FACTORY MANAGERS: THEIR ROLE IN PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT AND THEIR PLACE IN THE COMPANY[1]

Studies of recent developments in personnel management have concentrated on personnel specialists. It is also necessary to consider how general managers view labour relations. This article analyses a survey of the senior site managers, ‘factory managers’, in 229 large manufacturing establishments. The need to examine higher levels of firms notwithstanding, the establishment level remains of crucial importance, for it is here that policies are implemented. Factory managers might be expected to see labour relations as unimportant. In fact, they saw them as crucial to the operation of the plant, and the managers played a substantial role in decisions on personnel questions. They saw labour relations not in terms of overcoming union opposition, or even of formal institutions, stressing instead the involvement of individual employees. This article analyses these findings and raises some questions about the extent and depth of British management's commitment to this new style of labour relations.