Management and empowerment programmes

Citation

(2002), "Management and empowerment programmes", Measuring Business Excellence, Vol. 6 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/mbe.2002.26706baf.007

Management and empowerment programmes

Management and empowerment programmes

C. Hales, Work Employment & Society, Vol. 14 No. 3, September 2000

Studies why there has been a gap between the rhetoric surrounding empowerment and the results of empowerment programs. Draws out the ambiguities and contradictions within the empowerment literature, indicating the confusion concerning its definition and practice. Examines the use of empowerment in practice, summarizing two pieces of case study research, the first with ten Dutch hotels, the second with five UK organizations ranging across a number of industries. Draws out the inconsistencies in the approach to empowerment, concluding that they entailed little substantive change in worker autonomy or their tasks; some change in the work of junior managers; and that the rhetoric of empowerment used by senior managers was different from that voiced by junior managers. Analyses the reasons for this split between senior and junior managers, suggesting that the root of this lies in the changes within labor processes that are affecting senior and junior managers differently and which lead to different interpretations of empowerment. Widens the discussion to consider if these differences indicate a split within the conventional management ideology.

Comment: A very readable article that provides an interesting insight into why theory and practice are so often poles apart when it comes to empowerment.