Academic literature on the topic 'Motivation; Employee involvement; Participation'

<p>The significance of non-mandatory training is presently being acknowledged across the globe and currently its importance has been raised to a level near to that of compulsory training. However, research evidence indicates that if the training is non-mandatory, employees are generally reluctant to participate in training programs. Yet, a study of the current literature suggests there is no appropriate theoretical framework to predict and explain the motivational and inhibitory factors underlying employee participation in non-mandatory training. This paper addresses this lacuna, drawing from the Adult Learning theory, the Expectancy theory and the Perceived Organizational Support (POS) theory; it argues that the perception of a supportive environment in the organization, the fostering of employees’ dispositional characteristics, job involvement and career motivation, working together enhance employees’ intention to participate in the non-mandatory training programs. Building on this argument further, it is proposed that when the perceived benefit of training is stronger, its effect on employee dispositional characteristics, job involvement and career motivation pertaining to participation in non-mandatory training becomes stronger. Being one of the early attempts at theorizing on employees’ intention to participate in non-mandatory training, this paper hopes to provide an appropriate theoretical foundation for the empirical work in this field, while providing an insight for managers involved in non-mandatory training of employees. </p>

Renewed scholarly interest in forms of participative management links theories of employee motivation with job design and organizational change. Of the various obstacles to initiation and implementation of employee involvement plans the managerial barrier, rather than employee, structural, or situational barriers, is the primary concern here. To empirically analyze managerial attitudes toward participative management programs a questionnaire instrument was developed and distributed to managers in four large organizations, netting a sample of over 200 managerial respondents. The findings of the study indicate that: (1) there is a “participation gap” in 13 of 15 practices surveyed where managers would prefer more participation than currently exists and; (2) managers who use participatory techniques overwhelmingly find that they have a favorable impact on employee performance and employee attitudes at work. The implications of the findings are that there is a high degree of interest in participative management and in most cases the actual and perceived benefits outweigh the drawbacks in the view of managerial personnel.

Abstract Objective: The purpose of this article was to analyse the impact of the meaning of business activity on employees’ motivation. In the article, the basic contexts between the terms within the studied issue were presented. Methodology: Several methods and thought processes have been used in the article, such as analysis, synthesis, comparison, abstraction, or questionnaire survey. After analysing the theoretical background, questionnaires, interviews and observations were conducted and evaluated and their results led to the creation of specific recommendations. The research was carried out periodically in 2016 and subsequently in 2018. Findings: The basic sense of the functioning of the company must be properly explained to the employees in order to increase the level of their motivation. Only if employees identify themselves with the tasks assigned, they will take responsibility for them and will be willing to work with enthusiasm and interest. Such behaviour will have an impact on improving the efficiency of work performance and individual processes, which will also increase the overall efficiency of the organization. The first questionnaire survey revealed the high positive impact of several factors on increasing employee motivation. For example: interest in work; strive to be a good employee of the company; involvement in the workplace. The respondents of the second survey identified involvement in decision-making and participation in problem solving as important factors. Value Added: The core value of this article is based on the recommended model. In addition to the model that illustrates the basic elements in employee identification with the business meaning, a mechanism has been created to achieve this goal. If this mechanism, consisting of six key points, is used to implement a project, it can be assumed that employees will understand the importance of specific tasks. Recommendations: Motivation as an inner force of shifting a person – an employee – to achieve specific goals can be influenced by the motivation process. This process uses specific motivational tools to influence the behaviour of individuals. In line with this idea, the motivation of employees should be explored and encouraged. The main recommendation is to pay attention to identification of employees with the business meaning. In this case, employees will be involved in the decision-making, will be identified with the assigned tasks and will be willing to work with enthusiasm and interest.

What are the best interventions that Work and Organizational Psychology offers today for promoting high work motivation in organizations? This paper seeks to answer this question in two steps. First, we briefly summarize the main findings from 26 meta-analyses concerned with traditional practices such as goal setting, feedback, work design, financial incentives, or training. These practices can improve both organizational performance and the well-being of organizational members. Second, we examine in more depth a new, increasingly important high performance work practice: Employee involvement in organizational leadership (EIOL). This approach is built on theories focusing on organizational participation, shared leadership, and organizational democracy. We also illustrate recently constructed measurement instruments for assessing these constructs. This synopsis leads us to the development of a new integrative, multilevel model of EIOL. The model includes several mediator (e.g., knowledge exchange) and moderator variables (e.g., self-leadership competencies of actors) that explain why and when this approach is effective. We conclude that future research should focus on cross-level interactions of different forms of organizational participation, shared leadership, and organizational democracy, and seek to identify the processes mediating their interplay.

