How common Is workplace transformation and who adopts it?

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Citation: Paul Osterman (1994) How common Is workplace transformation and who adopts it?. Industrial and Labor Relations Review 47(2):173-188 (RSS)
Internet Archive Scholar (search for fulltext): How common Is workplace transformation and who adopts it?
Download: http://web.mit.edu/osterman/www/Common.pdf
Tagged: Business (RSS) Business (RSS), Workplace Transformation (RSS), TQM (RSS), Organizational Change (RSS)

Summary

Based on survey data from 694 organizations from a 1992 survey he deployed, Osterman claims that 35% of private industry in the US with 50 or more employees made substantial use of "high-performance work" strategies.

Some factors that Osterman claims affect the likelihood that a given firm had adopted such practices were:

  • being in an internationally competitive product market,
  • having a technology that requires high levels of skill,
  • striving towards a "high touch"/"premium" strategy
  • significant investment in human resources: training, innovative pay systems

Methodological contribution: -Surveying "establishments" (locations) vs. organizations - he hoped this would increase the validity of the data and increase response rate (response rate was 65.5%, previous surveys netted 6% and 32%, with lower data quality)

Theoretical and Practical Relevance

In 1992, many presumed that high-performance work strategies (e.g. TQM, Self-directed work teams) were not being put to widespread, sustained use. Osterman challenges this view.

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