Introduction 3
Difference between Employee ‘Involvement’ and Employee ‘Participation’ 4
Employee Involvement 4
Employee Participation 5
The difference between Employee Involvement and Employee Participation 5
Extent to which Employee Involvement provides Employees Influence over Decision-Making within Organisations 7
Employee Involvement Empowering Employees in Decision-Making Process 7
Employee Participation Empowering Employees in Decision-Making Process 11
References 13
Employment Relations and Law - Employee ‘Involvement’ and Employee ‘Participation’
Introduction
These days, every business professional is facing enormous difficulties to manage organisational resources and corporate challenges for keeping the entity viable and sound as a going concern. Apart from managing financial resources, management of human resources or human capital stands as one of the complex issue in the business management all across the world . In this regard, human resource managers refer to two different broad concepts in people management which are employee involvement and employee participation.
With these two important concepts in mind, this research paper is aimed at highlighting the true essence of employee involvement and employee participation. Not only this, it is also important to establish the core differences between these two concepts for bringing about the positive outcome all over the workplace. Apart from this, the manner and extent to which employee involvement and employee participation provide influence to employees in the decision making process is also discussed in succinct detail.
Such an analysis is performed by mentioning examples as well as explanation about employee empowerment. Because the employee influence in decision making is to be discussed with the help of employee involvement and employee participation, it is important to support such examination with the help of employee empowerment. This is followed by important discussion about the reasons for which employee involvement and employee participation are important to managers, employees and organisation as a whole.
Difference between Employee ‘Involvement’ and Employee ‘Participation’
Before highlighting important differences between these two important phrases of human resource management, it is imperative that the Employee ‘Involvement’ and Employee ‘Participation’ must be introduced for understanding. This explanation is done in the following manner:
Employee Involvement
It refers to those employer’s obligations that aim to get actively “involved” in each and every activity carried out within the workplace. It is the responsibility of employers to provide employee with lucrative opportunities to contribute actively in every organizational activity . Employee involvement requires it so because the human capital is considered an important asset in the business management since employees are the people who drive an organisation forward to achieve its corporate goals.
Employees are said to be actively involved in attainment of organisational goals and activities when they are assigned certain tasks for their completion within a specific time period . Such an employee contribution or involvement is appraised or evaluated at regular intervals with the help of different performance appraisal techniques employed by the human resource management department. In short, employee involvement represents a broad range of those activities that are specifically designed to understand, support and optimise employees’ contribution as well as their commitment to its objectives throughout an organisation .
Employee Participation
In contrast to employee involvement, participation refers to those activities and processes that are aimed at providing opportunities to employees so that they could actively participate in the decision-making process. In true sense, employee participation promotes employee empowerment throughout the workplace . One can say that employee participation is all about encouraging individual employees to assume full responsibility of their professional duties and endeavours for carrying out specifically assigned tasks while meeting customers’ requirements in full .
Employee participation stands as one of the important motivational techniques that the internal management of an organisation employs for encouraging all employees to contribute heavily towards the attainment of corporate success. Employee participation also represents an opportunity which employees get to freely express their opinion and share their ideas without any hassle .
Employee participation is said to prevail within an organisation when its internal management expects and appreciates all those employees who share their ideas, contribute actively and express their views while crucial decisions are being made for organisational success. Employee participation, in one form, is a sort of employee involvement which is designed to provide all personnel with an opportunity to influence those decisions and matters that affect their professional responsibilities .
The difference between Employee Involvement and Employee Participation
In this sub-section, the major differences between employee involvement and employee participation are highlighted with sufficient discussion. Employee involvement refers to a situation where the senior management and supervisors designate certain tasks to employees for completion on the basis of an employee’s commitment. When it comes to employee involvement, management can only designate specific activities to their personnel only with their consent and willingness. In contrast, employee participation represents those situations where employees are provided with an opportunity to get involved in the decision-making process. In employee participation, it is the management that welcomes, invites and appreciates sharing of ideas as well as expression of opinion from an employee’s side .
In employee involvement, managers encourage employees to get involved in a collective task or objective achievement activity on behalf of the whole organisational setting. In contrast, employee participation causes the management to welcome any feedback and ideas that employees have. Therefore, the former calls for involving employees in collective achievement process whereas the latter gives employees an opportunity to speak-up and have their say in the decision-making process.
Employee involvement occurs when personnel are actively included for achieving certain common objectives on an individual basis. It is said to prevail in an organisation when the internal management takes an initiative to include or involve all employees in attainment of corporate goals based on their professional pursuits. On the contrary, employee participation concept in human resource management tends to follow a collective process to encourage every employee to join hands with others in every business matter.
The main objective of employee involvement is to provoke the common between management and employees. Its main objectives are to bring forth commitment and employee empowerment. On the other hand, employee participation encourages employees to participate in any organisational activity, particularly in the decision-making process, on a collective basis through encouragement.
Extent to which Employee Involvement provides Employees Influence over Decision-Making within Organisations
This section is aimed at making an important discussion about the extent to which both the concepts of human resource management namely employee involvement and employee participation empowers personnel to have active influence in the decision-making process. In this regard, with each concept, employee empowerment is discussed. The manner in which employee involvement and employee participation empowers every employee with certain authority and responsibility has been demonstrated with suitable examples.
Employee Involvement Empowering Employees in Decision-Making Process
Employee involvement tends to empower employees in decision-making process by encouraging personnel to autonomously or individually contribute to every organisational task in light of their professional requirements. As employee involvement makes employees feel valued, it encourages individual participation in decision-making process when morale increases, productivity is improved, employees think creatively and healthy professional relationships prevail in an organisation .