This study explored the motivational factors of elementary students participating in AWANA, an evangelical Christian religious club. A qualitative research design was employed to gather data from 52 participants in six states. Participants consisted of 24 male and 28 female sixth grade students in the final year of club participation who were eligible to complete the program in Spring 2004. Involvement with AWANA entails Scripture memory and other character-building activities. Data collection consisted of semi-structured interviews with open-ended questions regarding their overall club experience and motivation. Results were analyzed to assess motivational factors contributing to long-term club participation and completion of the program. By long-term, we indicate that the majority of students had participated in the program enough years to complete the required books for the Timothy Award. Overall, we found that award recipients began AWANA with an outside-in, or extrinsic, motivation. However, by the time they achieved their awards, they seemed to have converted to more of an inside-out, or intrinsic, motivation.

This study is based on the impact of HRM practices on organizational performance in terms of behavioral outcomes of financial institutions of Nepal. The variables of HRM practices involve recruitment and selection, training and development, performance appraisal, career planning, compensation, employee participation, and job design whereas variable of behavioral outcomes involve motivation, cooperation, involvement and organizational citizenship. In this study, while analyzing the beta coefficient, it is found that job design sensitivity to organizational performance is high followed by employee participation and compensation system. But all other variables recruitment and selection training and development, and career planning have also positive impact on behaviour outcomes of organizational performance. However, recruitment and selection, training and development, and career planning have minimum impact on behaviour outcomes of organizational performance.

The ability for introduction of innovation, improve products, services and work processes is becoming increasingly important for the construction industry today. This paper focuses on the personal and socio-psychological characteristics of innovation: employee attitudes toward innovations, the degree of employee involvement in innovation activity, personal motivation and incentives. It was found that the innovative behavior of workers in construction organizations is positively influenced by: participative leadership style, support of employees’ innovative behavior on the part of management, external business contacts, innovative results, successful practice of introducing innovations in the firm (enterprise). These factors, combined with material incentives, the desire for self-realization, the involvement of employees in all stages of the innovation process, create a suitable environment for the innovative activity of employees.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to relate participative decision-making (PDM) to organizational learning, and examine the impact of PDM on organizational performance. Design/methodology/approach The paper integrates the resource-based theory with organizational learning theory to develop a framework, and distinguishes PDM in which decisions are jointly made by employees and managers from employee decision-making (EDM) in which decisions are completely in the hands of employees. The paper incorporates an augmented Cobb–Douglass production function into a structural equation model to estimate the performance impact of PDM and EDM. Findings The paper tests the framework against firm-level data form China, and finds that PDM provides an opportunity for collective learning, and has a positive relationship with productivity-based profit gains; the positive relationship is stronger in firms whose management has greater accumulated knowledge and experience; EDM fails to provide an opportunity for collective learning, and has a negative relationship with productivity-based profit gains. Originality/value Prior research focused on the role of PDM in enhancing the motivation and performance of individual employees, considered the degree of employee involvement as a continuum with the highest being decision-making “completely in the hands of employees,” and concluded that the more involved are employees in decision-making the better. This paper relates PDM to organizational performance, and challenges this conventional view from an organizational learning perspective.

The tension is noted between trade union activism and involvement in employee participation schemes. It is shown why, in the United Kingdom's offshore oil and gas industry, a participation scheme—the safety representative system—may be expected to promote union activism in an industry which has resisted union encroachment. It is explained why and how safety representatives have, nevertheless, tended to deny unions a role in the system by reference to the conditions in which representatives acquire their definition of their function. This leads to a categorization of safety representative motivation and role performance and a clarification of how those definitions which associate the representative with management functions rather than union activism receive institutional support.

The work deals with the problems of a self-development organization considered as a self-organization system without hierarchy and employee position. Such kind of management is realized by self-management teams having full authority, responsibility and focus on the result. An individual and group motivation mechanism uses the employee potential to achieve one’s ambition targets. The employee and one’s potential are engaged with a maximum power in all fields of activity. Enterprises management explores employee engagement to estimate and manage this process. Each manager has enough cases when employee goes far beyond job responsibilities to achieve the result. This employee is engaged taking an initiative and informal responsibility. Engagement is a multidimensional construction, which demonstrates employee wishes to invest self-resources (knowledge, skills, competences, emotions and power) in enterprises activity. Engagement is a positive moment implying active involvement, loyalty and direct work. A lot of engagement investigations are aimed at management, result and employee’s participation in organization management. The study of employee’s initiative is a part of employee’s engagement according to infrastructure and information factors at industrial enterprises in Perm region described in the article.

