Managing to Change?: British Workplaces and the Future of Work

This book presents new and authoritative evidence about change at the workplace, using it to cast light on recent debates about the future of work. The basic questions it poses are whether, and how, British workplaces are responding to the challenge of change, and what are the implications of change both for managers and employees. Using up-to-date information from 2000 workplaces, it provides a realistic basis for envisaging the changes through the first decade of the 21st century. It is accessible to a wide audience of policy makers, managers, professionals, students and academics.

According to social prophets of the past, these should be the times of the workers' paradise, with intellectually stimulating things to do, independence, and flexibility in terms of time and place of employment. What happened? And, more importantly, what will happen? In this report based on 2,000 interviews with UK managers, the authors find several answers. For example, they find that although the use of technology is important, regulations, competition and financial pressures, as well as some management cultural changes are major factors in whether a company will embrace workplace changes considered benefits to employees. Also, factors such as the use of technology are a double-edged sword, in that they could lead to outsourcing, downsizing, and thinking of workers as temporary. They also noted that some more career-minded employees were afforded opportunities within organizations to advance, but that the family- friendly workplace consisted primarily of part-time work. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Michael White founded the Employment Studies Group at the Policy Studies Institute, University of Westminster, where he is now Emeritus Fellow.

Stephen Hill is Principal of Royal Holloway, University of London.

Colin Mills is a Lecturer in sociology and a fellow of Nuffield College, University of Oxford.

Deborah Smeaton is a Research Fellow at the Policy Studies Institute.