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A Change Strategy for Industrial Relations: When the Old Meets the Future at CP Rail

Change Management / By

This article from 1996 takes a look at CP Rail, and the tremendous pressures for change it was being confronted with. Environmental forces, government policy and the responses of management and labour to their environment had a significant impact on industrial relations policies and practices at CP Rail. The story at CP Rail represents a classic case of an old system of industrial relations finally yielding to overwhelming forces for change.

Employee Involvement, Strategic Management & Human Resources: Exploring the Linkages

Human Resources / By

There has been very little research addressing the relationship between human resource practices and organizational strategy and culture. Among the questions that frequently arise are: what practices have other organizations implemented?, what HRM practices and organizational strategies distinguish successful and unsuccessful organizations?, and what is the impact of strategy and culture on the success of HRM practices and organizational behaviour? The present study is aimed at addressing these questions.

Transforming Workplaces

Labour Relations / By

While Robert McKersie was visiting the Queen's University School of Industrial Relations and the Queen's University Industrial Relations Centre to give the annual Don Wood Lecture in Industrial Relations, Mary Lou Coates took the opportunity to talk with Robert about his views and theories on the future of industrial relations and human resource management.

Work Re-organization in Canada: An Overview of Developments

Organization Development / By

The current restructuring of the Canadian economy is leading to a number of workplace changes, designed both to increase the productivity and competitiveness performance of firms and improve the work environment for employees.  This paper provides a comprehensive overview of work organization through increased employee participation in decision-making. As well, other aspects of workplace change will at times be referred to given the close interrelationships between the different aspects of workplace change.

 

Labour Unions in Canada Today

Labour Relations / By

In spring 1995, Bob White met with Pradeep Kumar and Bryan Downie of the School of Industrial Relations at Queen's University for a conversation on the labour movement in Canada, where it is and where it is going, and on Bob White's vision of the role and future of the movement..

Worker Cooperation and Technical Change

Organization Development / By

This paper explores the relationship between worker cooperation with technical change and international competitiveness. It outlines the reasons why worker cooperation is important, how it is (and is not) obtained, and assesses the likelihood that Canadian companies can achieve it. The conclusions are not entirely pessimistic. While it is often very hard to create a cooperative attitude where there was none before, there have been some remarkable success stories.
 

Overview of Labour Law in Canada

Labour Relations / By

George Adams presented this paper at the 1994 US-Mexico-Canada Conference on Labour Law and Industrial Relations in Washington, DC. According to Adams, Canada's participation in the North American Agreement on Labour Cooperation is important because it encourages us to explore our country's labour laws at both the federal and provincial levels so that we are better equipped to confront the issues we jointly face in a global economic environment.
 

Telecommunting: A Trend Towards the Hoffice

Organization Development / By

Although telecommuting – defined here as working at home using electronic communications technology linked to the employer's central office – has been under way in Canadian organizations to varying degrees for some time, it is only in the last few years that it has been formally implemented in some Canadian companies. There is every indication that telecommuting will become much more prevalent in North America during the next ten years.

Stressful Working Conditions and Union Dissatisfaction

Labour Relations / By

This paper examines the relationship between stressful working conditions and union members' dissatisfaction with their union. Few studies to date have examined this relationship and existing studies report contradictory findings. That is, some studies find that stressful work is associated with satisfaction with the union while other studies find either no relationship or that stressful work is associated with dissatisfaction with the union.

Child Care: Who Should Provide?

Labour Relations / By

With the increase in two earner and single parent families, the availability of good child care services has become a political, economic and social issue. Several elements are important when examining the provisions of child care: the provision of spaces, financing, quality, and responsibility for day-to-day operation. This article explores the four models of child care: the government model, the employer model, the mixed model, and the parent model.

Job Evaluation: A Quest for Gender Neutrality

Human Resources / By

The long debated issue of gender bias in job evaluation systems has become even more important with the advent of pay equity legislation in Ontario. This statute requires the use of a gender-neutral job comparison system to identify and rectify wage discrimination in female-dominated jobs. Unfortunately, this legislation provides very little guidance as to what is meant by a gender-neutral job comparison system. This paper identifies the ingredients of a gender-neutral comparison system.

