Page 176 - DMGT106_MANAGING_HUMAN_ELEMENTS_AT_WORK

Managing Human Element at Work

Notes and innovation, to motivate workers, and ensure that systems and procedures are
established with a view to promoting communication and cooperation.
• Two-way communication and small group activities can promote cooperation,
trust, intimacy, consensus-building, and generally improve the human relations
climate within the enterprise.
• Productivity improvement, which is possible in the long term only in an
environment which contains the elements referred to in (ii) above enables
enterprises (and ultimately a country) to remain or become competitive.

There are several International Labour Standards of the ILO which seek to give effect to the
elements of consultation, cooperation and communication. As regards consultation and
cooperation, the Cooperation at the Level of the Undertaking Recommendation 1952
(No. 94) contemplates the promotion of consultation in the enterprise on matters of mutual
concern not covered in collective bargaining or other machinery concerned with the
prescription of terms and conditions of employment. The Recommendation encourages such
consultation through voluntary agreements between the parties, and provides for consultation
and cooperation to be promoted through laws which establish appropriate bodies for this
purpose.

As regards communication, the communications within the Undertaking Recommendation
1967 (No. 129) prescribes a communications policy for an enterprise. It underlines the
importance, in the interests of both management and workers, of mutual trust and
understanding which can be generated through an exchange of information. It contemplates
the adoption by management of an effective communications policy, but only after
consultation with representatives of workers. The policy adopted should ensure that
information is provided and that consultation takes place, before management decisions are
made on matters of importance, provided the disclosure does not prejudice either party.
Among the main elements of a communications policy should be the following:
“Unions and employers have long been aware of the importance of information sharing in
an industrial relations system after bitter and protracted strikes in the forties and early
fifties, both management and labour made concerted efforts to restore industrial peace and
to develop a stable industrial relations system these efforts led to the development of key
aspects of the modern Japanese industrial relations system, including the joint consultation,
a corner-stone of labour management information sharing.”
Japanese joint consultation systems had their origins in the 1950s when it was promoted by
the Japan Productivity Centre. It is estimated that by 1990 about 84 per cent of unionized
enterprises had set up joint consultation schemes, and 44 per cent of non-unionized ones had
joint consultation arrangements. These mechanisms, which are an aspect of two-way
communication, deal with a variety of issues. In both union and non-union establishments
the most common subjects which come within consultation are working conditions, working
hours, leave, safety and health, welfare and cultural activities, bonus, pension and retirement
payments, work scheduling, education and training, recruitment; transfers, lay off, job
assignment. There are also a range of management issues which come within joint consultation,
but on these matters management merely provides information and explanations. These
management issues include business plans and policies, introduction of new technology,
organizational changes, and production and sales plans. Many establishments have two
levels of communication. Quality circles and shopfloor committees represent the mechanisms
at the shopfloor level, and joint consultation committees represent the mechanisms at the
corporate level. These committees supplement collective bargaining in the sense that they
provide the forum for information-sharing prior to wage negotiations.
One of the important characteristics of joint consultation in Japan is that collective bargaining
and joint consultation serve different objectives and are therefore not in conflict with each

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