MANAGEMENT AND REDUNDANCY: AN ANALYSIS OF PLANNED ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE*
| Author | R. H. Fryer,Roderick Martin |
| Date | 01 March 1970 |
| Published date | 01 March 1970 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.1970.tb00572.x |
MANAGEMENT AND REDUNDANCY:
AN
ANALYSIS
OF
PLANNED
ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE*
RODERICK
MARTINT
AND
R.
H.
FRYER$
THE
rapid pace of recent economic and technological change, with its
resulting fluctuations in labour demand, has stimulated renewed interest
in the last ten years in redundancy, the release of surplus manpower.
Unfortunately, most recent work has consisted of detailed case studies of
particular redundancies, unrelated to each other
or
to wider issues in
industrial sociology-there has been little cumulative research. However,
we are now reaching the point where enough case studies have been done,
or
are under way, for it to be worth attempting to advance generali-
zations about redundancy, if only cautiously; the studies by Hilda Kahn of
the motor car industry, by Dorothy Wedderburn of the aircraft industry
and of railway workshops, and by
J.
E.
T.
Eldridge of the iron and steel
industry, provide
a
reliable if patchy basis
for
attempting to construct
a
general theory of redundancy.l The following paper is an attempt to
stimulate such a discussion by locating the study of redundancy within the
sociological framework of organizational theory, by outlining a ‘bounded
rationality’ approach to its study, and by illustrating the approach from
existing studies and
our
own
research.a We hope that future studies will
incorporate comparable data, and translate our
ad
hoc
statements into
verified propositions.
THE
CASE
STUDY
Although we are concerned with redundancy in general in this paper,
and we intend to publish the findings of our own field-work in full at a
later stage, much of the argument will be based upon our own research,
and it will therefore be helpful to outline the background to our study.
The redundancy we are examining was announced at the beginning of
1967 in a medium sized industrial and market town in the north-west of
We are grateful
to
the Social Science Research Council and the Department of Social
and Administrative Studies,
Oxford,
for their generous
financial
support. We
also
wish
to
thank
the
Company
for their aasistance.
t
University Lecturer in Sociology and Fellow
of
Trinity College, Oxford.
Lecturer
in
Industrial Sociology,
”p”””t
of
Management
Sciences,
University
of
Manchester Institute of Science and
Techno
ogy.
1
H.
Kahn,
Rqkrctudons
of
Red-,
Allen and Unwin, London, 1964;
D.
Wedderburn,
White
collm
Ihhahcy,
Dcplvtmmt
of
AppLed Economka
Occasional
Paper,
Cambridge
University
Press,
1964; D. Wedderburn,
Redundung
and
the
Railruaymsn,
Department
of
Applied
Economics Occasional Paper, Cambridge University
Prou,
1965;
J.
E.
T.
Eldridge, Redundancy
Conflict in
an
Isolated
Steel
Community,
in
J.
E.
T.
Eldridge,
Zndusfrial
Disputes,
Routledge and
Kegan
Paul, London,
1968,
pp. 206-28
a
d.
H.
A.
Simon,
AdminiJtfdw
&h&ur,
2nd edition, The
Free
Press,
Glencoe, 1965, cap. 4
69
70
BRITISH JOURNAL
OF
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS
England, and is still in progress. Declining demand for the
firm’s
durable
consumer goods and increased competition from larger British and
American combines led to
a
defensive merger with
a
larger competitor,
initially with the hope of maintaining production at its former level whilst
rationalizing ancillary services. The hopes were disappointed, and the en-
larged firm embarked upon
a
programme of contraction and consoli-
dation. The major manufacturing processes, together with research and
sales staff, were centralized at the headquarters of the larger company,
a
decision that was influenced by the fact that it was situated in
a
govern-
ment Development Area. Part
of
the plant was transferred, part closed,
and the remainder retained in operation at
a
reduced level. Some
workers were transferred, mainly supervisory, technical and adminis-
trative staff, some were retired early, some were declared redundant,
many left voluntarily, and the remainder were retained.3
I
REDUNDANCY
AS
A
MANAGEMENT
DECISION
Redundancy has hitherto been largely
a
self-contained field of research.
Yet it may be regarded, at least initially, within the wider context of man-
power utilization: the disappearance of a job is the ultimate consequence
of attempts to improve-or of
a
catastrophic failure to improve-man-
power utilization. Attention may thus be focussed upon the causes and
consequences of management decision making, for initiatives regarding
manpower utilization are essentially management initiatives. Although
management and labour may have drawn up jointly
a
prior system
of
rules, the role of trade unions and workers, as commentators upon
productivity bargaining have stressed, is essentially one of respondent
rather than initiator-albeit of respondent with veto power.4 The inter-
action between management goals, knowledge, cultural and structural
constraints and facilities, will determine the composition of the labour
force released onto the market at
a
specific time.
I1
FORMAL,
OBJECTIVE
AND
SUBJECTIVE
RATIONALITY
To facilitate comparative studies by providing
a
bench-mark against
The numbers who left the firm for reasons related to the redundancy between the announce-
ment of the redundancy and our study were:
Redundant: monthly
staff,
87
hourly paid,
196
Voluntary leaven: monthly staff,
75
hourly paid,
206
The period covered is from
1st
February,
1967
to 30th November,
1968
‘
A.
Flanders,
The
Fawlcy
Productivity Agreements,
Faber
&
Faber, London,
1964;
A.
Flanders,
Industrial
Relations:
What
is
wrong with th
System?
Faber
&
Faber, London,
1964.
We begin with
the initial assumption of unilateral rather than bilateral job regulation, but this
is
an
analytical
convenience, not the translation of ideological belief into empirical generalization. Trade union
and work group action is considered later
as
a constraint on management’s ability to achieve
formal rationality.
CJ
A. Fox, ‘Managerial Ideology and Labour Relations’,
British
Journal
of
Industrial
Relations,
Vol.
IV,
No.
3,
November
1966,
pp. 366-78
To continue reading
Request your trial