Supporting Good Practice in Managing Employee Relations
Employment relationship – defn. “the relationship that exists between employers and employees in the workplace”
When an employee starts a new company there may be many internal and external factors that impact on the employment relationship. One external factor is the state of the economy, in recent years the economy has experienced a recession. This has impacted businesses in many ways; e.g. redundancies - less capital means companies can no longer afford to keep all staff.
A second external factor is the social impact. For example the age of retirement has increased which has resulted in an older retained workforce - the retention of specialised skills and knowledge of the company will be a positive impact on the employment relationship.
However, there are also internal factors that impact the employment relationship. Firstly employee participation. An example of this is to give employees a ‘voice’ by distributing employee engagement surveys, which allows employees to express their views on the company and motivates employees when actions are taken from their opinions.
Furthermore control of performance can also be a vital internal factor. Managing employee’s performances in the process of appraisals can motivate staff to continue reaching individual objectives which contribute to company goals.
Three types of employment status and three reasons why it is important to clearly determine an individual’s employment status are: -
* ‘Self Employment’ whereby a person will work for themselves rather than an employer. It is important to make this definition as the company will not be accountable to make NI contributions or pay any employment tax on behalf of this type of worker.
* A second employment status is a ‘worker’ which includes individuals working under a variety of contracts. It is important to establish this type of worker as they will be entitled to the core legal rights, they will be entitled to receive the National Minimum
When an employee starts a new company there may be many internal and external factors that impact on the employment relationship. One external factor is the state of the economy, in recent years the economy has experienced a recession. This has impacted businesses in many ways; e.g. redundancies - less capital means companies can no longer afford to keep all staff.
A second external factor is the social impact. For example the age of retirement has increased which has resulted in an older retained workforce - the retention of specialised skills and knowledge of the company will be a positive impact on the employment relationship.
However, there are also internal factors that impact the employment relationship. Firstly employee participation. An example of this is to give employees a ‘voice’ by distributing employee engagement surveys, which allows employees to express their views on the company and motivates employees when actions are taken from their opinions.
Furthermore control of performance can also be a vital internal factor. Managing employee’s performances in the process of appraisals can motivate staff to continue reaching individual objectives which contribute to company goals.
Three types of employment status and three reasons why it is important to clearly determine an individual’s employment status are: -
* ‘Self Employment’ whereby a person will work for themselves rather than an employer. It is important to make this definition as the company will not be accountable to make NI contributions or pay any employment tax on behalf of this type of worker.
* A second employment status is a ‘worker’ which includes individuals working under a variety of contracts. It is important to establish this type of worker as they will be entitled to the core legal rights, they will be entitled to receive the National Minimum
Bibliography: CIPD (April 2011) Employment Law FAQ [Online] Available from: http://www.cipd.co.uk/hr-resources/employment-law-faqs Accessed 27.03.2012 CIPD (April 2005) Change Agenda [Online] Available from: McFarlane Shore, L. & Tetrick, L.E. (1994). The psychological contract as an explanatory framework in the employment relationship, In: Cooper, C.L and Rousseau, D.M. Trends in organisational behaviour, Vol, 1, John Wiley & Sons, London. Rousseau, D.M. (1989) New hire perspectives of their own and their employer’s obligations: A study of psychological contracts, in Journal of Organisational Behaviour 11. Smith (2009) Why Equal Pay is still Important [Online] Available from: http://www.americanprogress.org Armstrong M (2003) A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice, 9th edition, Kogan Page, London CIPD – [Online]