Developments in Industrial Relations and Human Resource Practices in Canada: An Update from the 1980s

Human Resources / By

This study was undertaken as part of the Structural Change in Canadian Industrial Relations project at the Centre for Industrial Relations, University of Toronto. The Canadian industrial relations system has followed a course of incremental change and adjustment over the past decade that leaves intact the basic institutional framework and relationships among labor, business, and government. Thus, the system, while changing in ways that are similar to employment relations in other industrial nations, has not undergone any dramatic transformation.

Canadian Labour’s Response to Work Reorganization

Labour Relations / By

This paper was presented at the Annual Conference of the Canadian Industrial Relations Association, Carleton University, Ottawa on June 3-5, 1993. The paper is based on a larger study of the role of unions and collective bargaining in human resource innovations undertaken by the author as a part of a research project on Human Resource Management in Canada under the auspices of Industrial Relations Centre, Queen's University.

Freedom of Religion in the Workplace: Legislative Protection

Labour Relations / By

Current Human Rights legislation protects workers from discrimination on a number of grounds including religion. This paper looks at the history of legislation prohibiting discrimination and reviews current legislation to determine how freedom of religion is protected in the workplace. Precedents from discrimination cases are outlined to give an indication of how cases are currently being settled. Finally, the paper looks at cases concerning freedom of religion in the workplace over the past fifteen years to assess whether the legislation is in use and is effective.

Is There a Future for the Canadian Labour Movement?

Labour Relations / By

The labour movement in Canada has been under tremendous pressure in recent years. Intense global competition, economic integration and restructuring, trade liberalization initiatives such as the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement, rapid and pervasive technological change, the growing service economy and dramatic changes in the growth and composition of the workforce have ushered in a drastically altered economic, labour market and public policy environment within which unions operate.

Who Gains from Worker Participation?

Human Resources / By

There is a growing interest in participative management as a way to overcome rigidities in labour-management relations. This implies a higher degree of self-supervision, flatter hierarchies and blurring of the lines dividing workers and managers. In other words, participative management entails a restructuring of the power relation between labour and management. This paper addresses this issue.

Facilitating Organizational Commitment Through Human Resource Practices

Organization Development / By

High organizational commitment has consistently been associated with lower employee turnover, decreased absenteeism, longer job tenure, and in several studies, enhanced performance. These aspects of employee behaviour are of strategic concern to organizations. This paper brings the extensive academic knowledge of organizational commitment together in one essay for use by organizational practitioners.

Unions and Workplace Smoking Policy

Labour Relations / By

Do you remember when workers could smoke in the workplace? This article was written in 1992, at a time when concern over environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) was being identified as a leading occupational health hazard and policy makers were instituting smoking restrictions and bans in workplaces.

Negotiation: Why Do We Do It Like We Do?

Labour Relations / By

As a labour lawyer and a professor of labour law, George Adams mediated many disputes over the years. As a new member of the Ontario Court of Justice, he shared his views on the negotiation process with respect to the competitive challenges facing the workplace. He in presented this paper in May 1992 at the Annual Spring Industrial Relations Seminar. 

Labour Law Reform: Radical Departure or Natural Evolution?

Labour Relations / By

The current proposals to amend Ontario's collective bargaining laws have given rise to a loud, and frequently intemperate, debate that has not only divided Ontario's labour relations community but has now moved to the centre of Ontario's political stage. Underlying this debate is a realignment of the relative political influence of business and labour that came with the NDP's election victory in the fall of 1990.

Canadian Industrial Relations in the Year 2000: Towards a New Order?

Labour Relations / By

Canada's industrial relations system faces a rapidly changing external environment in this last decade of the 20th century. Significant and far-reaching changes in our economic, political and legal environment are already being felt and even more changes appear to be on the horizon. The question squarely facing Canada's industrial relations community is the extent to which these important changes will reshape our existing industrial relations order.
 

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