Enhancing the social capital in industrial work teams: results from aparticipatory intervention

摘要

We investigated the effects of an intervention aiming at enhancing four types ofteam-level social capital (bonding, bridging and two types of linking social capital) insix dairy plants with a total of 60 teams. Social capital and work engagement was assessedin baseline and follow-up surveys. The follow-up period was approximately 20 months,comprising an intervention period of 12 months. Intervention effects were assessed bycomparing changes in team-level mean-scores for teams that had developed action plans withteams that had not. Results show that teams that had developed action plans generallyshowed a larger increase in social capital and work engagement than other teams.Differences were statistically significant for linking social capital towards theworkplace as a whole and work engagement. However, effect sizes indicate an effect of theaction plans despite the lack of statistical significance. Moreover, the self-reportedlevel of implementation of the action plans was associated with the size and direction ofthe observed change.