchon, 2013a, 2013b; Euwema, Munduate, Elgoibar, Garcıa, & Pender, 2015; Munduate, Euwema, & Elgoibar, 2012). The works council meets with top management to discuss all issues relevant for employees in the organization. Typically, the HR director plays a key role in these meetings representing management. The regulations toward works councils, elections, and the rights of ERs differ between EU member states (Conchon, 2013b; Pulignano, Martinez-Lucio, & Whittall, 2012). ERs have under European law, as well as under national laws, quite some decisive power when it comes to vital issues in the organization, varying from health and safety to mergers and acquisitions (Euwema et al., 2015). Nevertheless, it is less clear what the actual influence of ERs is on the decision-making. “Influence is ‘power in action,’ just as power is ‘potential influence’” (French & Raven, 1959, p. 261). Influence and power are thus seen as two parts of the same coin. Anderson and Brion (2014) expressed this by stating: “Power represents a source of potential influence that may or may not be realized through compliance from others (2014, p 69).” Indeed, ERs often have a large potential to influence, which is based on different sources, varying from labor law to personal competences and working relationships with management (Martínez Lucio, 2016; Munduate & Medina, 2017). Given the importance of power for organizational dynamics, social scientists have analyzed how individuals achieve power within organizational groups; that is, how they gain respect, prominence, and influence in the eyes of others (Galinsky & Kilduff, 2013). The theory of bases of social power (French & Raven, 1959) examines the sources and specific resources used by powerholders to influence others. This classic theory proposes five bases of power: reward, coercion, legitimacy, reference, and expertise. ERs gain more influence in decision-making with management, depending on the different power sources available and their willingness and ability to use these. There is evidence that the nature of the resource that a powerholder controls may affect how the other party responds to that power (Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004). For example, Munduate and Dorado (1998) found that the use of expert power, or being perceived as competent, promotes a cooperative relationship with the other party. Expert power is defined as target’s perception of having expertise or knowledge in a specific domain (French & Raven, 1959). Following French and Raven (1959) and Korsgaard, Schweiger, and Sapienza (1995), we define influence in this context as the degree to 64 H3: Perceived competences of ERs are positively related to cooperative conflict behavior (H3a) and negatively related to competitive conflict behavior by ERs (H3b). Conflict Behavior Mediating the Relation Between Competences and Influence of ERs Industrial relations are prone to conflict by nature (Gilliland, Gross, & Hogler, 2014; Lewicki et al., 2016; Llorente, Luchi, & Sioli, 2013). Therefore, the way conflict is managed is critically important and related to ERs’ influence in decision-making. Jirjahn and Smith (2006) showed in a review of German works councils, that a more cooperative climate and related behaviors contribute to the acceptance of participation of ERs. This is in line with Van der Brempt (2014, p 23) who argues: “employee representatives will hold the most favorable perspective of works council effectiveness when managers and ERs cooperate to resolve work floor bottlenecks and make highquality decisions. This is in line with organizational behavior research, showing that cooperation is one of the principle antecedents of high-quality decisions, group members’ satisfaction, willingness to stay in the group and high task performance influence of works councils.” So, cooperation indeed contributes to influence of works councils. Cooperation, in its turn, is driven by perceived trustworthiness (Ferrin, Bligh, & Kohles, 2008; Munduate, Euwema, & Elgoibar, 2016). One of the components of trustworthiness is the ability, or competences of the other (Bollen & Euwema, 2014; Mayer, Davis, & Schoorman, 1995). So, we assume that the relation between perceived competences and influence of ERs might be mediated by their conflict behavior. Competent ERs are effective in managing conflict, and by doing so, they gain influence in the decision-making. Previously, we also argued that, for ERs to gain influence, a combination of cooperative and competitive behavior is most effective. How will these conflict behaviors mediate the relation between perceived competences and influence? It seems somewhat paradoxical that employers might perceive competent ERs as more cooperative and less competitive (H3) while these behaviors are both expected to contribute positively to ERs’ influence (H2). The way in which these behaviors mediate the relation between perceived competences and influence might thus be different. CCB theory prescribes to look at this mediation in congruence. Therefore, 65 the mediating role of these behaviors is best understood when we take both into account simultaneously. As components of a conglomerate, we expect that both cooperative and competitive conflict behavior by ERs partly mediate the relation between perceived competences and influence in decision-making. We expect so for decision-making on traditional as well as innovative issues. Additionally, we explore to what extent these effects differ for these two types of issues. Traditional issues such as pay, incentives, and working hours, may also be seen as distributive issues. When it comes to pay, it might be more difficult to find integrative potential compared to innovative issues, such as health and safety. For example, both employers and employees benefit from a reduction of sick leave. So, it is not unlikely that to gain influence on traditional issues, competitive behavior is needed more, compared to innovative issues, and the other way around for cooperative behaviors. Hence, we formulate H4: The relation between perceived competences of ERs and their influence on organizational decision-making is mediated by cooperative and competitive conflict behavior both for traditional (H4a) and innovative (H4b) issues. 3.2 Method Procedure and Respondents To test our hypotheses, data were collected through an online survey in 11 European countries: Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom. In all countries, HR directors and managers, from different sectors and sizes, were invited to participate using different networks in each participating country. We followed random sampling procedures in each country, distributing the surveys among networks, without preselection. We focused on HR directors and HR managers as they deal in most organizations most frequently with ERs and are engaged in most negotiations. Overall, 614 HR directors and HR managers completed the survey. The average age of the participants was 43.5 years, with 50% male and 47% female respondents (3% unanswered). The survey and instructions were translated into 10 languages (Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, and Spanish). For Belgium, both Dutch and French surveys were made available. In addition to measuring our key variables, information on participants (age, gender, role, education, years actively in contact with 66 ERs), and organizations (number of employees, economic conditions) was gathered. We also conducted more than 100 interviews with HR directors, which are used to contextualize our results and illustrate our findings. Measures Perceived Competences of ERs This construct was measured through nine items of a scale developed for competences of ERs (Munduate et al., 2012). The question was: “To what extent do you believe that ERs are competent in...?” (e.g., labor law, HRM, social skills; see Appendix 1 for the complete list of items). The respondents rated these competences on a Likert scale ranging from 1 to 5. Following George and Mallery (2003), reliabilities for the scales were good, with Cronbach’s alpha .94. Cooperative and Competitive Conflict Behavior These measures are based on Hempel, Zhang, and Tjosvold’s (2009) conflict behavior scale. The current scale includes four items of the original five items’ subscales. An example for cooperative behavior is: “Employee representatives encourage a ‘we are in it together’ attitude.” An example for competitive behavior is: “Employee representatives treat conflict as a win-lose contest.” Respondents rated these behaviors on a Likert scale ranging from 1 to 5 (1 = not at