LET OUR ADVANCE worrying become advance thinking and planning.
– Winston Churchill
INADEQUATE COMMUNICATION within a nation, an organisation or a family can cause feelings of alienation amongst its citizens, employees and members, which lower their morale, blur their sense of purpose and make it more difficult for them to effectively contribute to national, organisational, familial, and personal success.
Citizens, employees, and family members who harness their potential and pursue goals congruent with those of their nation, organisation and family are more likely those who are provided with meaningful/challenging goals, responsibilities, and opportunities to make recommendations and rewards for their contributions.
By extension, a good human resource management strategy is one that facilitates the achievement of national or organisational objectives, while respecting the human dignity and equality of all stakeholders.
Such a strategy engenders collective and individual development via the improvement of knowledge, values, attitudes and aptitudes, thus resulting in a participative, flexible, goal-oriented and productive environment.
The process of management/labour cooperation has the potential to pool the diverse perspectives, experiences and strengths of employers and employees, thus fostering greater innovation, organisational achievement and viability.
In his paper Project Management In the Context Of Change, Farhad Analoui suggests that participation assists in the formulation of sound and realistic plans; reduces resistance based on misapprehensions; provides feedback on progress; and helps to sustain support via closer involvement of relevant institutions and officials.
Fourteen years ago, in recognition of the tremendous opportunity afforded by greater synergy between management and labour, the International Labour Organisation started the Programme for the Promotion of Management Labour Cooperation (PROMALCO).
The programme, which was jointly sponsored by the International Labour Office and the United States Department of Labour, represented a tangible attempt to engage Caribbean enterprise, workers, employers and governments in a process of culture change and continuous improvement that was and still is demanded by the international economic system
It was hoped that workplace cooperation and joint problem solving would replace traditional relations of confrontation and lead to enhanced productivity and increased competitiveness.
The project, which was valiantly led by programme director Dr Andre-Vincent Henry, identified a number of enterprises that had started to implement more collaborative strategies and approaches to their employee-management relations, and used those enterprises as benchmarks for the sharing of experiences, encouraging dialogue and mentorship.
PROMALCO represented a search for flexible, cutting edge relationship building methods that would contribute to Caribbean enterprises’ ability to respond to the increased competition in the international market place.
There are some fundamental questions that can be asked in the wake of almost a decade since the conclusion of PROMALCO. Can we in Barbados boast of a climate characterised by genuine and sustained management-labour collaboration nationally and at the level of the individual firm?
Has our Social Partnership sustained the internationally touted synergies among its tripartite constituents and the hope of socio economic transformation?
What impact, if any, does a seeming fracture in the Congress of Trade Unions and Staff Associations of Barbados (CTUSAB) have on the labour movement in Barbados?
What impact, if any, does a CTUSAB situation pose to the overall industrial relations climate in Barbados?
Are the agencies that represent the interests of employers and businesses generally fully embracing the need for management-labour dialogue and cooperation?
Do managerial and non-managerial members of staff recognise that they both play a major role within the efficiency and effectiveness of their organisations?
Are brotherly love, relief and truth still important? Are our energies better spent fighting problems rather than people?
Do we believe that there is value in the saying touted by trade unionist George De Pena that “if we do not swim together, we will drown apart”?
As we grapple with the ongoing impacts of our socio-economic, organisational, familial and personal challenges, may all of us, whether policymaker, trade union leader, business owner, manager, employee and or citizen recall, be challenged and be inspired by the National Pledge: “I pledge allegiance to my country Barbados and to my flag, to uphold and defend their honour, and by my living, to do credit to my nation wherever I go.”
* Calvin Husbands is a labour management advisor.