The Effects of Participatory Human Resource Management Practices on Productivity and Quality in U.S. and Japanese Firms

摘要

A consistent premise of total quality (TQ) initiatives is that businesses must combine TQ initiatives with a new way of managing, utilizing, and involving each business's work force. A majority of U.S. establishments now have attempted some form of employee participation, quality circle, or other similar type of employee involvement initiative (Osterman, 1994). Yet, these various forms of employee involvement which are integral parts of TQ programs are often abandoned within a few years of their adoption with little to show in terms of improved business performance (Drago, 1988; Lawler, Mohrman, and Ledford, 1992). Our work focuses on providing quantitative evidence on the effectiveness of EI programs, on the conditions under which they are or are not effective, and on the reasons why plants may or may not adopt EI programs.