all; 5 = very much). Following George and Mallery (2003), reliabilities for the scales are good, with Cronbach’s alphas of .85 for cooperative behavior and .91 for competitive behavior. Influence of ERs Influence of ERs on organizational decision-making has been explored through items originally developed by Munduate et al. (2012). Likert scales ranging from 1 (no impact) to 5 (high impact) were used to assess participants’ opinions on ERs’ influence related to a variety of organizational issues. The main question being: “To what extent do employee representatives in your organization have impact on the following subjects (referring to: working hours, training, career development, pay and incentives, performance targets, work-life balance, equality issues, corporate social 67 responsibility, health and safety, and green issues)?” An exploratory factor analysis resulted in two factors, which were labeled traditional and innovative issues. The item on training and career development loaded on both factors, and they were for that reason left out of further analyses. Reliabilities for the scales were acceptable to good with Cronbach’s alphas being .74 for traditional issues (three items: working hours, pay and incentives, and performance targets) and .86 for innovative issues (five items: work-life balance, equality issues, corporate social responsibility, health and safety, and green issues). 3.3 Results Table 3.1 displays the descriptive data. Influence of ERs in organizational decisionmaking is limited, with an average score below the mean scale of the score between “little impact” and “some impact.” Influence is higher regarding innovative issues (M = 2.81) as compared to influence on traditional issues (M = 2.65). With regard to conflict behavior, ERs on average show slightly more cooperative behavior (M = 2.74) than competitive behavior (M = 2.63). Finally, their competences are perceived as below the mean of the scale, indicating a modest competence level (M = 2.45). As expected, perceived competences are positively related to influence, both on traditional issues (r = .30, p < .01), as well as on innovative issues (r = .45, p < .01). Table 3.1. Descriptive Statistics of the Research Variables (N=614) M SD (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) 1 Gender 1.46 .52 1 2 Age 43.24 9.70 -.18** 1 3 Perceived competences 2.45 0.77 .24* -.00 1 4 Cooperative CB 2.74 0.99 -.00 -.00 .61** 1 5 Competitive CB 2.63 0.95 -.10* -.00 -.24** -.41** 1 6 Influence on traditional issues 2.65 0.89 -.08* -.01 .30** .21** .16** 1 7 Influence on Innovative issues 2.81 0.82 -.11** .05 .45** .43** -.01 .53** Note: *p<0.05; **p<.01 Furthermore, perceived competences are positively related to cooperative conflict behavior and negatively related to competitive conflict behavior. Cooperative conflict behavior by ERs is positively related to influence of ERs, both on innovative and traditional issues. Competitive conflict behavior by ERs is positively related to 68 influence on traditional issues. Cooperative and competitive conflict behavior are negatively related. Gender is positively related to perceived competences, indicating female HR directors perceive ERs as more competent compared to male HR directors. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was conducted to test all hypotheses simultaneously, given that the model assumes relations between both mediating variables and the two dependent variables. The analyses were conducted with SPSS AMOS (Arbuckle, 2014). As control variables, gender, age, and country of respondent were included. To estimate the standard errors and the confidence intervals of indirect effects, we performed bootstrapping (10,000 samples and 95% bootstrap confidence intervals). The final model is presented in Figure 3.2. This model shows an acceptable fit (v2 = 786.800; df = 254, v2/df = 3.098; RMSEA = 0.059, CFI = 0.942, and TLI = 0.931), which means the model fits well to the data (Weston & Gore, 2006). As a check, we performed, SEM multigroup analyses (Arbuckle, 2014) on gender and age, and this did not change the results and these control variables are therefore excluded from the reported results. We also added country as a control variable, but we did not have enough cases for most of the countries to perform a reliable multigroup analysis. However, controlling for country also resulted in a fitting model, with only marginal changes on all relevant parameters (RMSEA: 0.065, CFI: 0.89, and TLI: 0.88). Figure 3.2. Structural equation modeling of the key research variables 69 Table 3.2. Direct and indirect effects of perceived competences on influence Standardized effect SE p Perceived competences and influence on traditional issues (TI) Total effect 0.405 0.056 .00 Direct effect 0.325 0.067 .00 Indirect effect 0.080 0.050 .11 Competences  Cooperative CB  TI 0.211 Competences  Competitive CB  TI - 0.134 Perceived competences and influence on innovative issues (InI) Total effect 0.477 0.042 .00 Direct effect 0.301 0.059 .00 Indirect effect 0.176 0.042 .00 Competences  Cooperative CB  InI 0.257 Competences  Competitive CB  InI - 0.080 Most respondents did not specify the organization. For that reason, we were not able to code the sectors in a meaningful way. The model shows all expected relations, thus offering support for H1 (perceived competences are positively related to influence in decision-making on tradition (H1a) and innovative (H1b) issues and H2 (as parts of a conglomerate, cooperative and competitive conflict behavior contribute positively to influence on decision-making on traditional issues (H2a) and innovative issues (H2b). Perceived competences are positively related to cooperative conflict behavior (H3a) and negatively related to competitive conflict behavior (H3b). To test H4, mediation of conflict behaviors on the relation between perceived competences and influence, we explored the multiple direct and indirect effects of perceived competences on influence in greater detail. Table 2 presents the relevant estimated parameters separately for the influence on traditional and innovative issues. The indirect, or mediation, effect for influence on decision-making of traditional issues is not significant (see Table 2). However, when a closer look reveals that opposite mediating effects exist. The positive path from competencies through cooperative conflict behavior is almost eliminated by the negative path through competitive conflict behavior. The joint effect of both indirect effects eliminates the total mediation effect, an example of “net suppression” as described in Zhao, Lynch, and Chen (2010, p 204). In case of the relation between ERs’ competences and innovative issues, the 70 same mechanism is observed; however, in this case the joint effect of both indirect paths remains significant, given the relative strong positive effect through cooperative conflict behavior, compared to the small negative parameter from competitive conflict behavior. Hence, H4 is partly confirmed. 3.4 Discussion The current study focuses on the influence of employee representatives (ERs) on organizational decision-making. In many organizations, ERs negotiate with management on behalf of their coworkers and are engaged in decision-making on a large variety of issues. We investigated the perceptions of HR directors in European organizations, who are the natural counterparts of ERs at the negotiation table. Despite the formal and legal position of ERs in European organizations, their impact on organizational decision-making is disputed. Although their formal power might be substantial, it is to a large extent management who either empowers ERs or minimizes their influence, reducing them in some cases to “toothless tigers” (Elgoibar, 2013). By way of illustration, we present some representative quotes of the HR directors we interviewed, to interpret the quantitative findings. Our study adds six contributions to the knowledge of influence by representatives in decision-making. We conclude this, by addressing possible implications for other agentic roles. ERs’ Perceived Competences are Key to Their Influence in Organizational Decision- Making First of all, this study shows a positive relationship between perceived competences of ERs and their perceived influence on both traditional and innovative issues. This outcome is in line with the theory of bases of power (French & Raven, 1959), underscoring that perceived competence can be seen as expert power (Munduate & Medina, 2017). Expert power is typically linked to specific areas of expertise. Our current study takes a much broader