Industrial Conflict And Its Impact On Employees’ Productivity

Student Name, Student ID BUSN20019 ASSESSMENT 1.1
1. Title. Industrial conflict and its impact on employees’ productivity – A study of
Queensland companies.
2. Background and problem statement.
Industrial conflicts are among the major issues affecting nearly every contemporary
organisation both locally and internationally (Kochan, Harry C Katz, & Robert B McKersie,
2018). Over the recent years, industrial conflicts have been on the rise among the
Queensland-based companies and existing research results prove that unfairness and
inequalities are the major contributors (Perez, Gray, Jason, & Skitmore, Martin, 2016).
Industrial conflicts must be contained as they can negatively affect these companies in
various ways such as declined workforce productivity, Workplace violence, and financial
crises. Such crises can have devastating effects on a company and its operations and may
lead to a shutdown. Industrial conflicts can also have more adverse effects in the
country’s economy, for instance, they have led to deceleration of trade union density in
Australia (International Labour Organization (ILO), 2020). Industrial conflicts can be caused
by various factors such as; poor working conditions, unfair wage rates and salaries,
misappropriation of resources, any form of discrimination, sexual harassment and other
unethical practices. Industrial conflicts can be easily solved. For instance, these
Queensland companies can create work committees to represent and advocate for both
the workers and employees (Fergus & Anne Gregory, 2017).
3. Data sources and research methodology.
This research will employ qualitative measures and secondary data publicly available in
the Australian Bureau of Statistics that gives industry trends relating to industrial disputes
of different Australian companies based in Queensland. The Australian Bureau of
Statistics gives detailed statistics on the number of disputes that occurred in a given
period, number of employees involved, and working days lost, and is available at the
website: https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mf/6321.0.55.001

Annual reports prepared by various relevant bodies will be used as the primary data
sources. Other useful academic materials like peer-reviewed journal articles addressing
the issue of industrial conflicts will also be used in the data collection process. Keywords
such industrial conflicts, Queensland Companies, workplace disputes among others will
be used to access essential information for the study.
The qualitative data that will be sourced from the materials will be analysed by
developing and applying codes (short phrases or words that will be used to represent
ideas and themes of the topic.
4. Research questions.
 How do industrial conflicts affect the success of Queensland companies?
5. Short literature review.
According to Creighton, Denvir, Johnstone, & McCrystal, (2018), employees are allowed
to take protected industrial action to support claims for a new enterprise agreement
provided that the action is authorized by the Fair Work Commission. Protected industrial
action involves actions such as restriction on the performance or acceptance of work and
failure to attend for work. Stewart, Gahan , McCrystal , & Chapman, (2015) point out
that that the main cause of industrial conflict in Australia has been discrimination and
work-place bullying claims. This is what has led to violence among workers, a rise in
workplace accidents, poor corporate reputations, decline in production levels, employee
turnover, and lack of loyalty amongst employees. However it is possible to settle disputes
and restore sanity in Queensland-based companies (Gramberg, Teicher, & Bamber, 2019).
By allowing employees to be heard and participate in decision-making processes then
they get comfortable and are less likely to quit or go for a strike. (Gramberg, Teicher, &
Bamber, 2019).