Harry C Katz

What's Ahead for ILR: A Presentation by Dean Harry Katz on Future Plans, Priorities and the Campaign

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:22:40 PDT

In the ILR School's first online webinar, Dean Harry Katz discusses the future of the ILR School

The Decentralization of Collective Bargaining: A Literature Review and Comparative Analysis

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:23 PDT

"The author reviews evidence that the bargaining structure is becoming more decentralized in Sweden, Australia, the former West Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, although In somewhat different degrees and ways from country to country. He then examines the various hypotheses that have been offered to explain the significant trend Shifts In bargaining power, as well as the diversification of corporate and worker Interests, have played a part in this change, he concludes, but work reorganization has been more influential still. He also explores how the roles of central unions and corporate industrial relations staffs are challenged by bargaining structure decentralization, and discusses the research gaps on this subject that need to be filled."

Industrial Relations and Productivity in the U.S. Automobile Industry

Harry C. Katz et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:20 PDT

"In the late 1970s and 1980s intensified international competition in motor vehicle manufacturing and sales was reflected by an increase in the share of the American market captured by imports. Some analysts argued that this increase reflected the low productivity of American automobile producers compared with that of Japanese and other foreign companies. Inflexible work rules or the adversarial nature of labor management relations was often blamed."

Telecommunications 2004: Strategy, HR Practices & Performance - Cornell-Rutgers Telecommunications Project

Rosemary Batt et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:17 PDT

This national benchmarking report of the U.S. telecommunications services industry traces the tumultuous changes in management and workforce practices and performance in the sector over the last 5 years. This is a follow-up report to our 1998 study. At that time, when the industry was booming, we conducted a national survey of establishments in the industry. In 2003, we returned to do a second national survey of the industry, this time in a sector that was recovering from one of the worst recessions in its history.

Training and Workforce Preparedness: Introduction

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:15 PDT

"An introduction to a special, multi-part report on training and workforce preparedness."

How High Performance Human Resource Practices and Workforce Unionization Affect Managerial Pay

Alexander Colvin et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:12 PDT

Using data from a nationally representative sample of telecommunications establishments, this study finds that HR practices and workforce unionization influence managerial pay levels and the ratio of manager-to-worker pay. High performance HR practices, including investment in the skills of the workforce, in computer-based technologies, and in performance-based worker pay practices, are all positively related to managerial pay; but the use of workforce teams, which shift some managerial responsibilities to workers, has the opposite association. High performance HR practices also are associated with lower manager to- worker pay differentials. In addition, workforce unionization is positively associated with managerial pay levels, with worker base pay mediating the relationship between managers' pay and unionization.

The Revitalization of the CWA: Integrating Collective Bargaining, Political Action, and Organizing

Harry C. Katz et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:09 PDT

This case study of the Communications Workers of America (CWA) demonstrates the value of resource dependence and contingency organizational theories—two branches of organization theory, which has most commonly been used to interpret firm behavior—for analyzing union revitalization. Consistent with predictions of those theories, the CWA responded to a changed environment by abandoning strategies that no longer achieved organizational objectives, but retaining and bolstering strategies that continued to be effective. Furthermore, like the organizations analyzed in Jeffrey Pfeffer and Gerald Salancik’s classic exposition of resource dependency theory, in the face of heightened environmental complexity and uncertainty the CWA used political action, growth strategies, and inter-organizational linkages to gain advantage. The CWA conformed to another prediction of contingency theory by using an integration strategy—specifically, by making simultaneous and interactive use of activities in collective bargaining, politics, and organizing—to spur innovation and respond to environmental complexity and uncertainty.

10. The Academic Departments

Harry Katz et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:06 PDT

Includes: Collective Bargaining, Labor Law, and Labor History: The Department of Economic and Social Statistics; Labor Economics and Income Security Department: A Parent Department: Human Resources and Administration; The Organizational Behavior Department; Evolution of the Human Resources and Administration Department.

Telecommunications 2000 Strategy, HR Practices & Performance

Rosemary Batt et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:03 PDT

This report constitutes the first benchmarking survey of business and human resource practices among a nationally representative sample of workplaces in the broadly defined telecommunications industry that includes wireline, wireless, cable, and internet providers. It grows out of a multi-year study of organizational change in the industry, and is based on extensive field study, site visits, interviews, and surveys conducted by research teams at Cornell and Rutgers Universities. Managers at 577 establishments across the country gave generously of their time during a lengthy telephone survey. The study was made possible through a generous grant by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

While this report is based on data collected among workplaces in the U.S., it has implications for the restructuring of the global telecommunications industry. In other research, we have found that the United States has been at the forefront of market deregulation and technology change, but many other countries have followed a similar path and look to the United States as a model for organizational restructuring (Katz 1997). Thus, at least some of the patterns we find here are likely to occur in other countries undergoing similar patterns of deregulation.

