Scenario
Do Quest is a privately owned company that has accepted union recognition for its employees. It produces high-end adventure clothing and has seen a consistent increase in growth during and post the pandemic. You have recently taken on the role of Employee Relations manager at Go Quest and at your first meeting with the Directors they explain that they are keen to draw on your knowledge and experience of working in the public sector within employment relationship management as this is an area that the company management seeks to improve. They have asked you to produce a report for senior and line managers that provides them with knowledge and understanding of approaches to employee voice and how these can be best used to foster engagement, performance and better working lives. Additionally, they need to understand the different forms of workplace conflict behaviour; disputes and sanctions; the role and main provisions of collective employment law; third party interventions; and managing discipline and grievance resolution.
To complete both sections of the report, you should provide written responses to each of the 16 points below, making appropriate use of academic theory, case and statutory law, research and good practical examples to substantiate your response and illustrate key points.
Section One
The first section of the report should provide knowledge and awareness to Go Quest’s management on approaches that might be adopted to facilitate direct and indirect forms of employee decision-making processes and support engagement, performance and better working lives.
To assist the reader, please make use of headings and assessment criteria references to signpost the assessment criteria being addressed.
The points that need to be addressed in the first section are:
1) Review emerging developments to inform approaches to employee voice and engagement. (AC 1.1)
2) Differentiate between employee involvement and employee participation and how it builds relationships. (AC 1.2)
3) Assess three employee voice tools and two approaches that might be used to drive employee engagement. (AC 1.3)
4) Critically evaluate the interrelationships between employee voice and organisational performance. (AC 1.4)
5) Explain the concept of better working lives and how this can be designed. (AC 1.5)
Section Two
This section of the report needs to provide understanding to Go Quest’s managers on the different forms of conflict behaviour and dispute resolution and how to manage performance, disciplinary and grievance matters lawfully. You need to:
1) Distinguish between organisational conflict and misbehaviour, and between informal and formal conflict. (AC 2.1)
2) Distinguish between official and unofficial employee action. (AC 2.2)
3) Assess emerging trends in the types of conflict and industrial sanctions. (AC 2.3)
4) Distinguish between third-party conciliation, mediation and arbitration. (AC 2.4)
5) Explain the principles of legislation relating to unfair dismissal in respect of capability and misconduct issues. (AC 3.1)
6) Analyse key causes of employee grievances. (AC 3.2)
7) Explain the skills required for effective grievance and discipline-handling procedures. (AC 3.3)
8) Advise on the importance of handling grievances effectively. (AC 3.4)
9) Explain the main provisions of collective employment law. (AC 4.1)
10) Compare the types of employee bodies, union and non-union forms of employee representation. (AC 4.2)
11) Evaluate the purpose of collective bargaining and how it works. (AC 4.3)
