Employee Relations: Role of HR and Employers

This report analyzes the role of HR and employers in maintaining employee relations and resolving conflicts. It discusses the unitary and pluralistic frames, trade unionism, and key players in employee relations. It also explores the procedures an organization should follow, key features of employee relations, and the role of negotiation in collective bargaining. The report concludes with recommendations for maintaining a healthy employee-employer relationship.

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EMPLOYEE RELATIONS

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Executive Summary:
The report is about the employee relationship as well as the role of the HR and employers
towards their employees. It has focussed on the diverse angles with which the different
problems of the employees can be resolved as well as point out the several conflicts for which
negotiations are needed. The report is an overall analysis about how the HR department can
bring about several diversified options to give its employees a time of relaxation and boost up
for their best outcome. In fact, the report has designed a draft telling about the human
resource relation with the employees along with the impacts on their working environment.

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Table of Content:
Introduction:..........................................................................................................................................4
Task: 1
1.1 Unitary and pluralistic frames:...................................................................................................5
1.2 Trade unionism effect over employee relations:........................................................................6
1.3 Role of the key players in employee relations:..........................................................................7
Task: 2
2.1 The procedures an organisation (NHS employer) should follow:..............................................9
2.2 Key features of employee relations:........................................................................................10
2.3 Evaluate the effectiveness:.......................................................................................................11
Task: 3
3.1 The role of negotiation in collective bargaining:.....................................................................12
3.2 Assess the impact of the negotiation strategies:.......................................................................13
Conclusion:..........................................................................................................................................16
Reference List:....................................................................................................................................17

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Introduction:
The report has analysed the two main aspects of conflicts such as the Unitarist and
Pluralist with their implication over the working of an organization. Next it had made an
assessment of the trade unionism over the relation with the employees.
Entirely the report has made an overview about how the employee employer
relationship can be maintained healthy with some suggestions making clear that it is the HR
role and the assistance of the employer which can actually bring the best ever result in terms
of working and maintaining a healthy working environment. According to Argenti (2015),
Trade Union has its biggest effect over the employee employer relationship.With their
various enforcements of applications they can actually help the employers to bring the best
consequence from an employee.
By Scott and Lodge (1985), HR has different roles to play to make the perfect team of
workforce and help the company in earning high.

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Task: 1
1.1
The two main aspects of conflicts are:
1) Unitarist: It is defined as a unit which will assume that all the people working in an
organization belongs to a team offering the similar purpose. The entire team will be
having Human Resource Management as their central concern and will share the
common objectives.(Bach and Kessler, 2011).
2) Pluralist: These are the people who make an observation that the managers and the
workers offer common and divergent interests (Hendrix et al. 2012).
Unitarist vs. Pluralist:
According to the definition, both the terms differ between each other in their approach
and definition. The former moves with the concept of working together for the welfare of a
company whereas the latter, that is Pluralism, works with the belief of finding the different
requirements of the employees and acknowledging such by fulfilling their demands.
As per the policy of the ‘Unitarists’, if some conflicts have risen, both the
management and the workforce will seat for a resolution. According to Armstrong and Taylor
(2014) such a meeting with the same agenda is termed as ‘Unitary Outlook’.
On the other hand, ‘Pluralism’ says that everyone is needed to follow a particular
system in an organization. According to them, power gets dispersed finely instead of being
concentrated in a single hand. In fact, they move with the opinion of voicing out individual
queries whereas Unitarism gives option of remaining in an organization as a big family.
The different methodologies for avoidingthe frequently raised industrial disputes include:
1) Communication and consultation with the staff who are involved in the making of
decisions through an employee representative and regular sessions for feedback as
well as workforce meetings (Edmans 2011, p. 621).
2) An effective procedure to exhibit your grievance and been settled and arranged by the
workforce. This are needed to allow all the employees in telling about their concerns
before any kinds of major problems get developed (Amstad et al. 2011, p.152).