perspective, showing that the general perception of competences is directly related to influence in decision-making on different types of issues. In our study, the assessment of competences resulted in one factor, covering a broad range of expertise and hard and soft skills. This is a strong indication that HR directors make a more holistic evaluation of the competences of ERs. It is noteworthy here to mention that in a previous European study (Munduate et 71 al., 2012), ERs self-perception of competences resulted in two factors: “hard” (e.g., business knowledge) and “soft” skills (e.g., communication). This raises interesting questions about perceptions of expertise power in negotiations and conflict management, comparing self-perceived competence—in terms of Bandura’s theory of selfefficacy (1977)—to the perception by the counterpart, as well as the type of assessments made. HR managers expressed the utmost importance of competent ERs: “ERs need to understand the dynamics of the organizations, finance and change management”; “We need highly competent people on the other side of the table.” Our study shows there is a general concern toward the lack of competences of ERs, as expressed by relative low scores. This lack of competences is reflected in quotes such as “The worst is, when ERs are incompetent and rigid.” HR managers suggested specific trainings for ERs regarding problem solving, leadership skills, ability to influence, negotiation skills, communication skills, general business knowledge, creative sense, sense of responsibility, and initiative. HR directors also explicitly make the connection between ERs’ competences and influence, expressing they tend to minimize their involvement when they perceive lack of competences. Noteworthy, most interviewed HR directors do appreciate competent counterparts and value the system of elected ERs as a model of participative decision-making. Conglomerate Conflict Behavior Contributes to Influence on Decision-Making The current study shows that both competitive and cooperative behaviors contribute positively to ERs influence on decision-making, when these behaviors are taken into account simultaneously. It is worth noticing that this is the perception of management, being the counterpart in the decision-making. Even ERs’ counterpart perceives that both behaviors are contributing to the influence of ERs. This finding confirms the theory of conglomerate conflict behavior (Munduate et al., 1999; Van de Vliert et al., 1995). Cooperative and competitive conflict behavior do not necessarily exclude one another. In organizational decision-making, issues are usually complex, with a diversity of interests at the table. A combination of cooperation and competition appears to contribute most to the influence of ERs. The older dichotomy of competitive or cooperative behavior does not fit well to these types of situations. It is noteworthy that competitive and cooperative conflict behaviors by ERs are negatively related in the 72 perception of HR directors. A previous study among ERs in Europe showed a strong positive relation between forcing and integrating, when ERs reported their own conflict behavior (Elgoibar, 2013). Promoting a combination of cooperative and competitive behaviors when dealing with conflict is a complex challenge, as competitive behavior is usually impacting the perceived competence in a negative way, as we will discuss below. Perceived Competences are Related to ER Conflict Behavior To the best of our knowledge, our study is the first study among HR directors or management to assess competences and conflict behavior by ERs. As expected, the perceptions of competences of ERs are positively related to cooperative conflict behavior by ERs and negatively related to competitive behavior. For HR managers, competence of ERs is strongly related to cooperative behavior. These outcomes underscore previous studies on perceived competence in conflict management. For instance, Gross and Guerrero (2000) and Gross et al. (2004) showed that perceived competence by counterparts is related to cooperative, problem solving behaviors, while the counterpart sees forcing behavior as incompetent. In our study, we observed a paradox. Management recognizes that competitive conflict behavior is beneficial for ERs as it increases their influence. Yet, they see competence as negatively related to this competitive conflict behavior of ERs. This outcome reflects a structural problem in involving employees, and particularly ERs, in organizational decision-making. Involving employees neither imply that employees will agree with the views of management, nor accept their proposals and ideas. By having competent representatives, management will have to face the challenge that this implies “constructive controversy” (Tjosvold, Wong, & Feng Chen, 2014), including competing behavior by representatives who argue and fight for their own views and interests. Although management does recognize this need, it also appears to be ambivalent about it. Conflict Issues Matter We tested the relationships between competences, conflict behavior and influence, both for innovative and traditional issues. First of all, it should be noted that influence in decision-making does differ depending on the issues at stake. Our study 73 shows somewhat more influence of ERs on innovative issues, compared to traditional issues. However, for both types of issues perceived competences are key to gain influence, and also cooperative behavior and competitive behavior are related. Competitive behavior seems to be more related to influence on traditional issues, whereas cooperative behavior seems to be more related to influence on innovative issues. An explanation for this result might be found in the distinction between integration and distribution as parts of negotiation (Lax & Sebenius, 1986; Neale & Bazerman, 1992; Sebenius, 2015). Integration is defined as: “The enlargement of the pie of available resources”; and distribution as: “The claiming of the pie” (Neale & Bazerman, 1992, p. 170). An explanation for the observed differences between the two types of issues might be that traditional issues also are often more distributive in nature, while innovative issues have more integrative potential. Gaining influence in the decision-making for distributive issues might require more competitive behavior in addition to cooperative behavior (Euwema et al., 2003; Lax & Sebenius, 1992). Conglomerate Conflict Behavior Mediates the Relation of Competences and Influence Perceived competence is related to influence, and this relation is partly mediated by conglomerate conflict behavior. A clear mediation effect was observed of influence on innovative issues but not on traditional issues. This is most likely due to a “net-suppression effect,” as the mediation through cooperative behavior is “compensated” by the mediation through competitive behavior. This result might be interpreted in line with our previous reflection on the differences between traditional and innovative issues. Here also, the tension between cooperative and competitive behavior becomes visible. For HR directors, it seems sometimes difficult to appreciate this conglomerate conflict behavior by ERs, as they perceive only cooperative behavior as competent. However, ERs face a constant tension between the interests of the organization and those of its employees (Parker & Slaughter, 1988; Van der Brempt, 2014). By engaging into a partnership with management too strongly, ERs risk losing legitimacy with their colleagues (Rolfsen, 2011). According to Rolfsen, the relationship needs to be at least a little controversial. 