The focus of this research is on advancing understanding of EIP at work in China. It sets out to examine the extent of practice adoption, and inquire the management intention, employee perception and the challenges from the internal and external environment in relation to the practice adoption. It also tries to understand the applicability of EIP practice in innovation and quality enhancement industries. The research methodology adopted is qualitative case study approach, with 20 respondent organisations including Chinese global enterprises, central state-owned enterprises, listed and small medium enterprises.

This thesis provides an examination of the theory and practice of Employee Involvement and Participation in the Libyan context. It consists of three case studies of multinational oil companies operating in Libya. Additionally, a detailed discussion is also provided about the Libyan oil regulatory agency - the National Oil Corporation (NOC) - and its influence on multinational oil companies operating in Libya. The empirical work involved, interviews with management and employees and a survey of employees as the main data collection tools within the three companies, and analysis of corporate documents. The results suggest that the three multinational companies i.e. Italian Eni-Gas, German Wintershall, and British Expro, share a similar approach to Employee Involvement and Participation, exhibiting popular downward communication, weak upward problem-solving techniques, and a lack of financial participation and nominated representative participation. Most of the similarities among these case studies are attributed to the strong influence of the NOC. Various differences were also observed in many respects, being explained by contextual factors such as technology, the style of management, and some small influence from the parent foreign company. This study also suggests that employee participation in decision-making is generally at the infonnative level, with consultation featuring at the bottom of ladder. The scope of EIP programmes was found to be tactical rather than strategic. Due to 'spiritless' initiatives of EIP programmes, their implementation was largely in the hands of individual managers. The effects of employee involvement and participation were also varied such as high levels of commitment, organisational performance and improve employee attitudes. It was confirmed that employee trust in their nominated representatives was minimal, and that more trust was placed in managers.

This thesis investigates the effect of profit sharing and employee share ownership schemes on employee job attitudes and behaviours by taking into account the critical role of participation in decision making. The data were obtained from a large British retail organization operating profit sharing (PS) and save-as-you-earn (SAYE) schemes. This is a quantitative study in which the data were gathered through a questionnaire. The unit of analysis is the individuals who responded to the survey, and the study is cross-sectional. To analyse the data a variety of statistical techniques, namely frequency, Pearson correlation, partial correlation, t-test, chi-square (X2), reliability, multiple regression, hierarchical regression, and path analyses, were conducted using SPSS. The sample comprised 1,000 employees subdivided into groups of managerial and non-managerial employees, and participants in schemes and non-participants in schemes. The administration of the questionnaire resulted in 450 returns (430 usable), an overall response rate of 45%. This study addresses four main research questions: (1)What are the effects of profit sharing and employee share ownership schemes (financial participation) on the job attitudes of individual employees in a large organization? (2) What are the effects of participation in decision making on employee job attitudes in a large organization? (3) What are the relative effects of financial participation in comparison to the effects of individual participation in decisions? (4) Does the combination of financial participation and participation in decision making produce more favourable effects on employee job attitudes than does participation in decision making on its own? The aim of this study was to construct a more advanced model of profit sharing and employee share ownership schemes by reviewing the theoretical and empirical literature and testing two theoretical frameworks, those developed by Long (1978) and Florkowski (1989). After reviewing the employee participation literature and testing Long's and Florkowski's models, it was found that both financial participation and participation in decision making have separate effects on employee job attitudes and behaviours, even if financial participation has a small (not statistically significant) impact on some attitudes and behaviours. Since financial participation shows a negligible effect on some job attitudes, and participation in decision making has a stronger effect on job attitudes than has financial participation, the new model is constructed on the assumption that both (a) the combination of financial participation and participation in decision making and (b) participation in decision making produce favourable effects on employee job attitudes, such as integration, involvement, commitment, satisfaction, motivation, perceived pay equity, and perceived performance-reward contingencies. The test of the new model shows that both (a) the combination of fmancial participation and participation in decision making and (b) participation in decision making produce favourable effects on employee job attitudes and behaviours, but the combination of financial participation and participation in decision making does not produce more favourable effects on employee job attitudes than does participation in decision making on its own. It should be noted that it is not known in this research whether financial participation changed employees' actual influence in decision making, as the study did not collect any data on this question. Therefore, there is the possibility that if the same study were conducted in organizations with financial participation schemes which increase employees' influence in decision making, the effect of the combination of financial participation and participation in decision making might be found to be stronger than that reported in this dissertation.