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3) No agreements for holding strikes will be given to any employee. To put a stop to
such, the employers will be paying high wages under a suitable working environment
where Unions would not be permitted to take any kinds of industrial actions within
prescribed period (Kim and Rhee, 2011, p. 244).
1.2
Five primary theoretical approaches have been set out for defining the conflict origins and
such are as follows:
a) Unitary
b) Pluralism
c) Radicalism
d) Theory stating about Labour Regulation
e) Dealing of the Transaction of Cost Economics
According to Newsom et al. (2012), the Unitary Perspective is defined as a concept where
all the employees are taken care of and they can share their views as an individual, which is
given enough importance in decision-making of the organization. On the other hand the
Pluralist Theory mentions that every employee is individual and all the individualistic needs
required to be fulfilled by the organization (Smith, 2012).
Industrial Relations:
It primarily focuses on the rules, systems and procedures that are being used by the
employers and the unions for determining rewards for efficient efforts (Van Buren et al.
2011, p. 209). Moreover IR is concerned with the several other employment conditions for
protecting the employed interests as well as the awareness of the employers with a way of
regulating in the similar way (Wilkinson and Fay 2011, p. 74).
According to Christian et al.(2011) employee relation stands as one of the most
comprehensive subjects which will be including all the kinds of aspects that human resource
management offers where each of the employees are needed to be dealt collectively. It will be
covering:
 Welfare of the Employee
 Development of Each Employees

Managers
Relation between Employer and EmployeeEmployees Employer
Employers AssociationHuman resource managementRepresentatives of the Trade Union
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 Remuneration collection of all the employees including their welfare, safety etc.
 Participative Management
1.3
The main people who have their direct involvement with the employee relations have
been shown in the diagram below:
Fig 1: The Key People involved in Employee Relationships
(Source: Kim and Rhee, 2011, p. 266)
Some of the main roles deserving focus while analysing employee relations are the
role played by the manager, human resource officials, employees and the trade unions.
Employees gain the maximum focus here, as all relations in this context revolve around
employees of an organisation. They are the main workers who are responsible for efficiently
functioning towards the stated goals and objectives of organisations. In this respect, the role
of the human resource department is also important, as this department is primarily
responsible for hiring employees, maintaining and looking after their wellbeing and welfare
and engaging in effective employee retention. Their role includes the creation of motivation
for all employees, which further helps them to be committed to the company. The key players
are responsible for creating beneficial channels for communicating with each other.
Moreover, they would be responsible in the achievement of high efficiency level. A human
resource professional plays a vital role in binding all employees together. They should also

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organise various get-togethers and activities to make employees acquainted with each other
as well as with the officials of the organisation. Providing a warm welcome to new
employees is a vital aspect here, which has intense impacts on his performance and
efficiency. The next important role played in this context is by the managers, who are
essentially responsible for managing juniors and subordinates and leading them to desired
objectives. It is the sole responsibility of the managers to ensure his team members to assign
their roles and functions according to their specialities and skills. This increases the overall
output of the organisation. They should also act as role models and guide the entire team.
Managers should also refrain from indulging in biased actions, discriminations and
partialities. This drastically demotivates employees, leading to poor results.
The role of the Trade Union also deserves mention in this context. They are
concerned about the collective bargaining capabilities of employees, their employment terms
and conditions and any conflicts with the management (Kim and Rhee, 2011, p. 267).
Additionally they have the responsibility of regulating a good relation with all the trade
unions and improving the employees’ abilities to influence events inside the workplace
(Morris, 2012). According to Kelly (2012), the Trade Unions act as the voice of grievance
and gratitude towards the employers and with their power of exchanging ideas and views
bring an improvement to the overall conditions of the employment. They take part in decision
making as well as in maintaining and creating a harmony and peace at work (Newsom et al.
2012). With these Unions a rule framework can be created for fair conducts in terms of
maintaining a healthy relationship with the organization.

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Task: 2
2.1
Industrial Conflict or dispute is defined as some disagreements, which take place
between the representatives of trade unions and management. These are serious enough to
include in the industrial actions (Kersley et al. 2013).
Such refers to the perspectives, which are connected with the relationship of the
employment (Christianet al. 2011, p.90). However, it is to be noted that the industrial
conflicts does not contain any kinds of interpersonal conflicts (Becchetti et al. 2012, p.1629).
On the other hand Industrial Action is defined as the measures which the workforce
have adopted for lessening, slowing down or halting of outputs so as to give the management
a pressure during their industrial arguments such as go-slow, overtime ban, strikes, work-to-
rule and so on (Poole, 2013).
The various types of Industrial Conflicts include:
a) The Conflict Nature
b) The Conflict Perspective
c) The Work Conflict
d) Overt and Strike Conflicts
e) Ways of resolving or avoiding of conflicts
The different variations of Industrial Actions include:
a) Picketing
b) Strikes
c) Sit In
d) Go Slow
e) Banning of Overtime
f) Work to Rule
The Conflict Perspective is of two types as discussed earlier:
1) Unitarist
2) Pluralist