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After showing and discussing the results in each country, we present a general picture of the outcomes at European level. The leading research question in this study is, how managers of European organizations perceive the competences, attitudes and behaviors of ERs, how they perceive the relationship between management and ERs, and what their expectations are for the future, as well as their ideas for improvement. The overall study and methods are described more in detail in ‘Promoting social dialogue in European organizations’ (Euwema, Munduate, Elgoibar, Pender, & García, 2015). This book is based on a European study investigating the perceptions of management towards ERs, conducted by the NEIRE group (New Industrial Relations in Europe). To investigate these perceptions the following NEIRE model was developed (Figure 5.1) (Euwema, Garcia, Munduate, Elgoibar, & Pender, 2015). Figure 5.1: NEIRE model for industrial relations in organizations (Euwema et al, 2015) In this chapter we aim to present a summary of good practices for achieving cooperative, innovative and constructive industrial relations, based on the factors included in the NEIRE model. These suggestions, offered by the HR managers from the different countries participating in this study, illustrate the wishes of one side of the table and bring us one step further to better understand the current European industrial relations system and their expectations, concerns, and objectives. A few quotes from our interviews illustrate this: ‘Because of the crisis, we have to lay people off. This doesn’t make the WC or the unions happy, so that makes the current situation difficult. However, we are able to keep a good relationship with them by ensuring that these measures are implemented in a fair way’ (Personnel manager, international bank). ‘We’re both (employers and ERs) aware that we represent different interests. That is clear. But we are also aware that we sit in the same boat and that we have to row 86 together so that the boat does not sink. (…) We have different interests, but we also have similar ones and this is what brings us together: we both fight for a common optimum solution where we all feel taken care of/represented’ (HR Manager, chemical industry). ‘[…] I know that a good WC, a WC that is critical, is able to offer constructive suggestions to find not only a solution but a better solution because they are is in a position to consider views that I am not able to take into consideration due to my position as an HR manager. For example, what factors motivate or demotivate the employees. And for this reason I support this constructive process of decision making, even when it costs a lot of time and can involve stress, because I know that through this process of compromise we will reach the best solution’(HR manager, consumer company). These testimonies illustrate some of the most optimistic and positive views among the interviewed HR managers in the European participating countries. Collaborative attitudes and behaviors, being able to listen to the other side of the table and integrate feedback to improve their future ways of solving conflicts are keys to success in many organizations (Lewicki, Barry & Saunders, 2007). However, there is also a more pessimistic side of the coin, represented in this book where a more competitive culture is shown by both parties and therefore more pessimistic analyses of the social dialogue and conflict management. In both cases, we observed among employers the will to work together on improving this sometimes scratched relation through the improvement of trust, competences, and conflict management styles in order to survive the harsh crisis we are immersed in. The relationship between ERs and managers has never been easy (Hyman, 2005; Martínez-Lucio & Stuart, 2005; Walton & McKersie, 1994). To a large extent, they represent two sides of the negotiation table. And the issues at the table have been traditionally often conflicting (Walton & McKersie, 1994). There are many issues also of shared interest, particularly concerning innovative issues as health and safety, gender equality, and vocational training (Pulignano, Martínez-Lucio & Whittall, 2012). Nevertheless, the strategies of the managerial board attempting to maintain a competitive business model are frequently conflicting the improvement of the workers conditions, particularly in the case of downsizing (Munduate et al., 2012). To overcome these difficulties, the exchange in social dialogue has to become innovative and cooperative (European Commission, 2012). The quotes above also illustrate the potential of cooperation between management and ERs. In contexts where conflicts are unavoidable and even necessary, there is also a need to increase the trust between parties, allowing the exchange of information that leads to agreements that can satisfy all parties involved. Of course, this ideal scenario has not yet been achieved in many cases. We offer below a cross-cultural overview, in order to discuss the results and analyze differences and commonalities in the different European countries. 87 5.2 Methods Procedure and Respondents Data were collected through an online survey in 11 European countries: Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom. In all countries, HR directors and managers, from different sectors and sizes, were invited to participate using different networks in each participating country. We followed random sampling procedures in each country, distributing the surveys among networks, without preselection. We focused on HR directors and HR managers as they deal in most organizations frequently with ERs and are key actors in the negotiations. Overall, 614 HR directors and HR managers completed the survey. The average age of the participants was 43.5 years, with 50% male and 47% female respondents (3% unanswered). The survey and instructions were translated into 10 languages (Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, and Spanish). For Belgium, both Dutch and French surveys were made available. In addition to measuring our key variables, information on participants (age, gender, role, education, years actively in contact with ERs), and organizations (number of employees, economic conditions) was gathered. We also conducted more than 100 interviews with HR directors, which are used to contextualize our results and illustrate our findings. Measures The survey was based on the NEIRE-model. For further description and operationalization of the variables we refer to chapters 3 and 4 in this dissertation, as well as to Euwema, Garcia, et al (2015). The complete survey can be found in Appendix 2. Analyses We conducted Anova-tests to assess the differences in scores between each country and the European mean score (without the specific country). This analysis was aimed to get an overall comparison between the countries. Given the relative low numbers of participants, we did not control for sectors. We furthermore conducted correlational and regression analyses to explore relations between the variables. However, our first aim was to offer descriptive results, as these are lacking in the field. The qualitative outcomes and suggestions based in the interviews, were analyzed in two steps. First, at country level this was generated by the national research coordinators. As a second step we conducted a comparison of these national reports, searching for common factors, and differences. 88 We present the results in two parts. Part 1 offers a mostly descriptive analysis and comparison between countries of the survey outcomes. Part 2 offers the outcomes of the interviews conducted in all countries about good practices and suggestions. This part offers a synthesis of these suggestions. 5.3 Results Part 1: Perceptions of European HR managers about ERs Table 5.1 shows the significant differences (p <.05) between each country and the European mean. Green squares indicate positive results on factors contributing to constructive social dialogue (for example, high ability or low frequency of conflicts). Red squares point out negative results on factors contributing to constructive social dialogue (for example, high competitive conflict management or low level of competences of ERs). White squares indicate no significant difference to Europe. Table 5.1 clearly shows the diversity in industrial relations climates in Europe. We make some additional observations for each country. Belgium is on many aspects comparable to the mean European score, however otherwise the opinion of HR managers is less positive, than average. ERs are seen as been less competent than the European mean. Additionally, a high diversity abound ERs is perceived. The empowerment of ERs is seen below the European average and HR managers show a higher need for control of ERs. They perceive more relational conflict. They furthermore perceive ERs as relatively competitive when it comes to conflict management. In Denmark, in contrast with Belgium, ERs are on most aspects perceived more positively, than European average. The relations seem to be characterized by a relatively high trust between management and ERs and low frequency of conflicts, at task and at relational level. Furthermore, when conflicts do arise, ERs are perceived as cooperative, competent and committed. Estonia shows a similar positive situation, trust between parties, low frequency of conflicts at both levels, higher empowerment and less need for control of managers. ERs are evaluated as more trustworthy, cooperative and competent than the European mean and this seems to be a general pattern, with low diversity among ERs. Please note however, that in Estonia a sharp contrast was observed between large, often multinational companies, and local, small to midsize organizations, in which ERs hardly play a formal role. France, like Belgium, shows overall a more antagonistic image through the eyes of the HR Managers. We observe higher frequency of relationship conflicts related to an industrial relations climate of low trust between managers and ERs. Managers perceive ERs as less committed to the organization and less competent than the European average. 