Group work (work organization)
Group work is a work organization concept that allows a group of employees to independently regulate the internal distribution of tasks for a defined area of responsibility in the production process based on division of labor .
In Germany, corporate group work has found its way into the Works Constitution Act : "Group work within the meaning of this provision exists when a group of employees essentially carries out an overall task assigned to them independently within the framework of the operational workflow" .
The REFA Association defines group work as follows: “In group work, the task of a work system is partially or completely fulfilled by several employees. Group work in the narrower sense occurs when several people work together on the same subject in one or more process sections . This definition does not differentiate between group work and “work in groups”. The criterion of responsible (autonomous) distribution of tasks without direct guidance by superiors is missing. Only the participation of the group members in the assignment of the individual tasks distinguishes group work in the sense defined here.
Often group work is equated with team work. But this term is not clear-cut because it is also used for project-related and interdisciplinary group cooperation.
history
The increasing dismantling of work processes in the course of the rationalization of industrial production processes, including through Taylorism and Fordism , aroused criticism of "soulless" factory work in the first half of the 20th century and drew attention to emotional and motivational aspects of work in mass production . The social historian Ernst Michel stated that "the former workers question has developed into the social problem of industrial work par excellence". The criticism ultimately culminated in reform projects and reform proposals from social and ergonomists .
- At the suggestion of the psychologist Willy Hellpach , Daimler-Benz introduced “group production” in the 1920s. Hellpach saw it as a form of industrial work "which counteracts the atomization and emptying of meaning in factory work".
- The sociologist Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy also recommended in the 1920s the “workshop relocation”, that is, the outsourcing of operating units, combined with a certain degree of independence for the decentralized units.
- As early as the 1950s and 1960s, some Norwegian and Swedish companies tried out new forms of work with autonomous groups with advice from the social sciences.
- The British Tavistock Institute (London) developed the concept of the semi-autonomous working group for the first time in the context of its socio-technical approach .
- The great American study by James Womack and his colleagues from the 1980s discovered and recommended the Japanese organizational concept of lean production with flexible production groups to automobile manufacturers.
The Swedish model of group work
The Swedish automobile companies Volvo implemented the concept of the semi-autonomous group in the assembly plants Kalmar and Uddevalla as well as Saab in Malmö during the 1980s and 1990s in a comprehensive manner and with strong social science support. The most radical implementation of the group concept took place in the Uddevalla assembly plant, where the individual teams were responsible for assembling entire cars. However, the Swedish concepts only presented a very extensive variant of the Jobenlargement , which lacked essential elements of employee participation and which did not prove itself in the long term.
The German discussion
As part of the federal government's research program “ Humanization of Working Life ”, new forms of work organization, in particular group work, were tested in several company projects from 1974 onwards, involving trade unions and employers' associations. The then Research Minister Hans Matthöfer was one of the promoters of this program. However, this action program did not have a broad impact. The rise in unemployment since the mid-1970s shifted priorities from “humane” to secure jobs.
In particular, the study by Womack et al. about the work organization at Toyota , which revived the discussion about group work in Germany in the 1990s. A social science trend report speaks of a “second 'Japan wave' with the lean management debate since the early 1990s”. In many companies management took the initiative to introduce group work, to which the unions initially reacted hesitantly. In the meantime, trade unions and employers' associations have concluded framework collective agreements and works councils and company managements have concluded works agreements on group work. The contracts concluded by Volkswagen with IG Metall as part of the “ Auto 5000 ” model project include the nationwide establishment of group work with a “high level of group self-organization”.
Structural requirements for group work
In practice, group work often does not prove itself in the long run, falls asleep, grinds itself off or does not achieve the expected productivity. From the perspective of lean production, this is justified by the fact that group work is only one element of lean production and, if the rest of the work is inadequately implemented, group work cannot lead to success either. Independently of this, it has been established over the course of time that successful group work is tied to specific characteristics in the work organization . If they are missing, group work cannot be successful. These are:
- Implementation autonomy (A),
- Task completeness (A),
- Planning autonomy (A),
- Personnel continuity (B),
- Communication options (B),
- Group size (B) as well
- Qualification structure (C).