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The approaches of avoiding disputes include:
a) Communication as well as consultation with the staffs in taking decision through
regular meetings with the employee representatives as well as making feedback
sessions (Jacksonet al.2013)
b) An effective procedure of showing grievance with which the staffs are allowed to put
their complaints in front of the management agreed by all the other employees (Cina,
2013)
c) No agreements in terms of posing strikes in return for either working conditions or for
low wages. Infact it is the union who would be agreeing not to take any kinds of
actions related to industry for some period of time (Broom et al. 2013)
2.2
The key features have been discussed below:
1: The relations termed ‘employer-employee’ can be considered as the best ever outcomes
as per industry standards. Such a relationship will never be existing without the presence of
both the parties such as the ‘Employees’ and the ‘Employers’ (Becchetti et al. 2012, p. 1629).
The industry will be providing the setup for establishing relationship between the employer
and the employee (Robbins et al. 2012, p. 235). In the particular conflict taken into
consideration in this assessment, maintaining good relationships between employees and
employers are a vital aspect here.
2: Such a kind of bond exists in both the collective as well as individual relationships (Ng
and Feldman, 2012 p. 222). The later, individual relationship implies a relation established
between the employees and the employer. On the other hand, collective relationship implies a
relationship made between the trade unions and the employers along with the State who will
be regulating such relations.
3: The role of the trade unions is important in relation to the specific conflict. They lay
down various rule and regulation, which should be strictly followed by all employees. In this
case, employees are seen to differ in opinions and ideas, leading to conflicting situations.
Thus, trade unions should reinforce specific rules, which should be followed diligently by all
employees to gain a common ideological framework.

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4: The employee employer relationship is multi-dimensional as well as a complex one.
Such a concept will never be limited within the Trade Union to employer relations but it is
more than that. It will be covering unregulated and regulated, individual and institutionalized
relations.
5: The developing and a dynamic concept is the employee-employer relationship which
undergoes changes within the industry circumstances as well as the changing structures. The
entire idea cannot be taken as some static concept. Instead, it stagnates or flourishes and even
decays along with the social and economic institutions, which will have its existence within
the society.
6: The ‘employer-employee’ relationship moves with the sole purpose of maintaining a
pleasant relationship between the labour and the management. In addition, accommodation
remains the prime focus. The people involved get a training of maintaining a harmonious
environment as well as cooperating each other while working as a team.
2.3
Some of the procedures followed to resolve the conflict situation are efficient, whereas
certain others are ineffective. The points are discussed below:
1. Communication and consultation with staff is important, however in most cases they
prove to be inefficient. Decision making through the various employee representation
methods is a tough criteria due to the varying opinions of employees in this crisis.
Thus, such methods prove inappropriate.
2. An effective procedure of grievance, which is actually a way of making complaints in
front of the organization management, is also a common resolving method. Such a
method allows all the staffs to voice out all their concerns in front of the employer,
which are raising issues (Gupta and Kumar, 2012). This is an effective process in this
crisis situation
3. Agreements on no strike for a mentioned period are another method in this respect.
However, such agreements prove to be a failure in this crisis.
4. Single agreements for Union where all the employees will be agreed to are
represented by a single Union. The advantage will be that it would be making simpler

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negotiations for putting prevention to the rivalries taking place in between the
manifold Unions (Sirota and Klein 2013). These mechanisms are useful and effective.
5. Finding of facts: This comes up as soon as you are asking someone about the reviews
of the conflicts as well as the evidence and facts of some situations and observing
inside the group (Dozieret al., 2013). Such pieces of information are vital and prove
useful in solving crises.
6. Conciliation: The third party will have a separate view with the sides having a lot
many disputes to make a reduction of the tensions and henceforth make a
development of the process of resolution enabling a common position to agree by all
(Bak, et al.2013).
7. Mediation: According to Jackson et al., (2013), here the third party will be
participating in the process of negotiation and making attempts for helping the sides
with disputes so as to get some way outs. This is also an effective method that helps in
resolving the current crisis.
Task: 3
3.1
Definition of Collective Bargain:
According to Van De Voorde et al. 2012, p. 392, it is defined as a voluntary
negotiation-taking place between the organization and the worker or the employee, keeping a
view about the terms and conditions and its regulations of employment along with a
collective agreement. The collective bargaining contract is needed to be acceptable as well as
a standard by the management with union membership, union representatives and the
management (Sirota and Klein, 2013). Negotiation is the most important aspect in collective
bargaining. Its role is discussed in brief in relation to the crisis taken into consideration in this
assessment. The negotiation process mainly has four key stages. These are firstly preparation,
the opining, trading and finally agreement. Preparation includes research on the specific case,
which is of utmost importance here. Unless vital information regarding the causal factors of
the crisis is recognised, no efficient solutions can be drawn. Proposals are also important, to
which, others should reply in order to come at a conclusion. In this specific case, such
proposals were forwarded, but were denied immediately. Trading is the next important
aspect, which is also important in this case. Such trading practices are noticed between the

