The propensity for employee participation by electrical and mechanical trades in the construction industry

Employee participation has attracted scant attention in the construction industry, yet the experience of firms in many other industries indicate that considerable benefits in terms of improved quality, lower production costs and greater competitiveness can be achieved from formal employee participation. Studies show that there are numerous examples of employee participation, in a variety of forms, being used successfully in other industries, but none in construction - why? One possible explanation is that some fundamental aspects of the construction industry prevent the application of participation. This paper reports on research that explored whether a propensity for participation exists in the construction industry, and if so, how significant is it. The research established a conceptual model of the factors that contribute towards participation in any given workplace and established the relationship between the main variables and their constituent subvariables and subsubvariables. The model was used to determine the propensity for participation in the construction industry. The results revealed that a significant amount of informal (direct) participation already occurs in the construction industry, and a strong propensity for direct participation exists. Workers are shown to have a strong desire to participate and to have significant potential for participation in defining and controlling their everyday work (defined as the 'task'). The contextual variables of'environment' and 'organization' are shown to be non-preventive and conducive to participation, respectively. The conclusion is that there are no inherent reasons that prevent participation being successfully applied in the construction industry.