89 Table 5.1. Significant differences between each country and the European mean, red indicating a negative difference, and green indicating a positive difference Country Variable BE DK EE FR GE IT NL PL PT SP UK Industrial Relations in terms of Trust Ability of ERs Benevolence of ERs Integrity of ERs Competencies of ERs Organizational commitment of ERs Diversity in competences of ERs High Low Low Low Low High Empowerment of ERs Managers’ need of control of ERs Task conflict Relationship conflict Cooperative conflict behavior by ERs Competitive conflict beharvior by ERs Conflict efficacy Impact of ERs on traditional issues Impact of ERs on innovative issues Quality of agreements In Germany there appears to be an environment of relative trust and cooperative relationships, where ERs have impact on traditional and innovative decisions related to the codetermination system. Collective agreements inside the organization are also 96 company, as compared with shop stewards who are employed by the unions. Related to that, in small companies where informal dialogue is working, the structure of ERs can be considered as less needed: ‘Simplifying the structure would be better. For example: if we are 49 we don’t need to have this structure but if we are 51 we need 10 members in the workers council!’ (HR Manager, France). Good practice: A more flexible representation structure within the organizations is an attractive model for most HR managers. Efficient relationships are built more at an informal level than at a formal level. c) Unions become more innovative and less ideological Employers in most countries express appreciation for ERs. Nevertheless, there is a sense among employers that unions should be more adaptive to economic developments, also at organizational level. Unions, and from national and sectorial level, also in organizations, could improve the IR climate and their impact on decision making in organizations, if they are less conservative, in the eyes of employers. The doctoral dissertation of Van der Brempt (2014), demonstrates this clearly. In case of WC members are in majority members of union with an ideology of traditional “class conflict”, ERs are perceived as less impactful, and less cooperative, also by the ERs themselves. More impact is perceived when members are in unions with a stronger focus on cooperation with employers. ERs are expected to fight for the interests of the employees; however this is not necessarily in conflict with the interests of the company. This indeed is the perception of most employers, who expect that unions would also take that perspective and that they would consequentially educate ERs in this way. Within Europe, ERs in Germany are perceived to have a relatively high impact. A German manager illustrates this: ‘Traditionally industrial relations can be characterized as constructive, a desire to work together, and I think that 99% of my colleagues and 99% of the workers would back me up on this’. Good practice: take a constructive and innovative approach towards conflict. d) Invest in social dialogue Many employers see the relevance of a structural representation, and invest substantially in realizing this. Paying the part time and full time working hours for representatives, and having staff and facilities at the human resources department engaged in the social dialogue and structural negotiations. Most see this as money well spent, although quite a few feel there could be more efficiency in the formal structures. Investing in social 97 dialogue in diverse ways pays of, particularly when this is framed in a cooperative relation. ‘The role of the ER is important in our organization; we need them to reach good agreements with our employees and trust that they put their best intentions into doing just that’ (HR director, education sector). ‘Social dialogue has to focus on the ‘weakest group’ in terms of explanations and therefore, a sound didactic approach is required. It is not per se the workers who need such explanations – for instance, if it is about a technical problem in our production, then the employees and managers are in need of clarification. So it depends very much on the topic we talk about’ (HR manager, industry). Good practice: Promote social dialogue and involve different groups of workers depending on the topic on the bargaining agenda: e) Invest in informal relations Within each country we see clear differences between organizations, and between sectors. Even though the financial sector has faced dramatic changes, the IR climate is relatively cooperative, compared with industry. Higher education is also more cooperative compared to the industrial sector, generally speaking. How to promote a cooperative industrial relations climate in the organization? A key factor mentioned by many HR managers is to develop good and task-focused informal relations. In Belgium, Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands, management widely uses informal communication prior to officially starting to negotiate in order to circumvent the ‘heavy’ structures and come up with possible solutions beforehand. ‘In informal meetings, employee representatives are more likely to show understanding for topics that would be very difficult to put on the table in formal meetings’. ‘Our informal relationship is certainly better than the formal one. Therefore, I try to actively engage in these informal relationships with the employee representatives as I am convinced that in the long-run, this will also enhance our formal relationship’. Good practice: invest in informal relations. f) Build trust Trust is recognized as key in the relation between management and ERs. Also, clearly trust is regularly lacking, and managers regularly believe that ERs don’t trust them. Trust mostly grows slowly and is associated with long tenures of ERs. Generally, employers manifest the need to be transparent and to promote open communication, together with sensitivity towards employees. Managers refer once again to the need for training to be able to communicate more effectively with ERs about different and complex topics related to organizational dynamics and therefore improve trust between the parties. Some companies report that they carry out a team activity for both 98 management and ERs once a year in order to improve the relationship and establish trust. ‘In order to keep good and trustworthy social relations, we – management and employee representatives together – go on a trip once a year, e.g. to visit one of our plants abroad. For us, it is important to view employee representatives not only in their function, but also as human beings with a personal background’ (HR manager, Belgium). ‘Generally speaking the relations between management and ERs are very cooperative. We respect each other’s position and share open information’ (HR manager, Denmark). Good practice: share information and involve ERs in decision making process. g) Develop competencies of ERs There is a general opinion among employers on the need to professionalize the ERs role and training on technical competencies. The ideological orientation that shapes the profile of ERs in many European countries, such as Spain, is characterized by class struggle and confrontation with management. In this regard, employers point out that it’s important to make the role attractive to competent people, including those who are younger and have a more flexible attitude. Training ERs is regularly seen as responsibility of unions. However, this is sometimes used as excuse for not investing in training by companies. We have seen good practices where employers work together with unions, under the umbrella of unions, respecting their independent role. And in addition also invest in company provided or facilitated training for works councils. ‘In our company we invest in the training of our ERs, we believe that we achieve more innovative and higher quality agreements if we negotiate with competent