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government and the employees and junior doctors. Agreement is the final stage of the
negotiation process, which is the most important step here. Unless agreements are concluded
upon, crises do not get resolved. Such is also noticed in this crisis, where agreements made
between the government and employees and doctors were not agreed upon leading to
unresolved situations.
3.2
Definition about Negotiation:
It is defined as a kind of conversation between two parties to come to a solution
(Armstrong and Taylor, 2014). This takes place in order to find out a resolution of getting
into a joint agreement about the several views or requirements. It involves making use of
‘persuasion’ so as to make others understand as well as agree the different viewpoints
(Fossum, 2014). People never think in the same way (Purce, 2014). With different levels of
thinking and behaviour under separate circumstances with diverse requirements, negotiation
becomes one of the primary solutions to the ‘conflict’ problems (Kearney and Mareschal,
2014). Therefore, to remain under the same shelter happily at all professional, personal or
business level, disagreements and conflicts are needed to be resolved. Some of the key
negotiating strategies implemented to resolve the crisis taken into consideration here are
stated and discussed in brief. The first strategy is the problem solving approach, which starts
with respect for each other. In this approach, particular perspectives and points of view
should be understood and evaluated. Discussion and conversations should be implemented to
analyse the issue and come at common points of conclusion. Such a strategy is most vital in
the current crisis, as understanding the problem resolves most of the issue. Competing is
another strategy used in the crisis, which seeks some balance at the cost of the other party. To
develop an equitable deal, one party should be compromising, which is absent in the above
case. However, a strong competition is seen between the government, employees, and
doctors. Some of the other negotiating strategies, which could be useful for this crisis, are
compromising, yielding and negotiating through offers.
For negotiation, the skills, which are necessary, are:
 Skills of communication
 Good skills of analytical psychology
 Conflict skills of resolution

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 Assertiveness
 Marketing skills
 Sales skills
Negotiation and its Principles:
A few basic principles are there which can commonly get applied to the several
negotiations types under every situation (Storey, 2014). The basics have been discussed
below:
 In the process of negotiation at least two parties are needed to have their involvement
 Both the parties are required to have at least one common interest which will be
bringing them together
 Generally it is believed that both the parties make negotiation for solving their
differences
 The term negotiation will only have its effect when there is a difference of opinion
Task: 4
4.1: Assessing the influence of the EU on industrial democracy in the UK
Industrial democracy is mainly an arrangement which involves workers making effective
decisions, sharing various responsibilities and authority in their workplace. In major
European countries, the structure of Industrial Democracy often do not match or fit well with
the existing forms of relationship between managers and unions. European Legislation gives
more focus on the prominent role of workers in the decision making process. However,
present EU influences have compelled the practice of mutual and beneficial partner based
relationships, where unions and management works together. Unions are now perceived to
educate management and employees regarding the positive impacts of including workers in
the decision making process.
4.2: Evaluating methods used to gain the participation and involvement of employees in
the decision making process
Some of the most important methods used to include employees in the decision making
process are discussed in brief for a better understanding. Amongst them, the first and most
efficient is the attitude survey, which seeks the views of employees on specific matters and

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concerns such as pay determination, performance management and job evaluation. Another
method is quality circle or improvement group, which is used to solve problems through a
top-down strategy. This strategy tends to ignore lower levels, for which a small group of
volunteers are chosen who speak for these ignored classes of workers. Suggestion scheme is
another method deserving importance here, through which suggestions of employees are
taken into consideration for the improvement of the organisation.
4.3: Assessing the impact of human resource management on employee relations
Human resource management includes both employees and management. When they include
employees in the decision making process, it increases their commitment towards the
company. Such a factor helps in achieving organisational goals. This also leads to job
satisfaction, employee motivation and improves their attitude towards work.

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Conclusion:
Finally, the report has put a conclusion stating that the best organization will contain
the happy employees whose smiles will 100% depend on the behaviour of the employer. It is
infact not the role of the employer only to boost up the employees but the HR, acting as a
mediator between the employer and employee; to implement the best ever plans for cheering
up the employees in giving the company the finest rewards. Implementation of the different
boost up plans will enhance as well as enable the organization in applying the different
methodologies with 100% best result in terms of earning profit. Trade Unions have its effect
whose influence has also put its impact over the condition of the employment.

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