Because employee involvement considers every organisational member as a unique source of talent and expertise, everyone is encouraged and empowered on an individual basis to help the business meet its corporate objectives. In the decision-making process, every employee is empowered through involvement to participate since individual input is welcomed, appreciated and valued by the internal management.
Through employee involvement, each workplace member is encouraged and empowered in the decision-making process to identify all those obstacles and problems that an organisation faces in achieving its strategic goal and corporate objectives. Employees are empowered in the decision-making process through active individual participation because the internal management makes every tool and authority available to empowered employees to make timely business decisions.
Because the management has some expectation from every organisational member, employees are extensively recognised and encouraged to solve problems while they are empowered in the decision-making process. This concept holds true as employee empowerment is all about encouraging everyone to actively participate in the decision-making process as well as improvement activities through employee involvement.
Employee involvement empowers every member to actively participate in the decision-making process by giving all employees the sense of responsibility and provides every individual core authorities to get involved in problem-solving and respective decision-making process based on everyone’s appropriate hierarchical level. Furthermore, by empowering personnel, employee involvement gets everyone involved in those decision-making activities that affect their job directly.
For example, as far as quality control practices are concerned, employee involvement empowers personnel in the production and service related decision-making process to discuss and select alternatives measures for improving the manner in which goods and services are manufactured as well as the manner in which service is delivered.
When employees are empowered through greater autonomous involvement in those decision-making activities aimed at directly affecting their job, the professional morale improves greatly . For instance, treating employees as a valuable asset to an organisation and welcoming individual participation causes managers to empower each employee through employee involvement in the decision-making process. This, in turn, increases confidence in every employee and significant gains in work productivity could be observed while employees get involved actively in the decision-making process.
Moreover, employee involvement and empowerment increases the rate of loyalty due to which each organisational member remains loyal and gets involved in the decision-making activities for a longer period. The longer an employee is retained by an organisation, greater will be the experience of each member that makes them indispensable to managerial staff and mentor to new personnel in the decision-making process .
When employees are actively involved in organisational activities through individual participation, it is more likely that their work productivity would improve. In this regard, all those employees who are highly productive at work will be empowered and invited by the internal management to get involved in the decision-making process.
This is why, it is said that employee involvement and empowerment tends to increase productivity and participation in decisions-making activities. For example, if employee role is welcomed in the decision-making process through involvement, it is more likely that such an organisational member would feel valued, display increased productivity, assume strong work ethics and enter into healthy relationships with others.
Employee involvement is said to increase in the decision-making process when every member is individually empowered to become self-sufficient and independent which, in turn, increases their work efficiency over time. This notion holds true because through employee involvement, they learn to direct their skills and professional responsibilities without any disturbance and dependence over other managerial staff .
Because of increase in individual employee involvement, team cohesion is promoted all across the workplace with employment of empowerment; such a team-based approach gives an extensive opportunity to every member to actively participate in the decision-making process. As employee involvement gives autonomous authority to each employee and health relationships foster throughout the workplace, it becomes easier for individuals to participate freely and share their views in the decision-making process.
For example, more independence provides confidence to each member to perform all those activities mentioned in the job description without any hassle and interference. Such an employee becomes more informed within the workplace. Managers involved in the decision-making process welcome and appreciate participation by those personnel in the decision-making process.
Employee Participation Empowering Employees in Decision-Making Process
The notion behind employee participation concerns that in order to empower employees in the decision-making process; the internal management of every organisation should transfer decision-making authority to each member through delegation of authority and independence. Because of this core activity, employees will feel valued and tend to have more sense of responsibility. This way, an organisation would be able to retain its key and talented employees for a longer period as driven by greater employee participation in the decision-making process concerning all matters .
For example, when employees are empowered through appreciation of their greater participation, personnel assume a better position to look after business processes and their professional responsibilities. Due to this increased competences, for example, employees are invited to participate in making decision about different organisational matters. Employee participation calls for keeping employees educated and well-informed through extensive training concerning problem-solving strategies. In light of this, internal management tends to delegate some decision-making authority to the most competent employees through empowerment. Employees that are well-informed and extensively equipped with updated skills can identify problems beforehand that increase their chances of increased participation in the decision-making process.
Employee participation gives employees more authority to take part in managerial decision-making since this concept is concerned with encouraging the existing workforce to participate in improving and running the business affairs . For example, employee participation calls for empowering personnel in the decision-making process by recognising opinions, inputs and feedback by all employees on an individual basis. In the decision-making process, employees are empowered through participation when the internal management of an organisation considers employees as a valuable and unique asset while their feedback is highly appreciated.
Employee participation prevails throughout an organisation; personnel are empowered in the decision-making process when the internal management welcomes employee feedback for suggestions and alternative solutions. As an example, employee participation is said to have empowered personnel in the decision-making process when monthly meetings are held where employees’ suggestions are invited as well as reviewed to address a particular business decision. For example, employee participation further empowers employees in the decision-making process when they can freely speak about the problem in meetings and share their ideas as a solution.
Employee empowerment could be observed within the workplace when individual as well as collective participation in the decision-making process could resolve problem quicker than before. For example, employees who are able to act fast on their decisions due to increased participation and empowerment, they do not require other authority’s permission to resolve any issue or address certain business concern. However, while employee participation is highly appreciated in the decision-making process, the senior management of an organisation still has an authority to reject or ignore non-productive solutions and make final decision .
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