ERs’ (HR manager, Belgium). ‘The company should provide ERs with training as soon as they got elected’ (HR manager, France). ‘Training in subjects like business management, finance and negotiation skills can give ERs more tools to work with and make them more flexible’ (HR manager, Spain). Good practice: Increase and improve the training for ERs, especially in subjects such as business management and economy and training to improve their communication and negotiation skills. Apart from upgrading their competencies, a more open attitude when negotiating could result from this specialized training. h) Increase attractiveness of the role of ER 99 Many HR directors express concern about the recruitment of competent and motivated ERs. And employers are searching for ways to promote competent, young employees to engage as ER. Interesting options of good practices are mentioned such as: • Reward the role of ER, as part of career management (you cannot become manager unless you have served as ER); • Promote adequate remuneration, especially in large organizations. • Don’t necessarily limit the wages at the level of entry, when ERs start. • Involve ERs for shorter periods or specific project assignments, instead of long year commitment ‘The problem is that TU don’t have successors and highly qualified potential leaders to substitute current ERs’ Good practice: Make the role of ER attractive for young and diverse talent in the organization as part of their career. i) Contribute to willingness to change In terms of attitudes, the HR management particularly desires a higher degree of openness towards change. A number of HR managers describe attitudes as rigid. This is perceived as a problem, especially due to the fact that most of the investigated companies are situated in a highly dynamic environment with constant changes, e.g. in terms of competition. In the view of the HR management, the continuous need to adapt to the external environment can hardly be aligned with the current attitudes of ERs. However, management generally does not want to take responsibility in this regard, e.g. by offering trainings. In addition, management can contribute to willingness to change by involving ERs early in the process, informing them well, and empower them. An HR manager of a university: ‘Training and education for employee representatives is provided by the university. We also take time to regularly clarify difficult files in order to empower them to take decisions. However, this is a tricky issue. It requires a trustworthy climate, otherwise it is perceived as manipulation’. Good practice: providing training and high education. j) Promote constructive conflict management Promoting a constructive management of conflicts is seen as a need by many HR managers. Employers can contribute to that. For example, several of the investigated companies use working groups consisting of employer and ERs to overcome potential conflicts prior to negotiations. Moreover, members of the working groups are mostly 100 selected based on expertise, which means that everyone on the table should in principle have sound knowledge about the topic. This arguably facilitates discussions and probably, leads to good outcomes. Results show that adding employees with expertise to workgroups is a good practice to achieve more constructive and innovative social dialogue. ‘The ERs should have the function of a co-manager, together with management it should be concerned with finding the best solution for the company and therefore WC members need to be orally competent, they need to understand financially how the company works. They need to possess all the competencies required of a co-manager so that they are on the same level as the top management’ (…..). Several HR managers refer explicitly to ‘national action days’, which are seen as a burden, since the workforce normally, participates although there is not necessarily a link to the company. HR managers would like to see more innovative and creative solutions in this respect. According to the HR management, there are ways to avoid participating in such national action days and it is important to find solutions to do so. An HR manager reports: ‘Taking part in national action days means high costs for us, although the strike is mostly not related to the company at all. This should be evitable and we proved twice that it can work. However, we had to engage in concession bargaining and that is unhealthy’. Good practice: train ERs as well as HR managers in principled negotiation, so that both parties focus on exploring the interests instead of staying in the positions. Actions days are not beneficial for managers (the company lose) neither for workers (the worker lose). Therefore, working together on creative solutions that satisfy both parties is a more beneficial alternative. In that, trust and competences are essential at the negotiation table. One hand, trust facilitates information sharing; on the other hand, competences make it possible for ERs to understand the task and the decision to be made. 5.5 Discussion and conclusion There’s no doubt that most European employers recognize the need of constructive social dialogue. They are generally aware of the importance of the role played by ERs and they express the need and wish to work with strong and competent social partners. The negative side of the story is that in general, European managers don’t think ERs are up to their desired standards in certain aspects. For example, managers of many of the participating countries believed that ERs lack key competences, such as financial expertise and organizational change. Also, the impact of ERs in the decision making processes of European organizations is seen as rather poor. Furthermore, numerous managers from different countries expressed that ERs represent less and less of the 101 workforce as a whole, rather being more interested in representing individuals separately and especially backing up the interests of the trade union they are part of. Related to this, it was common that managers would express more problems with external unions than with the actual WC and ERs within the organization. Nevertheless, ERs are regarded as quite cooperative when looking at the big European picture. It should be noted that there are major differences between countries according to the results. We can see more positive results in the Nordic countries (e.g. Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany) and in general those countries that are not so affected by the crisis. In contrast, the countries in the south show more competitive relationship patterns (e.g.: Spain, Portugal, France and Italy). However, clear commonalities can be observed if we focus on the good practices suggested by HR managers. Altogether, employers prefer to negotiate with their own employees, meaning they would appreciate further decentralization. As pointed out before, they want ERs to have an important role in the decision making processes and they would like them to have more impact over the issues discussed inside the organization. Notwithstanding, this would require ERs to show a proactive attitude and offering innovative and interesting proposals. Mmany managers share the perception of ERs being inflexible and showing a confrontational attitude. This also requires skilled and informed ERs. Employers express a desire to work with open minded ERs who are competent and able to think in a strategic way. Additionally, managers state that another requirement would be for ERs to show stronger cohesion among themselves. Conflicts between ERs and the trade unions also don’t help towards the impact of ERs on organizational issues, according to managers. Employers in Europe also share the belief that trust is essential for creating constructive social dialogue, yet the overall situation points out to a lack of trust between social partners in a great number of contexts. Frequently, managers pointed out that the complex structure of employee representation doesn’t help in this sense and they believe a more simple structure would facilitate cooperative relations. To conclude, this study offers a deep exploration about HR managers’ perceptions on the role of ERs. Different perceptions of competences of ERs, trust between parties, and perceived commitment to the organization. These factors impact the amount and type of task and relatioship conflicts they have to face. And we have seen that the conflict behavior by ERs are related to either poorer or better quality of agreements and impact of ERs on decision making. The proposals from HR managers in each country are listed in order to improve social dialogue practices, leading towards more and more efficient participation by ERs in the decision making processes of organizations, as well as towards a higher quality of agreements. Developing cooperative relations between management and ERs includes mutual empowerment. Doing so, parties together can build a Tower of Power, in which decisions taken, optimally meet the interests of all parties. Participants in our study testify that indeed a strong partnership between management and ERs can be such a powerhouse, with high 102 quality of social dialogue. So, we promote to work on an organizational Tower of Power, as the healthiest and fairest way to make decisions in a democratic organizational context. 