New Dimensions in Employee Participation and Involvement

 

Voluntary involvement of the employees of the organization in making decisions about the organization and answering the questions of the organization is a hot topic nowadays. However, much attention is being paid to this subject today, and much research has been done on it since the 1990s. In a 1990 study by William Kahn, he highlighted the positive changes that can be made in an employee's psychology through employee participation. In his work, Khan identified three basic dimensions of employee engagement. (Physical engagement, Cognitive engagement, and Emotional engagement). (Kahn produced his paper, Psychological Conditions of Personal Engagement and Disengagement "Academy of Management Journal, December 1990, Vol. 3, no. 4, pp 692-724”). 

Participation Management is the first theory we come across while researching this employee participation and involvement. This Participation Management we can define as a way to get things accomplished by creating an environment where employers are encouraged to become mentally and emotionally involved in problem-solving situations that will contribute to organizational objectives and goals. This definition mention employees are “involved both mentally and emotionally” this mean employee do not just participate or contribute. Involvement is a much larger part it is well loyalty with organization. As I explained earlier, in the past we looked at this participation management or involvement management like a management tool but in present days it is a guiding philosophy because this benefit comes to the organization and employees. For example, an employee's participation in an organization is a decision-making activity of the organization to increase the organization's profit.  It benefits the company and gives the employees an allowance as the profit is high. It also benefits employees.

Several factors affect participatory management. Among them, leadership, skills and abilities of employees, employee value and attitudes are key factors. For example, autocratic leadership don’t like to be involved with the employee in decision making in the organization but other leadership styles can be shared to decide with both together. Another example is employees have good skills or knowledge about organization and decision making it is helpful to owners and leaders to take employment in the organization decision making process.

We can learn about the importance of this participation in the present day from the research report of the 2017 year "The Influence of Respect for Employees on the Relationship between Participative Leadership and Job Satisfaction: A Case Study at University Technology Malaysia". This study, conducted by 93 non-academic staff members at University Technology Malaysia, found that employees are currently motivated by participatory management. But problems arise when this participation is not used properly by management. For example, when an employee to the organization’s decision-making process, attention participants should be paid to the employee's attitudes, knowledge, and experience or companies should provide some training and contact an employee. Otherwise, the decisions taken by the institution will affect the decline of the institution. However, participative management is a double-edged sword and needs to be used with due consideration given to many contingent factors. This has been explained in research articles (Participatory Management In Modern Organizations a Critical Review (Muhammad Zeb Khan & Muhammad Iqbal 2016 - Sarhad University of Science & IT Peshawar, Pakistan). Another thing is that when introducing participatory management to an organization we have to do it with some time and good planning. Because the concept of participatory management fails if there is no time to implement the right plan and plan. For example, in an organization with an authoritarian leader and the majority of its employees do not have much knowledge about the organization, participatory management should be implemented with proper planning and timing.

The next point is that many companies only participated employees in their decision-making process and do not involve them. I explained earlier the difference between participation and involvement. Many researchers in today's world say that employees need to be involved in the organization not only participated (Scanlan and Atherton, 1981).

Within the Sri Lankan context, participatory management does not work in every organization. It operates only in a very small number of organizations. For example "Helakuru" organization and "Virtusa" IT company. The following theory explains why this is often not the case in Sri Lanka.

According to the X and Y theories of participation management, many companies in Sri Lanka have employees with the X Theory. That is, they work in the organization but reluctantly. It is not appropriate to introduce participation & involvement management in an organization with such X employees. In such cases, we should introduce employees with Y theory to the organization. As a result, participation & involvement management companies are often inactive in Sri Lanka.

Companies like "Helakuru" in Sri Lanka often follow the same culture as the world-leading companies like Google and apple because all the employees of these companies belong to Y theory that’s way successful implementation of participation & involvement management in those companies. In other foreign countries, companies involve employees in decision-making through their employee unions. But in Sri Lanka, it takes a different form on all sides. (Emerging trends in employee participation in Sri Lanka 2013/ Shyamali Ranaraja; International Labour Office, Industrial and Employment Relations Department. - Geneva: ILO). This research report explains how the Sri Lankan trade unions and top management are always evolving into conflict. Top management, therefore, does not involve employees in the decision-making process of the organization trade unions. These research four enterprises selected for this study on employee participation management. A study of these four institutions has shown that participation & involvement management is not done properly.

Happily, the younger generation is paying more attention to this employee involvement. Today, young entrepreneurs are emerging and they are more inclined to implement this. Like "Helakuru" I mentioned earlier, Vega Innovations Company is a business built on the ideas of these young entrepreneurs. They carry out this participation & involvement management properly.