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Middlesex research into legislative models protecting whistleblowers has, since its beginnings in 1993 (Lewis), made a substantial contribution to protecting this category of persons in the UK and abroad. Research has led to improved corporate accountability, making organisations act responsibly, benefiting employees, and enhancing civil society voices. Empirical research in the public and private sectors has been brought into wider social policy debates. The International Whistleblowing Research Network, established in 2009 and hosted at Middlesex, is now actively used as a conduit for collaboration, taking findings to stakeholders and serving as a means to engage policy makers in numerous countries. Beneficiaries are whistleblowers, organisations and the general public.
Research has linked employee wellbeing to employee motivation and engagement, which can in turn drive increases in productivity and improved levels of product/service delivery. This case study illustrates how academic research and enterprise-based activity, through a university spinout company, has helped to create a significant positive impact on promoting and improving employee wellbeing. This has been achieved across a variety of national and international organisations, including several high profile private and public organisations, involving over 50,000 employees across Europe. This has resulted in a number of positive outcomes such as national and international awards in the area of HR as well as increased employee engagement and reduced employee absenteeism.
Research on employee share plans and employee ownership has made an impact in the media and on government policy. Pendleton's research has influenced and increased media discussions of participation in share plans, financial knowledge, and plan outcomes in the specialist reward and financial press. Additionally, the research impacted upon government policy in two ways: one in informing a government decision not to remove the tax benefits connected with share ownership plans; and two, in contributing to an enquiry which has subsequently had a significant influence on the views of the main political parties towards employee ownership.
The UK's adoption, and implementation in 2004, of the European Union's (EU) Information and Consultation of Employees (ICE) Directive had profound implications for industrial relations in the UK, which historically had no provision for works councils (a representative structure where management meet with employee representatives to discuss working conditions). Professor Mark Hall's research on the impact of the ICE Regulations on organisations has had an impact on both policy and implementation of the Regulations at the UK and European levels. The outputs from the research have helped to inform UK policy-making, and supported significant European reviews of the legislation as well as contributing to improving professional practice through training and information.
Research on employee ownership (EO) conducted by Professors Lampel and Bhalla at City University London has made a substantial contribution to the evidence base used by the UK government to formulate and introduce policies aimed at boosting employee ownership. Evidence on the resilience and flexibility of EO firms, as well as the barriers that they confront, played an important role in the launch on 4th July 2013 of a new government policy to make employee ownership more accessible, including the injection of £50M annually to support EO models. Greater adoption of the EO model in the private sector benefits employees and employers and improves the wider economy. The evidence provided by this research has also led to a greater focus on EO in the public sector, with government policies now being formulated to encourage greater adoption of EO, specifically in the areas of health and social care, benefiting additionally the recipients of services and their families.
Over the last five years, researchers within the Institute for Research into Organisations, Work and Employment (iROWE) have worked closely with policy-makers at the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas) to develop a programme of research that has provided new evidence in the areas of conflict management and downsizing. This has been central in re-shaping Acas's strategic priorities to include explicit reference to conflict management for the first time. It has also informed Acas's response to government over proposed employment reform and been used to develop new guidance in respect of redundancy handling, representation and workplace mediation. These impacts were sustained and maximised through the co-ordination of an ESRC funded seminar series, co-sponsored by Acas in 2012-13.
University of Bath research into employee attitudes and behaviours has underpinned changes at Alexander Mann Solutions (AMS), a global provider of Human Resource (HR) outsourcing and consultancy services to 45 major clients in 6 countries. The research has improved AMS's ability to understand and to manage employee commitment across organisational boundaries. As a direct result of this research, AMS have developed new processes and approaches that balance commitment to clients with commitment to the company. Specifically, they have enhanced their induction programme; increased training hours for technical staff by 15% and for managers by 45%; initiated a global teamwork award; introduced an electronic knowledge base; and established senior management development. Results have shown a 9% improvement in employee commitment, an 8% reduction on intention to quit, and a 5% increase in internal promotions.
Sandy Hobbs and Jim McKechnie have been researching the issue of young people's (i.e. under 16 years of age) involvement in employment: this is usually termed child labour or child employment. The goal of this research was to establish an evidence base regarding the nature and extent of child employment in the UK, and to consider the benefits and costs of this experience for young people. The impact of this research has been to raise the level of awareness of this issue within the UK, providing an evidence base that has been used by NGOs, and evaluating policy and practice for local and national government departments in the UK and the Isle of Man.
Research undertaken since 1999 by Professor Paul Latreille at Swansea University has examined workplace conflict and its resolution. Much of this research has been externally funded by the ESRC, government and other bodies, and published as reports and papers in internationally recognised academic journals. The research has delivered a range of impacts, including shaping policymaker and practitioner debate and providing confirmation of, and challenges to, policy and practice. Impact is evidenced, inter alia, by references to the research in government consultation documents and responses to such documents, Parliamentary debate and practitioner materials.
The impact of the Hull University Business School`s (HUBS) research on ESV emerged out of a project with Yorkshire Bank and Irwin Mitchell Solicitors (August 2010-July 2011) and a separate project with the Co-operative Group and the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens (FCFCG) (February 2012 - January 2013). These led to wider impacts on:
1) Corporate ESV policies of the case study companies.
2) Hull and East Yorkshire Community Foundation (HEYCF) approaches to ESV and engagement with business.
3) Securing new funding from the ESRC Knowledge Exchange Opportunities Grants Scheme in partnership with HEYCF.