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In this article we will discuss about:- 1. Meaning of Grievances 2. Causes of Grievances 3. Effects 4. Grievance Redressal Machinery 5. Grievance Interview.
Meaning of Grievances:
Conflicts or disagreements often occur between employees and organizations regarding employment conditions. Such conflicts result in dissatisfaction or sense of injustice in employees. The grievance may be genuine or imaginary on the part of the employee but it produce low morale, frustration and discontentment.
According to Dale Yader, Grievance may be defined as “a written complaint filed by an employee claiming unfair treatment.”
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According to Michael J. Jucius, Grievance may be defined as “any discontent or dissatisfaction, whether expressed or not, whether valid or not, arising out of anything connected with the company that an employee thinks, believes or even feels, is unfair, unjust or inequitable.”
According to the National Commission of Labor, “Complaints affecting one or more individual workers in respect of wave payment, overtime, leave, transfer, promotions, seniority, work assignment and discharges constitute grievance.”
According to ILO (The International Labor Organization), grievance may be defined as “a complaint of one or more workers in respect of wages, allowances, conditions of work and interpretation of service stipulation, covering such areas as overtime, leave, transfer, promotion, seniority, job assignment and termination of service.”
According to Kerth Davis, grievance may be defined as “any real or imagined feeling of personal injustice which an employee has concerning his employment relationship.”
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Pigors and Myers have differentiated the terms dissatisfaction, complaint and grievance.
According to them dissatisfaction is “anything that disturbs an employee, whether or not he expresses his unrest in words” and complaint is a “spoken or written dissatisfaction brought to the attention of the supervisor and the shop steward and a grievance is “complaint that has been ignored, overridden, or discussed without consideration.” A grievance has a formal status because of the fact that while a complain can be either oral or written, a grievance is always in writing.
The above definitions of grievance may differ from one thinker to another but the criterion common to all definitions is the fact that the grievance should only be related to employment conditions of an employee i.e. the organizational policies and practices that affect the employees in their work situation only are eligible for inclusion as ‘grievances’.
Causes of Grievances:
From the above definitions of grievance, we can say that the causes of grievances are:
(i) Promotion, demotion and discharge policies.
(ii) Leave, overtime policies.
(iii) Improper placements or wage payments.
(iv) Unscheduled changes.
(v) Lack or excess of discipline.
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(v) Seniority or transfer policies.
(vi) Unfavourable working conditions (insufficient ventilation, non-availability of tools, machines or equipment etc.).
(vii) Violation of organization’s rules.
(viii) Management’s hostility towards labor union.
(ix) Dissatisfactory supervision style (victimization or favoritism).
(x) Violation of Central or State Laws.
(xi) Violation of Past practices of the organization.
(xii) Inadequate safety, health and welfare amenities.
Effects of Grievances:
Whatever may be the cause of a grievance, the effects it has on the organization’s working atmosphere are always adverse.
Effects of grievances are:
(i) Decline in productivity
(ii) Conflicts, disagreements and dissatisfaction.
(iii) Strikes or lock-outs in extreme conditions.
(iv) Poor performance due to lack of interest in work.
(v) Increase in unrest and indiscipline.
(vi) Increase in absenteeism.
(vii) Wastage of resources.
(viii) Increase in production costs.
(ix) Increase in resignation of employees.
Considering the adverse effects of grievance, it is obviously in the interest of the management to aim for zero grievance rate in the organization. To ensure high productivity, management needs to maintain a work environment where the employees have cordial and harmonious relations with the management. To ensure good Industrial relations the grievances need to be identified and then redressed.
There are four main ways of discovering grievances in order to nip the evil in the bud:
(i) Suggestion Boxes:
Employees are encouraged to bring to the mind of management, their complaints and suggestions. They are directed to do so without signing their complaints in order to reduce their insecurity or fear of being ridiculed or punished.
(ii) Open Door Policy:
Mostly practical only in case of small organization this policy encourages the employees to approach the management directly in case they have a grievance. Due to lack of time for such hearings, this method is not very practical for the large organizations.
(iii) Exit Interviews:
The employees quitting the organization due to better prospects elsewhere or any grievance are interviewed in order to gain information about their reasons for leaving the organization.
(iv) Opinion Surveys:
Through periodical interviews and group discussions, vital information can be gathered about employee dissatisfaction.
By using these 4 tools, employee dissatisfaction is discovered and not given the incubation period for developing into a grievance.
Despite all efforts made by management of an organization, employee dissatisfaction sometimes does turn into a grievance. In that case, it needs to be redressed as soon as possible because refusal to recognize the existence of a grievance or faulty handling of a grievance can have serious adverse effects like violence, strikes, lock-outs, damage of industrial equipment and property.
In every industrial organization employing more than five hundred employees, it is mandatory to appoint labor welfare officers, under the provision of the Factories Act, 1948. However, according to this Act the Welfare Officers have very little scope in areas of Welfare, safety and working condition. Hence there is need for its amendment to empower the Welfare officers while handling grievances.
Grievance Redressal Machinery:
Every management should have a well-defined, in house grievance redressal machinery for time-bound redressal of grievances. Only then the management can ensure the achievement of organizational objectives of high productivity and high quality.
Grievance redressal mechanism actually gives the employees an opportunity to express their dissatisfaction and free themselves of the tension and frustration of discontentment. Any management with a progressive outlook that does not believe in the philosophy of autocratic management of employees is likely to have some sort of grievance redressal machinery for fair, open-minded prompt action on grievance.
Grievance Interview:
Grievance Interview is an important cog in the grievance machinery. It involves a personal interview with the grievant. The interviewer talks to the aggrieved employee, listens carefully and projectively and tries to grasp the concealed feelings of the grievant. The interviewer empathizes with the employee to gain his confidence and gently encourages him to express his fears and apprehensions about his grievance.
The grievance interview is informal and unstructured i.e. it is employee driven, where most of the talking is done by the aggrieved employee and the interviewer restrains from interrupting or expressing his own opinion on any aspect of the grievance.
From the interview, the interviewer tries to identify the main issue and make the problem more explicit and clear. Then he places his interpretation of the problem, in front of the aggrieved employee in order to get confirmation from him regarding the accurate perception of the problem.
The grievance interview has a very important role to play in the grievance handling. Without accurate comprehension there cannot be accurate evaluation for arriving at the right decision.