The purpose of this study was to document and assess the consequences of implementing employee involvement in a manufacturing setting. Using a quasi-experimental design, the study utilized information from various sources of data including archives, interview, and questionnaire data for a three to four year period. Time series comparisons were used. The results indicated that production increased initially, but then dropped back to original level. Quality of products increased and continued to improve gradually. The highest rate of improvement was observed in safety. An attempt was made to measure current level of commitment at the plant but was unsuccessful due to a low return rate of questionnaires. Overall, data collected partially support the hypotheses. Implications for further research and practice are discussed.

This study investigates the role social information and personal dispositions play in the development of attitudes of unionized employees towards employee involvement programs. A theoretical model was developed in order to understand how social information and dispositions form union member attitudes towards employee involvement programs. This was designed from models of employee involvement and attitude formation. Data were collected from employees at electrical power generation facilities. Measures of organizational and union commitment, locus of control, participativeness, social information provided by the company, social information provided by the union, and employee involvement attitudes were gathered through a survey distributed at the facilities. General affect and satisfaction towards four types of employee involvement programs union members are most likely to encounter were measured. Specific hypotheses were developed in order to test and analyze parts of the theoretical model. While the results were at times contrary to the hypothesized relationships within the model, the data fit with the theorized model well enough to provide support for it. This model effectively demonstrated how employee involvement attitudes are formed from such data, and the relationships between the variables measured.
Ph. D.

Participative management practices between United States parent companies in the maquiladora industry and their Mexico assembly plants were investigated for this study. It was hypothesized that managers of parent maquiladora companies in the United States encouraged greater levels of worker participation than did expatriate managers in Mexican subsidiaries. However, the findings of this study indicate that expatriate managers in a number of the Mexico subsidiaries are currently implementing employee involvement approaches. In some instances, highly participative team-based approaches are being used.

Theories of high commitment management (HCM) ascribe a central role to high trust relationships between management and labour if organisations are to achieve high performance (Legge, 2005; Appelbaum et al, 2000). However, such relations are difficult to achieve within the capitalist employment relationship, particularly so within liberal market economies such as the UK (Godard, 2002; Hall and Soskice, 2001). Employee involvement (EI) and participation initiatives potentially constitute a principal mechanism through which trust may be achieved, although wider evidence suggests that desired performance improvements may only accrue where participation is'meaningful' (Delbridge and Whitfield, 2001). Conversely, EI can be used to intensify the work process and achieve tighter control, although whether this is done through managerial 'commission' or 'omission' remains open to debate. This study sought to explore these questions. The critical realist paradigm was deemed to be the most appropriate methodological approach, and a'firm-insector' approach was applied. This facilitated investigation of meso-level, as well as macro-level, effects on enterpriselevel processes and outcomes. Four manufacturing plants, drawn from the pharmaceuticals and automotive components sectors, constituted the units of analysis. It was postulated that the pharmaceuticals sector might constitute a more conducive environment in which to cultivate trust. Conversely, it was averred that the encroachment of the 'customer' into the management of the employment relationship within the components supply business might encourage a control orientation. In keeping with a general predilection of British management, it was found that 'genuine' trust existed in none of the organisations at the time of the fieldwork (Thompson, 2003; Claydon, 1998). Management sought to (or had done so) substitute 'meaningless' EI for collective organisation. However, at two of the plants, employees reported previous instances where trust had existed. Significantly, this was not confined to the pharmaceutical sector. This facilitated identification of the antecedent conditions necessary for trust to develop, namely a value orientation on the part of senior management, strong organisational performance, effective trade unionism and participative, 'informal' management styles.

This chapter aims to assist those responsible for implementing change to think more about how employee participation or involvement is undertaken during the change process. The chapter starts by providing an overview of the theoretical explanations as to why employee participation in change management is important. The authors then examine the nature of employee participation in three organizations undertaking major culture change programs, each using a different change intervention. They present three case studies that show how the context surrounding the change (comprising drivers, intervention, approach to change, and change levers) influenced the characteristics of employee participation in the change process. They conclude by emphasizing the significance of examining change agents' intervention methodology as a contextual factor to understand better the experience of culture change programs. The key message is that employees' experiences of participation influence their perceptions on the effectiveness of this type of change.

