High-involvement innovation: views from frontline service workers and managers
| Pages | 208-226 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/ER-07-2016-0143 |
| Published date | 12 February 2018 |
| Date | 12 February 2018 |
| Author | Marisa Kay Smith |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Industrial/labour relations,Employment law |
High-involvement innovation:
views from frontline service
workers and managers
Marisa Kay Smith
Department of Strategy and Organisation, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to examine the experience of call centre employees who have been
involved in high-involvement innovation (HII) activities to understand what frontline and managerial
employees think of these involvement activities.
Design/methodology/approach –A qualitative case study approach is utilised, drawing on evidence
from seven UK call centres. Various sources of data are examined, i.e. interviews, observation, call listening
and documentary.
Findings –From the analysis of the testimonies, it is found that job design, the mechanisms and practices as well
as other people’s perceptions of involvement influence the experience of frontline and managerial employees.
The findings highlight that HII has the potential to intensify jobs (both frontline and managerial employees) when
the quantity of ideas submitted becomes a component of the employee performance appraisal system.
Research limitations/implications –This research has shown that the heightened targets used in many
of the cases have reduced the ability of employees to be involved in any innovation activities. What is not
clear from the findings is that if performance measures can be used in a more participative way with
employees so that they can have less time pressure allowing them to become more involved in innovation
activities. Thus, an interesting direction for future research would be to consider the effects of performance
measurement systems in the role they play in facilitating HII activities.
Practical implications –The findings show that HII has the potential to enrich frontline employees’jobs,
making them feel more valued and giving them some variety and challenge in their job. Therefore,
practitioners should approach employee involvement in the innovation process as something potentially
fruitful and not just wasted time away from the phones.
Originality/value –This research is important as it explores what effects these involvement initiatives have
on the employees and managers involved in them. This is valuable since there is no real consensus across
human resource management, labour process and critical management fields resulting in a limited
conceptualisation of the relationship between management practices, employee experiences and the
outcomes. This research makes a contribution through the elaboration of current theory to understand
the complexities and subtleties that exist between the high involvement management practices and the
experience of workers and their managers.
Keywords Employee involvement, Call centres, Employee-driven innovation,
High-involvement innovation
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
The nature of work is changing; organisations are demanding more from their employees.
It is no longer acceptable to turn up and do your job when organisations are looking for
employees to go “above and beyond”to get extra from their employees. The effect of
financialization has exacerbated trends towards “frontline workers being required to
contribute to low level operational decisions”(Thompson, 2013, p. 478). Thompson and
McHugh (2009) highlighted that advocates of this change say that “employees’attitudes
have to move from grudging compliance to high commitment”(p. 216). In various work
spheres, innovation has become the buzzword of the moment and as such managers are
looking for “innovation”from all areas of the organisation. This pursuit of innovation, and
ideas as the nuclei of the innovation process, has primarily been driven by firms in
order to remain competitive in capitalist environments. Consequently, all levels of
employees are being encouraged to generate and submit ideas in order to provide the
Employee Relations
Vol. 40 No. 2, 2018
pp. 208-226
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/ER-07-2016-0143
Received 20 July 2016
Revised 31 May 2017
17 August 2017
Accepted 18 August 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
208
ER
40,2
seeds of innovation for the organisation, in what is branded “high-involvement innovation
(HII)”(Bessant, 2003).
This concept has been developed for organisations where people have been viewed as
“cogs in the machine”, it is therefore interesting to see what effects HII will have in the call
centre context which is referred to as “an assembly line in the head”(Taylor and Bain, 1999).
The difference here is that Bessant has referred to obtaining a “free brain”with “every pair
of hands”which might not be possible when the work is mainly mental as in the case of the
call centre industry. Thus, this research aims to explore the impact HII activities have on
frontline and managerial employees in call centres.
This research is important as it explores what effect these involvement initiatives have
on the employees and managers concerned with them. This is valuable since there is no real
consensus across human resource management, labour process and critical management
fields resulting in a limited conceptualisation of the relationship between management
practices, employee experiences and the outcome. This research makes a contribution
through the elaboration of current theory to understand the complexities and subtleties that
exist between the high involvement management practices and the experience of workers
and their managers.
The research is undertaken using seven comparative case studies looking at innovation
activities in a number of different types of call centre. Interviews, observations and call
listening were done in many of the cases. From the analysis of the testimonies, it would seem
that the job design, the mechanisms and practices as well as other people’s perceptions of
involvement influence the experience of frontline and managerial employees. The findings
also appear to highlight that HII has the potential to intensify jobs (both frontline and
managerial employees) when the quantity of ideas submitted becomes a component of the
employee performance appraisal system.
Background literature
High involvement work practices (HIWP)
It is over 30 years ago that Lawler (1986) coined the term “high involvement management”
to describe practices that included the involvement of employees, since then “high
involvement”practices have developed both conceptually and practically. HIWP have their
roots in the high performance work system (HPWS) literature. However, there is a confusion
in the literature over the various terms used, i.e. participation, involvement, commitment.
This is due to this topic being examined from different theoretical lenses, such as labour
process theory, operations management, human resource management, industrial relations
(Wood and de Menezes, 2011). What is agreed is that high involvement practices are a
dimension of HPWS and so the conceptual definitions of these terms are difficult to separate.
It is not the aim in this paper to open up a debate on the various dimensions and
conceptualisations of HPWS but to highlight that there is a significant overlap between
these concepts which are often used interchangeably in many studies. Boxall and Macky
(2009) stated that HIWP terminology is best suited and connected to understanding HPWS
conceptually as it focusses on work and involvement and is also a less loaded terminology
removing the focus from “performance”from the term HPWS.
Fairly recent quantitative studies have attempted to understand the relationships
between various complex dimensions of HPWS. Examining the UK Workplace Employee
Relations survey: Ramsay et al. (2000) analysed the 1998 survey results and Wood and de
Menezes (2011) analysed the 2004 results to identify the complex and fuzzy relationship
between high involvement management practices and high performing work systems and
organisational outcomes. Ramsay et al. (2000) present some interesting findings with their
analysis providing little support for the assumed relationships that underpin mainstream
theories on HPWS, similarly they have also found little support for the labour process or
209
High-
involvement
innovation
To continue reading
Request your trial