Question
You have just started a new online course on managing employee relations at your local college. Your line manager has asked you to come up with a short report and summary on the different theories and perspectives on employee relations. In your answer, you may want to consider some reference to prevalent HR journal articles or real-life examples from your workplace
Solution
The workforce is a critical part of the organisation. Notably, employees require a supportive working environment that is characterised by profound communication and relationship with leadership and management. This ensures the individual is motivated and satisfied with the job. Employers, therefore, need to manage workplace relationships to ensure smooth running of the firm’s functions. Employee relations entail the organisational endeavours on managing the relationships between employees and the employer. Good employee relations are described by fairness, trust, engagement, and commitment (CIPD 2020). Some of the issues that affect employee relations are rewards, work-life balance, and health and safety at the workplace. This formative assessment entails an evaluation of the theories of employee relations.
There are four major theories in employee relations. These include Unitarist, Pluralist, Radical, and Marxist.
Unitarist model: This model details the co-dependency of the employees and employers. To unitarist, the firm is characterised as friendly, integrated, and collaborative. However, organisations do not favour trade unions. Unitarists further believe that conflicts at the workplace are not inevitable, especially between employees and managers. Rather the conflict occurrences are perceived as aberrations in a collaboration that is subject to be cooperative (Abbott, 2006). Both managers and employees are perceived to have similar interests in the organisation’s survival. Therefore, whenever there are conflicts, both the managers and the employees may not allow the challenges to extend to the point that the firm is rendered insolvent. Examples of the sources of divisions and conflicts at the workplace are poor communication, inappropriate promotion and recruitment practices, and deviance of the employees.
Pluralist theory: This model is concerned with the processes and functions of the management and the trade unions. It further strengthens the importance of the collective bargain approach……………………………………
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