The aim of this work is to carry out an exploratory study on the situation of employee share ownership in Morocco in order to detect the effects induced by ownership on motivation, organizational involvement, and the intention to leave. To this end, the authors have used agency theory, which offers an interesting framework for analyzing the practice of employee share ownership, and they have proposed a synthesis of empirical work on the organizational effects of property. Subsequently, they set out their empirical approach in order to explain the progress of the field survey, which relates to the description of the situation of employee shareholding in Morocco. The results obtained confirm the empirical studies analyzed and show that employee share ownership improves the feeling of belonging to the company, motivation, and organizational involvement. On the other hand, ownership makes it possible to lower the departure intention of employee shareholders.

Citizens worldwide are increasingly concerned about the animal welfare of farm animals but lack knowledge about animal production systems, as fewer and fewer people have a direct connection to rural environment. Veterinary students these days present low motivation for teaching subjects related to agricultural species because they are more focused on companion animals. The aim of this work was to evaluate the perception of veterinary students about the degree of utility for learing achieve, satisfaction and acceptability of participation on an service-learning activity integrated in a teaching innovation project. We choose the service-learning activity because learner-centered methodologies could be appealing to students to stimulate external motivation and, simultaneously, provide benefits for society. The participants reported increases in the awareness of lack of knowledge about food animal production aspects and the importance of university involvement in activities that provide social benefits. Together with a 94 % of high or very high self-reported learning increase about the specific topics of the curricula of the subject and an 80% of high or very high self-reported global satisfaction with the participation in the SL activity, despite some technical difficulties, led us to conclude that service-learning methodologies could be successfully integrated in the veterinary curricula.

