Employee Relations Audits

C. Jennings, W. E. J. McCarthy, R. Undy

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351851619
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

This book, first published in 1990, is a practical manual which presents guidance on how to carry out and evaluate an employee relations audit. This title also provides audits for five key areas of employee relations, including communication and consultation, equality of opportunity and disciplinary matters. This book should be of interest to lecturers, post-graduate students and practitioners of management, personnel, employee relations and industrial relations.

Part one

Stages in the audit process

Stages in the audit process

This section explains the various stages in implementing an employee relations audit. You should read this section carefully before starting your audit in order to understand fully the various elements in an audit and to plan for them. There are seven stages to consider:

Stage 1:	decide which aspect of ER is to be audited and specify your objectives;
Stage 2:	decide who is to participate;
Stage 3:	develop the questionnaire;
Stage 4:	refine and test the questionnaire;
Stage 5:	brief participants and distribute the questionnaires;
Stage 6:	summarize information from completed questionnaires;
Stage 7:	analyse the findings and draw up recommendations.

It is very important that you follow each stage rigorously; avoid the temptation to cut corners, otherwise you are likely to fail to achieve your objectives.

Stage 1: decide which aspect of ER is to be audited and specify your objectives

At the outset you will have to decide which aspect of employee relations is to be the focus of your audit. This manual contains reference material for the following:

• communication and consultation (Audit 1)

• health and safety at work (Audit 2)

• equality of opportunity (Audit 3)

• trade union representation and employee grievances (Audit 4)

• disciplinary matters (Audit 5)

If you decide to audit some aspect of employee relations not listed above, then you will have to develop your own questionnaire material. However, the method outlined in this section will still be valid.

Once you have decided what is to be audited, you will then need to specify your objectives. It is likely that you will be seeking sensitive information from participants and you will also raise expectations concerning action over the findings. Hence, it is very important that you think through carefully what you are setting out to achieve in your audit. Your objectives should not only have a direct influence on the content of your questionnaire(s) but should also assist in ‘selling’ the audit to those whose co-operation you need for it to be a success.

In practice, objectives can relate to the identification of problems, the effectiveness of current policies, attitudes, or training needs. Examples of audit objectives are included with each set of questions.

Note: Clearly defined objectives are essential to give direction to an ER audit.

Stage 2: decide who is to participate

At this stage there are two key questions to be tackled: Who is to complete a questionnaire? and Who is to be consulted? Each of these will be considered in turn.

Who is to complete a questionnaire?

This decision is likely to be influenced by your audit objectives. For example, if you are seeking to evaluate the effectiveness of your channels of management-employee communications, then clearly members of management and employees would both have to supply information if an accurate evaluation is to be carried out. On the other hand, if your prime objective is to determine management training needs in the handling of disciplinary matters, then it may be that managers and supervisors alone should complete questionnaires. It is important to note that if you decide that managers and employees will be asked to complete questionnaires, then you should be prepared to develop two separate questionnaires. Attempts to develop a single questionnaire for these two groups will result in key management and employee questions being omitted and create problems in the wording of questions that are included.

Once it has been decided whether managers and/or employees are to complete questionnaires then it will be necessary to decide whether all members of the relevant groups will participate or whether sampling will be used. Although it may not be difficult to determine a sample size which will produce statistically sound findings, there are strong arguments for 100 per cent coverage within the relevant groups. If, for example, a 33 per cent sample is used in a communications audit it will be necessary to explain to individuals why they have been included or excluded. Also, if the findings are not very palatable to some members of senior management, they might be tempted to discredit them by stressing that the findings are only representative of the views of a minority. Further, it will prove particularly valuable, when seeking commitment to implement changes arising from the audit, to have previously involved all those affected by the changes in the audit, hence giving them ownership of the findings.

However, it is acknowledged that for large organizations it may be necessary to reduce the ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• Part one: Stages in the audit process
• Part two: The audits
• Index