HRM and employee involvement in Britain and Sweden:a comparative study

This paper seeks to examine employee involvement in a comparative context against a background of increased HRM practices, using Poole's framework of power in workers' participation as a tool of analysis. Since the 1980s the concept of employee involvement has assumed a position of central importance in human resource management and the aim of this research was to examine these contentions in a British bank, which has consciously adopted HRM policies over the past six years, and a Swedish bank, which could be said to be typical of the Swedish service sector in its employee relations practices. From the research a picture emerged in which the Swedish work-force felt that they had a greater degree of involvement in their workplace (micro level) than their British counterparts. Of particular significance was that, at organizational level (macro level), the Swedish work-force felt as much estrangement as the British work-force from participation and involvement on strategic issues despite the existence of co-determinational structures. Explanations of these findings, it is suggested, lie in an understanding of the wider convergent and divergent forces such as societal structures and economic changes influencing corporate life.