Final Report on a Survey of Training and the Restructuring of Work in Large Unionized Firms

Harry C. Katz et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:15:00 PDT

[Excerpt] This report summarizes and analyzes a survey of the training and work restructuring occurring in large unionized firms. This survey provides the most comprehensive answers to date to the following questions for large unionized workplaces: What kinds and amounts of training do workers receive in American firms? How much change occurred in training amounts and types from 1980 to 1990? Why do some firms provide more training than other firms? What is the amount of work reorganization underway in these workplaces and what are the links between work reorganization and training activities? Do firms perceive shortages in adequately trained new hires?

Telecommunications 2004: Business Strategy, HR Practices, and Performance

Rosemary Batt et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:57 PDT

Interest Arbitration, Outcomes, and the Incentive to Bargain

Henry S. Farber et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:54 PDT

"This study develops a model of bargaining that demonstrates that an interest arbitration procedure will encourage negotiated settlements to the extent that risk aversion dominates the preferences of the parties and there is uncertainty regarding the arbitrator's behavior. The authors conclude that it is likely that risk aversion does dominate preferences, but the evidence is not conclusive. They also argue that uncertainty may be reduced over time for various reasons, leading to increased use of arbitration and a convergence between the terms of negotiated and arbitrated agreements."

A Study of Regulatory Intervention in Labor-Management Relations: School Desegregation in Los Angeles, Dade County, and Boston

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:51 PDT

"This article analyzes the interaction between public school desegregation and labor relations in Los Angeles, Dade County, and Boston. First enumerating the ways in which desegregation led to specific changes in either personnel policies or collective bargaining agreements in the three school systems, then providing an evaluation of the performance of the court’s regulatory intervention within labor management relations in the three school systems. After comparing regulatory performance, the factors that influence the observed variations in performance are assessed. A distinction is found between those causal factors that are ‘environmental’ and those that are under the direct control of the parties. The article concludes with a theoretical discussion of the differences that exist between the court’s regulatory intervention in collective bargaining and arbitration."

Industrial Relations in the U.S. Automobile Industry: An Illustration of Increased Decentralization and Diversity

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:48 PDT

"This paper traces the evolution of employment relations in the U.S. auto industry over the post World War II period with particular emphasis on recent developments. There is a strong movement toward growing variation in employment relations within both the assembly and parts sectors of the auto industry. Variation appears both through the spread of more contingent compensation and team systems of work organization. There is also wide variety across plants and industry segments in basic employment systems including low wage, human resource, Japanese-oriented, and joint team-based approaches. Declining unionization is a particularly strong influence in the parts sector although nonunion operations have no spread to the assembly sector. While these trends are well illustrated by developments in the auto industry, they are trends common to other parts of the U.S. economy."

The Restructuring of Industrial Relations in the United States

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:46 PDT

This paper discusses the extent to which a new industrial relations system including greater participation in decision making by workers and unions has diffused in the American economy. The paper uses the automobile as an illustrative case. The paper includes examination of the factors that have limited the diffusion of new industrial relations in the auto industry and elsewhere.

Symposium on Employment Relations Reform in the World Automobile Industry: Introduction

Russell D. Lansbury et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:42 PDT

"The international automobile industry provides a useful basis for examining the degree and nature of change in employment relations under a variety of external conditions. By studying auto firms in various economies, it can be observed how employee relations strategies related to overall governance of the firm, to industry-level structures and institutions, and to the macro-economic and political institutions. These broader institutional arrangements in industrial relations may have a significant effect on how well the industry operates in both the domestic and international marketplace."

Industrial Relations Performance, Economic Performance, and QWL Programs: An Interplant Analysis

Harry C. Katz et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:39 PDT

"This study analyzes the relationship among plant-level measures of industrial relations performance, economic performance, and quality-of-working-life programs. The analysis employs pooled time-series and cross-section data from 18 plants within a division of General Motors for the years 1970-79. The empirical results show strong associations between industrial relations and economic performance measures and limited support for the hypothesis that quality-of-working-life efforts improve both kinds of performance."

Telecommunications 2000: Strategy, HR Practices and Performance

Rosemary Batt et al. — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:36 PDT

The Municipal Budgetary Response to Changing Labor Costs: The Case of San Francisco

Harry C. Katz — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 11:14:33 PDT

"This paper analyzes how expenditures of the city of San Francisco were altered in response to changes in municipal labor costs over the period 1945 through 1976. A hybrid of the "demands" and the "organizational" models of budgeting is used to measure the budgetary response to changes in the relative prices of labor inputs. Descriptive and econometric evidence reveals significant adjustments both among and within departments in reaction to changes in relative labor costs. The empirical evidence demonstrates that the city's budgetary process is guided by simple allocative rules modified by price-responsive adjustments."