Attention to safety and health are of ever-increasing priority to industrial organizations. Good Safety is demanded by stockholders, employees, and the community while increasing injury costs provide additional motivation for safety and health excellence. Safety has always been a strong corporate value of DuPont and a vital part of its culture. As a result, DuPont has become a benchmark in safety and health performance. Since 1990, DuPont has re-engineered itself to meet global competition and address future vision. In the new re-engineered organizational structures, DuPont has also had to re-engineer its safety management systems. A special Discovery Team was chartered by DuPont senior management to determine the “best practices’ for safety and health being used in DuPont best-performing sites. A summary of the findings is presented, and five of the practices are discussed. Excellence in safety and health management is more important today than ever. Public awareness, federal and state regulations, and enlightened management have resulted in a widespread conviction that all employees have the right to work in an environment that will not adversely affect their safety and health. In DuPont, we believe that excellence in safety and health is necessary to achieve global competitiveness, maintain employee loyalty, and be an accepted member of the communities in which we make, handle, use, and transport products. Safety can also be the “catalyst” to achieving excellence in other important business parameters. The organizational and communication skills developed by management, individuals, and teams in safety can be directly applied to other company initiatives. As we look into the 21st Century, we must also recognize that new organizational structures (flatter with empowered teams) will require new safety management techniques and systems in order to maintain continuous improvement in safety performance. Injury costs, which have risen dramatically in the past twenty years, provide another incentive for safety and health excellence. Shown in the Figure 1, injury costs have increased even after correcting for inflation. Many companies have found these costs to be an “invisible drain” on earnings and profitability. In some organizations, significant initiatives have been launched to better manage the workers’ compensation systems. We have found that the ultimate solution is to prevent injuries and incidents before they occur. A globally-respected company, DuPont is regarded as a well-managed, extremely ethical firm that is the benchmark in industrial safety performance. Like many other companies, DuPont has re-engineered itself and downsized its operations since 1985. Through these changes, we have maintained dedication to our principles and developed new techniques to manage in these organizational environments. As a diversified company, our operations involve chemical process facilities, production line operations, field activities, and sales and distribution of materials. Our customer base is almost entirely industrial and yet we still maintain a high level of consumer awareness and positive perception. The DuPont concern for safety dates back to the early 1800s and the first days of the company. In 1802 E.I. DuPont, a Frenchman, began manufacturing quality grade explosives to fill America’s growing need to build roads, clear fields, increase mining output, and protect its recently won independence. Because explosives production is such a hazardous industry, DuPont recognized and accepted the need for an effective safety effort. The building walls of the first powder mill near Wilmington, Delaware, were built three stones thick on three sides. The back remained open to the Brandywine River to direct any explosive forces away from other buildings and employees. To set the safety example, DuPont also built his home and the homes of his managers next to the powder yard. An effective safety program was a necessity. It represented the first defense against instant corporate liquidation. Safety needs more than a well-designed plant, however. In 1811, work rules were posted in the mill to guide employee work habits. Though not nearly as sophisticated as the safety standards of today, they did introduce an important basic concept — that safety must be a line management responsibility. Later, DuPont introduced an employee health program and hired a company doctor. An early step taken in 1912 was the keeping of safety statistics, approximately 60 years before the federal requirement to do so. We had a visible measure of our safety performance and were determined that we were going to improve it. When the nation entered World War I, the DuPont Company supplied 40 percent of the explosives used by the Allied Forces, more than 1.5 billion pounds. To accomplish this task, over 30,000 new employees were hired and trained to build and operate many plants. Among these facilities was the largest smokeless powder plant the world had ever seen. The new plant was producing granulated powder in a record 116 days after ground breaking. The trends on the safety performance chart reflect the problems that a large new work force can pose until the employees fully accept the company’s safety philosophy. The first arrow reflects the World War I scale-up, and the second arrow represents rapid diversification into new businesses during the 1920s. These instances of significant deterioration in safety performance reinforced DuPont’s commitment to reduce the unsafe acts that were causing 96 percent of our injuries. Only 4 percent of injuries result from unsafe conditions or equipment — the remainder result from the unsafe acts of people. This is an important concept if we are to focus our attention on reducing injuries and incidents within the work environment. World War II brought on a similar set of demands. The story was similar to World War I but the numbers were even more astonishing: one billion dollars in capital expenditures, 54 new plants, 75,000 additional employees, and 4.5 billion pounds of explosives produced — 20 percent of the volume used by the Allied Forces. Yet, the performance during the war years showed no significant deviation from the pre-war years. In 1941, the DuPont Company was 10 times safer than all industry and 9 times safer than the Chemical Industry. Management and the line organization were finally working as they should to control the real causes of injuries. Today, DuPont is about 50 times safer than US industrial safety performance averages. Comparing performance to other industries, it is interesting to note that seemingly “hazard-free” industries seem to have extraordinarily high injury rates. This is because, as DuPont has found out, performance is a function of injury prevention and safety management systems, not hazard exposure. Our success in safety results from a sound safety management philosophy. Each of the 125 DuPont facilities is responsible for its own safety program, progress, and performance. However, management at each of these facilities approaches safety from the same fundamental and sound philosophy. This philosophy can be expressed in eleven straightforward principles. The first principle is that all injuries can be prevented. That statement may seem a bit optimistic. In fact, we believe that this is a realistic goal and not just a theoretical objective. Our safety performance proves that the objective is achievable. We have plants with over 2,000 employees that have operated for over 10 years without a lost time injury. As injuries and incidents are investigated, we can always identify actions that could have prevented that incident. If we manage safety in a proactive — rather than reactive — manner, we will eliminate injuries by reducing the acts and conditions that cause them. The second principle is that management, which includes all levels through first-line supervisors, is responsible and accountable for preventing injuries. Only when senior management exerts sustained and consistent leadership in establishing safety goals, demanding accountability for safety performance and providing the necessary