103 References Bacon, N. & Blyton, P. (2007). 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Journal of Applied Psychology, 80 (2), 271-281. Van der Brempt, O. (2014). Opening the black box of works council effectiveness: The role of group composition, trust and perceived influence. PhD dissertation. University of Antwerp, Belgium. Walton, R.E. & McKersie, R.B. (1994). A behavioral theory of labour negotiations. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill. 105 Chapter 6. Discussion and Conclusions 112 works council, and therefore even in the organizational structure the negotiations take place within a team composed of management and ERs (Van der Brempt, Boone, van Witteloostuijn, & Van den Berg, 2017). Our study shows, that the concepts of task and relationship conflict are meaningful and relevant when investigating negotiations between management and ERs. Furthermore, we notice a strong positive relation between the two types of conflict, and the types of conflict are related with conflict behavior and different team outcomes (see chapter 4). Future research is needed to understand better the conditions under which task and relationship conflict in industrial relations develop, and can be reduced. Also, more recent types of conflict might help to gain a deeper understanding of the conflict dynamics. Particularly process conflict (O'Neill, Allen, & Hastings, 2013), and status conflict (Bendersky & Hays, 2012) might be relevant, as this is closely related to issues of power and trust, which easily come at play in the dynamics between management and ERs, as was discussed in different chapters in this dissertation. Conglomerate Conflict Behavior by ERs Our two empirical studies focus on the conflict behaviors by ERs, as perceived by HR managers, their counterpart in the social dialogue in organizations. This is a next step in a series of studies to investigate conglomerate conflict behavior. A first interesting notion relates to the issue of ‘who is assessing the conflict behavior’. In our study, the HR managers see a clear negative relation between cooperative and competitive conflict behavior by ERs (-.41; see chapters 3 and 4 of this dissertation). This is in clear contrast with the self-perception of ERs. Elgoibar (2013) concludes based on a self-reported study of conflict behavior by ERs: “According to the conflict pattern, this study concludes that forcing and integrating are positively correlated for ERs. This is consistent with the CCB theory (Van de Vliert et al.,1995). This theory states that the combination of behaviors is explained by the mixed-motive situations in conflict.” (Elgoibar,2013, p.41). So, we see that ERs themselves perceive their competitive (forcing) behavior, and integrative (problem solving) behavior as positively related, while HR managers perceive a negative relationship between cooperative and competitive behaviors. Although the measures in both studies are somewhat different, it is important to further understand conglomerate conflict behavior from different 113 perspectives: the self-perception clearly differs from the perception of the counterpart. In most tests of conflict instruments, this perspective is not taken into account. For industrial relations, it is without doubt highly relevant. Both in understanding how conglomerate conflict behavior is perceived by the actor, as by others, might relate to different outcomes. Investigations towards the combination of these perspectives seems a natural next step in research. Clearly, the previous statements that cooperative and competitive conflict behaviors are positively related in conglomerate behavior, should be subject to further investigation. Our assumption would be, that in the eye of the beholder there might be a positive relation, while in the eye of the other party, the same behavior might be perceived as contrasting. 6.4 Practical implications Data from this study concludes that European employers prefer strong counterparts at the table (García et al, 2015; chapter 5 in this PhD). And they want to make high quality agreements that meet the changing developments in the workforce and economy. Employers value a formal structure for social dialogue to make such agreements, also within the organization (Garcia et al, 2015). In the next points, we use our model to highlight interventions to improve constructive conflict management and quality of decision making in organizations. Developing Competencies of ERs Perceived competences are closely related to conflicts, conflict behavior, influence of ERs and the quality of decision making. Therefore, investing in competences of ERs is of great interest, both for unions, ERs, and for employers. There is a general opinion among employers on the need to professionalize the ERs role and the development of both ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ skills. Employers have pointed out that it’s important to make the role attractive to competent people, including those who are young and have a more flexible attitude (Euwema et al, 2015). Investing in the recruitment of competent ERs and the continuous development of competences is a joint interest, and therefore also might be a shared point of action. Employers and unions can team up in this respect. And also at organizational level, management and ERs could invest in cooperative 114 learning (Garcia et al, 2015). This will not only lead to an increase in competences, however also contributes to mutual understanding, less fault lines between management and ERs (Van der Brempt, 2014), and more cooperative relations. Differentiating Task and Relationship Conflicts In our studies, we observed that task and relationship conflict are strongly positively related. As mentioned in chapter 4, it is an essential skill for negotiators, to differentiate between task and relationship conflict. Knowing and recognizing the differences, and dealing with relationship issues in different ways from task conflicts, are important competences, however not easy to develop. Particularly not, when parties are also personally involved, as in the case of ERs. They have a double role, representing the interests of their co-workers, however also have personal interests, and are expected to take the interest of the company also into consideration. Task conflict easily provokes relationship conflict, particularly for people with low self-control (Jimmieson et al, 2017). Interventions can therefore also be directed at the selection of spokespersons, who are capable of differentiating task and relationship conflicts. This might help to also reduce the negative relation between inevitable task conflicts and quality of decision making. Promoting Constructive Conflict Behavior Central to our study is conflict behavior. We have demonstrated that competitive and cooperative conflict behaviors both contribute positively to influence of ERs and to quality of decision making. However, we also have seen that competitive conflict behavior by ERs is perceived mostly negative (less competent) by HR managers. Important to notice furthermore, is that the positive effects of competitive behavior only become visible, when this is seen as part of a conglomerate conflict behavior, where also cooperative behavior is present. More so, cooperative conflict behavior contributes by far more to positive outcomes, compared to competitive behavior. This implicates that both parties, employers and ERs, could benefit from the development of such conglomerate conflict behavior, learning to combine cooperative behavior with competitive aspects, both in time (sequentially), and at the same time (simultaneously). How and when to use what behaviors, is an advanced skill, and highly dependent of the context, conflict issues at stake and personal relations. Therefore, training in this matter 115 need to be