Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of Contributors
- 1 What Works at Work: Overview and Assessment
- 2 Diffusion and Performance of Modular Production in the U.S. Apparel Industry
- 3 Modular Production: Improving Performance in the Apparel Industry
- 4 The Participatory Bureaucracy: A Structural Explanation for the Effects of Group-Based Employee Participation Programs on Productivity in the Machined Products Sector
- 5 Methodological Issues in Cross-sectional and Panel Estimates of the Link between Human Resource Strategies and Firm Performance
- 6 The Adoption of High-Involvement Work Practices
- 7 The Effects of Total Quality Management on Corporate Performance: An Empirical Investigation
- 8 Implementing Effective Total Quality Management Programs and Financial Performance: A Synthesis of Evidence from Quality Award Winners
- 9 Public Policy Implications
- Index
6 - The Adoption of High-Involvement Work Practices
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 February 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- List of Contributors
- 1 What Works at Work: Overview and Assessment
- 2 Diffusion and Performance of Modular Production in the U.S. Apparel Industry
- 3 Modular Production: Improving Performance in the Apparel Industry
- 4 The Participatory Bureaucracy: A Structural Explanation for the Effects of Group-Based Employee Participation Programs on Productivity in the Machined Products Sector
- 5 Methodological Issues in Cross-sectional and Panel Estimates of the Link between Human Resource Strategies and Firm Performance
- 6 The Adoption of High-Involvement Work Practices
- 7 The Effects of Total Quality Management on Corporate Performance: An Empirical Investigation
- 8 Implementing Effective Total Quality Management Programs and Financial Performance: A Synthesis of Evidence from Quality Award Winners
- 9 Public Policy Implications
- Index
Summary
There is a striking paradox in research on high-involvement work practices. A growing body of literature establishes strong empirical links between such practices and improved economic performance, and reveals that these practices are most effective as part of a larger “bundle,” or system, that includes complementary human resource (HR) practices (Arthur, 1992; Batt, 1995; Huselid, 1995; Ichniowski & Kochan, 1995; Ichniowski et al., 1994; Kochan & Osterman, 1990; MacDuffie, 1995a). Thus, from the perspective of economic rationality, one should expect high-involvement work practices to be widely used. Yet many argue that the imitation, learning, and diffusion of these practices have been slow and sporadic (Ichniowski & Shaw, 1995; Kochan & Osterman, 1994; Osterman, 1994; Pfeffer, 1994). The goal of this chapter is to explain why individual work practices (as well as bundles of high-involvement work practices and complementary HR practices) are adopted more rapidly by some establishments than by others.
We develop a theoretical framework that draws on evolutionary economics, innovation, and strategy literature to identify three factors driving adoption: (1) the presence of complementary HR practices and technology; (2) low levels of economic performance achieved with current work practices; and (3) organizational characteristics and behaviors that reduce the cost of introducing new work practices. Longitudinal data from the international auto industry enable us to test several hypotheses about these factors.
We examine the adoption of high-involvement work practices by analyzing data gathered in two rounds of surveys (1989 and 1993–1994) from 43 automobile assembly plants located around the world (MacDuffie & Pil, 1996). Although the use of such practices increased considerably over this five-year period, the rate of increase varied dramatically from plant to plant.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The American WorkplaceSkills, Pay, and Employment Involvement, pp. 137 - 171Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2000
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