resources, can a safety program be effective in an industrial environment. The third principle states that, while recognizing management responsibility, it takes the combined energy of the entire organization to reach sustained, continuous improvement in safety and health performance. Creating an environment in which employees feel ownership for the safety effort and make significant contributions is an essential task for management, and one that needs deliberate and ongoing attention. The fourth principle is a corollary to the first principle that all injuries are preventable. It holds that all operating exposures that may result in injuries or illnesses can be controlled. No matter what the exposure, an effective safeguard can be provided. It is preferable, of course, to eliminate sources of danger, but when this is not reasonable or practical, supervision must specify measures such as special training, safety devices, and protective clothing. Our fifth safety principle states that safety is a condition of employment. Conscientious assumption of safety responsibility is required from all employees from their first day on the job. Each employee must be convinced that he or she has a responsibility for working safely. The sixth safety principle: Employees must be trained to work safely. We have found that an awareness for safety does not come naturally and that people have to be trained to work safely. With effective training programs to teach, motivate, and sustain safety knowledge, all injuries and illnesses can be eliminated. Our seventh principle holds that management must audit performance on the workplace to assess safety program success. Comprehensive inspections of both facilities and programs not only confirm their effectiveness in achieving the desired performance, but also detect specific problems and help to identify weaknesses in the safety effort. The Company’s eighth principle states that all deficiencies must be corrected promptly. Without prompt action, risk of injuries will increase and, even more important, the credibility of management’s safety efforts will suffer. Our ninth principle is a statement that off-the-job safety is an important part of the overall safety effort. We do not expect nor want employees to “turn safety on” as they come to work and “turn it off” when they go home. The company safety culture truly becomes of the individual employee’s way of thinking. The tenth principle recognizes that it’s good business to prevent injuries. Injuries cost money. However, hidden or indirect costs usually exceed the direct cost. Our last principle is the most important. Safety must be integrated as core business and personal value. There are two reasons for this. First, we’ve learned from almost 200 years of experience that 96 percent of safety incidents are directly caused by the action of people, not by faulty equipment or inadequate safety standards. But conversely, it is our people who provide the solutions to our safety problems. They are the one essential ingredient in the recipe for a safe workplace. Intelligent, trained, and motivated employees are any company’s greatest resource. Our success in safety depends upon the men and women in our plants following procedures, participating actively in training, and identifying and alerting each other and management to potential hazards. By demonstrating a real concern for each employee, management helps establish a mutual respect, and the foundation is laid for a solid safety program. This, of course, is also the foundation for good employee relations. An important lesson learned in DuPont is that the majority of injuries are caused by unsafe acts and at-risk behaviors rather than unsafe equipment or conditions. In fact, in several DuPont studies it was estimated that 96 percent of injuries are caused by unsafe acts. This was particularly revealing when considering safety audits — if audits were only focused on conditions, at best we could only prevent four percent of our injuries. By establishing management systems for safety auditing that focus on people, including audit training, techniques, and plans, all incidents are preventable. Of course, employee contribution and involvement in auditing leads to sustainability through stakeholdership in the system. Management safety audits help to make manage the “behavioral balance.” Every job and task performed at a site can do be done at-risk or safely. The essence of a good safety system ensures that safe behavior is the accepted norm amongst employees, and that it is the expected and respected way of doing things. Shifting employees norms contributes mightily to changing culture. The management safety audit provides a way to quantify these norms. DuPont safety performance has continued to improve since we began keeping records in 1911 until about 1990. In the 1990–1994 time frame, performance deteriorated as shown in the chart that follows: This increase in injuries caused great concern to senior DuPont management as well as employees. It occurred while the corporation was undergoing changes in organization. In order to sustain our technological, competitive, and business leadership positions, DuPont began re-engineering itself beginning in about 1990. New streamlined organizational structures and collaborative work processes eliminated many positions and levels of management and supervision. The total employment of the company was reduced about 25 percent during these four years. In our traditional hierarchical organization structures, every level of supervision and management knew exactly what they were expected to do with safety, and all had important roles. As many of these levels were eliminated, new systems needed to be identified for these new organizations. In early 1995, Edgar S. Woolard, DuPont Chairman, chartered a Corporate Discovery Team to look for processes that will put DuPont on a consistent path toward a goal of zero injuries and occupational illnesses. The cross-functional team used a mode of “discovery through learning” from as many DuPont employees and sites around the world. The Discovery Team fostered the rapid sharing and leveraging of “best practices” and innovative approaches being pursued at DuPont’s plants, field sites, laboratories, and office locations. In short, the team examined the company’s current state, described the future state, identified barriers between the two, and recommended key ways to overcome these barriers. After reporting back to executive management in April, 1995, the Discovery Team was realigned to help organizations implement their recommendations. The Discovery Team reconfirmed key values in DuPont — in short, that all injuries, incidents, and occupational illnesses are preventable and that safety is a source of competitive advantage. As such, the steps taken to improve safety performance also improve overall competitiveness. Senior management made this belief clear: “We will strengthen our business by making safety excellence an integral part of all business activities.” One of the key findings of the Discovery Team was the identification of the best practices used within the company, which are listed below: ▪ Felt Leadership – Management Commitment ▪ Business Integration ▪ Responsibility and Accountability ▪ Individual/Team Involvement and Influence ▪ Contractor Safety ▪ Metrics and Measurements ▪ Communications ▪ Rewards and Recognition ▪ Caring Interdependent Culture; Team-Based Work Process and Systems ▪ Performance Standards and Operating Discipline ▪ Training/Capability ▪ Technology ▪ Safety and Health Resources ▪ Management and Team Audits ▪ Deviation Investigation ▪ Risk Management and Emergency Response ▪ Process Safety ▪ Off-the-Job Safety and Health Education Attention to each of these best practices is essential to achieve sustained improvements in safety and health. The Discovery Implementation in conjunction with DuPont Safety and Environmental Management Services has developed a Safety Self-Assessment around these systems. In this presentation, we will discuss a few of these practices and learn what they mean. Paper published with permission.