contextualized, and can contribute to gain more influence and better outcomes. Focus on Quality of Decision Making through Influence of ERs In our model, we focus on two related outcomes: the influence of ERs on decision making, and the quality of decision making. Our studies show that competences of ERs are an important driver of both outcomes, preventing conflicts, and contributing to constructive conflict behaviors. This is related, as we have seen, to the conflict issues at stake (traditional or innovative). The practical implication of this, is for both ERs and management, to start at the end: what types of decisions need to be made, and how important is the influence of ERs on this decision? Based on this assessment, both parties can bring in the needed expertise, to come to an optimal decision making process. Though this might sound naïve, given the often-conflictive relations, this practice is what we have seen in several of the organizations we investigated. These companies use working groups consisting of the most relevant managers (with expertise) and ERs to solve potential conflicts prior to negotiations. Members of such working groups are typically selected based on their expertise, which means that everyone on the table should in principle have sound knowledge about the topic. This arguably facilitates discussions and contributes to quality of decision making (García et al, 2015). Adding employees with expertise to workgroups is a good practice to achieve more constructive and innovative social dialogue. 6.5 Conclusion This dissertation is about conflict in organizations, how ERs cope with these conflicts and what the effects of this behavior are. We illustrated this with cases from the airline industry. A turbulent sector, where industrial relations are under constant pressure, and change is ongoing. The quality of decision making and their influence in the decisions depends on the competences of the people representing both management and employees, as well as on their conflict behavior. I hope this work contributes to a better understanding of conflict dynamics, its antecedents and consequences. Key issues for the future of work of many employees. They deserve competent representatives. And 116 competent representatives deserve influence in organizational decision making. 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Complex interpersonal conflict behavior: Theoretical frontiers. Hove, England: Psychology Press. 144 Appendix 2. English Survey NEIRE SURVEY FEBRUARY 2013 This survey is part of a European project promoting social innovations in organizations in 11 countries. This questionnaire for HRM directors and managers, focuses on your experiences with and expectations of employee representatives in your organization. Please mark the answer representing best your opinion. Your answers are completely confidential. You can contact us at: [email protected] You and your Organization 1. What is your position in your organization? HRM Director (responsible for all HR activities, directly reporting at the board) HRM Manager (reporting at management and at HR director) HR internal advisor for labor relations Line management …… Other: …… 2. What is the name of your organization? …………….. (OPTIONAL) 3. My organization has branches National European Global 4. How is the organization doing in 2012-2013? Organization is growing Organization is stable Organization is downsizing 5. How many employees are working for you organization (nationally)? 6. Since how long are you working actively with employee representatives? 7. How much of your working time are you involved in contacts with employee representatives and unions? ……. % 8. Your gender o Male o Female 9. Your age ….….. 145 How would you characterize the relation between management and employee representatives in your organization? 1 2 3 4 5 None A very great deal To what extent is there a trusting relation between management and employee representatives? To what extent is there a constructive dialogue between management and the employee representatives? To what extent do employee representatives and management distrust each other? How often do management and employee representatives disagree? To what extent do management and employee representatives disagree about the content of strategic decisions? How frequently are there disagreements about ideas between management and employee representatives? How much personal friction is there between management and employee representatives? How much personality clashes are there between management and employee representatives? How much tension is there between management and employee representatives? How do you perceive the ability, benevolence, and integrity of employee representatives in your company? 1 2 3 4 5 I totally disagree I disagree Neutral I agree I totally agree Employee representatives are capable of performing their job as representatives. Employee representatives are well qualified to perform their role as representatives. Employee representatives look out for what is important for the organization. Employee representatives would not do anything (deliberately) to hurt the organization. Employee representatives have a sense of justice. Employee representatives will stick to their word. I support employee representatives to have influence over issues that are important to the organization. I prefer to keep an eye on what the employee representatives are doing. I see large differences between the employee representatives in my organization in terms of competencies and attitudes. To what extent do employee representatives have impact in your organization on the following subjects? 146 1 2 3 4 5 No impact Little impact Some impact Substantial impact Strong impact Working hours (hours per week, daily working hours, schedule, leave) Pay and incentives (salary, pay increase) Performance targets (performance level, quantity and quality of employees’ work) Training and career development (education, personal development plan) Health and safety Work-Live balance Equality Issues Corporate Social Responsibility Green issues What is the attitude and style of operation by employee representatives in your organisation? 1 2 3 4 5 Never Sometimes Regularly Often Always Employee representatives…. - encourage a “we are in it together” attitude. - seek a solution that will be good for both employees and employer. - treat conflict as a mutual problem of both employer and employees to solve. - work so that both employer and employees get what they want. - demand that the other party agrees with their position. - want the other party to make concessions while not making concessions themselves. - treat conflict as a win-lose contest. - overstate their position to get their way. - are committed to the wellbeing of this organization. - are proud to tell other people that they work for this organization. To what extent do you believe that employee representatives are competent in? 1 2 3 4 5 Very low Somewhat Reasonable Good Excellent Human Resources Management Establishing and maintaining relationships with management 147 Labor law Social skills Business and management Negotiation and conflict management Organizational change and business mergers Stress management Managing complex information (on strategy and change) What is your opinion on characteristics and quality of agreements between management and employee representatives in your organization? Traditional agreements 1 2 3 4 5 Innovative agreements Inflexible agreements 1 2 3 4 5 Flexible agreements Poor quality agreements 1 2 3 4 5 Quality agreements Low commitment High commitment by management 1 2 3 4 5 by management Low commitment High Commitment by employee by employee representatives 1 2 3 4 5 representatives What is your opinion of how management and employee representatives manage conflicts in your organization? 1 2 3 4 5 Never Sometimes Regularly Often Always In our organization management and employee representatives - are effective in managing conflicts. - are dealing with potential conflicts in a constructive way. - maintain good personal relations while solving the conflict issues Open questions: 1. Do unions renew to improve social dialogue? If so, how do they do that? 2. What changes are most important in your organization to improve social dialogue and relations between management and employee representatives? 3. Optional third open question in each partner country 148 If you want to be informed about the results of the study, please fill in your e-mail here: ………………………………………………………………………………………………………. Thank you for your participation.