As in an ABC analysis, the characteristics are divided into A, B and C criteria according to their general meaning . If the A criteria are not sufficiently developed, group work will not function successfully in a work system. The same applies to the B criteria: Inadequate characteristics can be temporarily compensated for by accompanying measures, but it permanently jeopardizes success. Only the C criterion can also be compensated for for a longer period of time. A work system that cannot be structured in such a way that the criteria are met is not suitable for group work.
Implementation autonomy
A motivating common work orientation can only develop in a work group if it has a common task. It must be a task for which she can take responsibility and where she determines and controls the work processes herself. This means that there should be little technical interlinking of the work processes in the group with those outside. The entire spectrum of group tasks should also be able to be done in the group. The ideal is the creation of a finished (partial) product in a group.
Task completeness
Task completeness means the sequential and hierarchical completeness of the assigned work task as defined in terms of action theory . The requirement for completeness of tasks applies generally and independently of group work. Employees who work on incomplete work for a longer period of time experience an impairment of their personality that is later irreversible and can only be temporarily compensated for by leisure activities.
Group work offers a good chance to provide complete work tasks for employees in industrial series production, as it is not necessary to meet the completeness criterion for each individual workstation. It is sufficient if this applies to the group task. The condition is that all group members feel responsible for the entire task of the group regardless of the work they have just taken on. This presupposes that all employees of the group also carry out all work at more or less regular intervals.
Sequential completeness means - roughly speaking - that an action is not only planned or only carried out, but that both the planning and the execution belong to the task. So it describes the holistic nature of a task. Hierarchical completeness is present if the task is not only handed over on a level where independent target and action planning is still required (and is therefore permitted), but also includes the underlying operational levels of an action. A complete task can be recognized by the following characteristics:
- Independent setting of goals that are embedded in overarching goals,
- independent action preparation in terms of independent planning,
- own selection of the means to achieve the goal,
- Execution activities with feedback to enable action to be corrected and
- Feedback on the results and the opportunity to check whether one's actions correspond to the goals set.
Planning autonomy
It is about the extent to which the group is independent of plans and events outside. The task must therefore not only be defined as complete, the external network should also be so loose that there is actually autonomous planning leeway within which the group can really plan.
In addition to the range of a planning horizon, it is also important how high the reliability of the data is within this horizon. Short-term interventions by outsiders are particularly critical here.
Personnel continuity
Even with group work, it will always be necessary that members of the group work at workstations outside the group. A certain personal exchange across group boundaries is inevitable. But: it should be limited. Employees who work more time outside of the group than in the group will hardly develop a sense of group or group responsibility. Group work can therefore only work if the work system offers a guarantee that an exchange of personnel beyond the group is kept within limits. Only in this way can measures initiated by the group for cases of illness and vacation plans have a salary and become binding.
Communication options
Interpersonal contacts in the group are crucial for the development of the we-feeling, which in turn is necessary for a powerful group. In group work this can be opposed by:
- working distances that are too great,
- excessive noise level or
- linguistic barriers, resulting from a high proportion of employees with poor language integration.
The first point can usually hardly be changed when introducing group work, but it can possibly be mitigated.
Group size
The group size is determined by the work requirements and the number of integrated process steps. So it is more a consequence of other decisions that are more important and compelling than an autonomous parameter. However, not every result can be accepted. If the employees are to compensate for vacations and sick leave themselves, the work must be able to be done for a limited time by at least one person less in the group. On the other hand: With a linear increase in the number of group members, their communication needs increase exponentially. If there are more than 13 members at the latest, there are subgroups and the system becomes unproductive.
Qualification structure
The perceived similarity between the group members is an important factor for group formation. They should complement each other professionally and experience each other as similar. In addition, if the qualification structures are so different that not everyone can work, then subgroups with the same qualification structure are formed. This would either have to be compensated for in the medium term through qualification measures, or the completeness of tasks must already be guaranteed for these subgroups.
Complementary factors
- In addition to the structural prerequisites for group work, the possibility of employee participation, for example in the sense of a continuous improvement process, is necessary.
- An unfavorable remuneration system can "cap" performance potential and suppress intrinsic motivators among employees. Discussions about a new pay system can dominate the entire introduction process and thus hinder it.
- Operational managers must see group work as an opportunity to bring about positive changes for them too.
There should be potential for increasing performance through group work.