The increasing advance of the new technologies applied in the retail market, make it common to sell products without the personal contact between seller and buyer, being the registration and payment of the products made in electronic equipment of self-checkout. The large-scale use of these devices forces the consumer to participate in the service process, which was previously done through interaction with the company's employees. The user of the self-checkout system thus performs all the steps of the purchase, from weighing the products, registering them and making the payment. This is seen as a partial employee, whose participation or performance in providing services can be used by the company to improve the quality of its operations (KELLEY, et al 1993). However this participation does not always satisfy the user, and may cause negative experiences related to usability failures. This article presents the results of the evaluation by the users of the self-checkout system. The data were collected in Portugal through a questionnaire to 400 users. The study analyzes the degree of satisfaction regarding the quality and usability of the system, the degree of motivation for its adoption, as well as the profile of the users. Analysis of the sample data reveals that users have basic or higher education and use new technologies very often. They also have a high domain of the system and an easy learning of its use. The reason for using self-checkout instead of the traditional checkout is mainly due to "queues at checkout with operator" and "at the small volume of products". In general, the sample reveals a high degree of satisfaction with the service and with quality, however, in comparative terms, self-checkout is not considered better than operator checkout. The evaluation of the interaction with the self-checkout was classified according to twenty-six attributes of the system. The analysis identifies five groups with similar characteristics, of which two have low scores. "Cancellation of registered articles", "search for articles without a bar code", "manual registration", "bagging area", "error messages", "weight sensor" and “invoice request "are seven critical attributes of the system. The results indicate that the usability analysis oriented to the self-checkout service can be determinant for the user-system interaction. The implications of empirical findings are discussed together with guidelines for future research.Keywords: Interaction Design, Self service, Self-checkout, User evaluation, UsabilityReferencias ABRAHÃO, J., et al (2013). Ergonomia e Usabilidade. 1ª Edição. São Paulo: Blucher. ALEXANDRE, J. W. C., et al (2013). Análise do número de categorias da escala de Likert aplicada à gestão pela qualidade total através da teoria da resposta ao item. In: XXIII Encontro Nacional de Engenharia de Produção, Ouro Preto. BOOTH, P. (2014). An Introduction to Human-Computer Interaction (Psychology Revivals). London Taylor and Francis. CASTRO, D., ATKINSON, R., EZELL, J., (2010). Embracing the Self-Service Economy, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. Available at SSRN: http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1590982 CHANG, L.A. (1994). A psychometric evaluation of 4-point and 6-point Likert-type scale in relation to reliability and validity. Applied Psychological Measurement. v. 18, n. 2, p. 05-15. DABHOLKAR, P. A. (1996). Consumer Evaluations of New Technology-based Self-service Options: An Investigation of Alternative Models of Service Quality. International Journal of Research in Marketing, Vol. 13, pp. 29-51. DABHOLKAR, P. A., BAGOZZI, R. P. (2002). An Attitudinal Model of Technology-based Selfservice: Moderating Effects of Consumer Traits and Situational Factors. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 30 (3), pp. 184-201. DABHOLKAR, P. A., BOBBITT, L. M. &amp; LEE, E. (2003). Understanding Consumer Motivation and Behavior related to Self-scanning in Retailing. International Journal of Service Industry Management, Vol. 14 (1), pp. 59-95. DIX, A. et al (2004). Human-Computer Interaction. Third edition. Pearson/Prentice-Hall. New York. FERNANDES, F. et al, (2015). Do Ensaio à Investigação – Textos Breves Sobre a Investigação, Bernabé Hernandis, Carmen Lloret e Francisco Sanmartín (Editores), Oficina de Acción Internacional - Universidade Politécnica de Valência Edições ESAD.cr/IPL, Leiria. HELANDER, M., LANDAUER, T., PRABHU, P. (1997). Handbook of Human – Computer Interaction. North–Holland: Elsevier. KALLWEIT, K., SPREER, P. &amp; TOPOROWSKI, W. (2014). Why do Customers use Self-service Information Technologies in Retail? The Mediating Effect of Perceived Service Quality. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Vol. 21, pp. 268-276. KELLEY SW, HOFFMAN KD, DAVIS MA. (1993). A typology of retail failures and recoveries. J Retailing. 69(4):429 – 52.