Spread of group work in German industry
According to a survey by the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research from 2009 in 1484 manufacturing companies, 60 percent of the companies have group work (no further definition). If you limit group work to three to 15 members, the proportion drops to 54 percent; if you also ask about scheduling and quality assurance tasks that fall within their area of activity, the quota is 46 percent of the companies surveyed. The use of group work increases with the size of the company. Large companies with over 1,000 employees are 90 percent of the users of group work in some form.
literature
- Peter Binkelmann / Hans-Joachim Braczyk / Rüdiger Seltz (eds.): Development of group work in Germany . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1993.
- Christian Berggren: From Ford to Volvo. Automobile manufacturing in Sweden . Springer, Berlin 1991.
- Hermann Kocyba / Uwe Vormbusch: Participation as a management strategy . Group work and flexible control in the automotive and mechanical engineering industries . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 2000.
- Heiner Minssen: From hierarchy to discourse. The unreasonable demands of self-regulation . Hampp, Munich / Mering 1999.
- Eugen Rosenstock-Hussey: workshop relocation. Investigations into the living space of the industrial worker . Springer, Berlin 1922.
- RKW Magazin Issue 4, 2011: Focus on group and team work .
- Siegfried Roth / Heribert Kohl (eds.): Perspective: group work . Bund-Verlag. Cologne 1988.
- Thomas Sandberg: Work Organization and Autonomous Groups . LiberFörlag, Lund 1982.
- James P. Womack / Daniel T. Jones / Daniel Roos: The Machine that Changed the World . New York. 1990. Dt. The second revolution in the automotive industry . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1991.
See also
- Working group
- Work structuring
- Lean production
- team
- Semi-autonomous working group
- Toyota production system
- Virtual team
Web links
supporting documents
- ↑ BetrVG § 87 Zif. 13.
- ↑ Refa: Methodology of Working Studies, Part 1: Basics . Hanser, Munich 1984, p. 116. ISBN 3-446-14234-7 .
- ^ Ernst Michel: Social history of industrial work . Knecht, Frankfurt am Main 1948. p. 164.
- ^ Gertraude Mikl-Horke : Industrial and work sociology . 3rd edition, Oldenbourg, Munich / Vienna 1995, p. 148.
- ↑ Eugen Rosenstock-Hussey: Workshop relocation. Investigations into the living space of the industrial worker . Springer, Berlin 1922. In excerpts in: Friedrich Fürstenberg (Hrsg.): Industrial Sociology I: Precursors and Early Years 1835-1934 . Luchterhand. Neuwied 1959, p. 219ff.
- ^ Thomas Sandberg: Work Organization and Autonomous Groups . LiberFörlag, Lund 1982, p. 96ff.
- ^ Walther Müller-Jentsch: Work and Citizen Status. Studies on social and industrial democracy . SV Verlag, Wiesbaden 2008, p. 217f.
- ↑ James P. Womack / Daniel T. Jones / Daniel Roos: The second revolution in the automotive industry . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1991. pp. 119f.
- ^ Christian Berggren: From Ford to Volvo. Automobile manufacturing in Sweden . Springer, Berlin 1991, pp. 180f.
- ↑ James P. Womack / Daniel T. Jones / Daniel Roos: The second revolution in the automotive industry . Campus, Frankfurt am Main 1991. pp. 101-103.
- ↑ Hans Matthöfer: Humanization of work and productivity in the industrial society . European Publishing House, Cologne / Frankfurt am Main 1978, pp. 175ff. ISBN 978-3-43400-343-4
- ↑ Hans Joachim Sperling: Innovatiove work organization and intelligent participation management. Trend report on participation and organization. Schüren, Marburg 1994, p. 42.
- ^ Lothar Kamp: group work. Analysis and recommendations for action . Hans Böckler Foundation, Düsseldorf 1999.
- ↑ Michael Schumann / Martin Kuhlmann / Frauke Sanders / Hans Joachim Sperling: Auto 5000: a new production concept. The German answer to the Toyota way? VSA Hamburg 2006, p. 90ff.
- ^ Günter Lay / Petra Jung Ercek / Hans-Dieter Schat: Spread of group work in German industry . In: RKW Magazin Issue 4, 2011: Focus on group and teamwork , p. 22f.
- ^ Günter Lay / Petra Jung Ercek / Hans-Dieter Schat: Spread of group work in German industry . In: RKW Magazin Issue 4, 2011: Focus on group and teamwork , p. 24.