The New Workplace A Guide to the Human Impact of Modern Working Practices

"Just-in-time", "total quality management", "lean manufacturing", "call centres", "team work", "empowerment" - most people in business have heard these buzz words, often offered as a panacea to all profit ills. So why don't they always work? Can you combine them anyhow? If not, why not? The New Workplace Handbook is a comprehensive guide to the evidence available on how modern working practices and technology affect the people in organizations. Within a broad psychological framework, leading experts examine how people work, their experience of work, the impact on productivity and performance and the human resource implications. Guidance is offered on a range of different methods, tools and practices that can be used to guide the design and implementation of modern working practices to ensure that pitfalls are avoided and the best possible results are obtained from new initiatives. Indispensable for consultants, this Handbook will also be useful for students and scholars in the psychology of business, human resource professionals and anyone involved in the management of new working practices.

DAVID HOLMAN is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Organisation and Innovation, which is part of the Institute of Work Psychology, University of Sheffield. He obtained his degree in psychology, diploma in personnel management and doctorate from Manchester Metropolitan University. His main research interests are job design, well-being and emotions at work, learning at work, and management education and development. He is the author of Management and Language: The Manager as a Practical Author, and has published articles in the Journal of Occupational and Organisational Psychology, Human Relations, Management Learning, Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing, and Applied Ergonomics. TOBY D WALL is Professor of Psychology at the University of Sheffield, where he is Director of the Institute of Work Psychology and the ESRC Centre for Organisation and Innovation. He obtained his first degree and his doctorate from the University of Nottingham England. His main research interests have been in industrial and organisational psychology and have recently focused on the effects of advanced manufacturing technology and shop floor work organisation on work performance and strain. His research has appeared in the Journal of Applied Psychology, the Academy of Management Journal, and other leading publications. He also the author of several books including The Human Side of Advanced Manufacturing Technology and Job and Work Design. CHRIS W CLEGG is Professor of Organisational Psychology and Deputy Director of the Institute of Work Psychology at the University of Sheffield. He is a Co-Director of the ESRC Centre for Organisation and Innovation, and Co-Director of the BAE -- Rolls-Royce University Technology Partnership for Design. He currently chairs the Sociotechnical Sub-Group of the British Computer Society. He holds a BA (honours) in Psychology from the University of Newcastle-on-Tyne and an MSc in Business Administration from the University of Bradford. He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society, and a chartered psychologist. Chris Clegg's research interests are in the areas of new technology, work organisation, information and control systems, sociotechnical theory and new management practices. He has published his work in a number of books and journals. PAUL SPARROWis the Ford Professor of International Human Resource Management at Manchester Business School. He graduated from the University of Manchester with a BSc (Hons) Psychology and the University of Aston with an MSc Applied Psychology and was then sponsored by Rank Xerox to study the impacts of ageing on the organisation for his PhD at Aston University. He has written and edited a number of books including European human resource management in transition, The Competent Organization: a psychological analysis of the strategic management process, and Human Resource Management: the new agenda. He has also published articles in leading journals on the future of work, human resource strategy, the psychology of strategic management, international human resource management and cross-cultural management. He is currently Editor of the Journal of Occupational and Organisational Psychology. ANN HOWARD is Manager of Assessment Technology Integrity for Development Dimensions International (DDI), a leading provider of human resource programs and services. She has served as president of the Leadership Research Institute, a non-profit organization that she co-founded in 1987. Ann is the author of more than 85 publications on topics such as assessment centers, management selection, managerial careers, and leadership. She is the senior author (with Dr. Douglas W. Bray) of Managerial Lives in Transition: Advancing Age and Changing Times, which received the George R. Terry Award of Excellence from the Academy of Management in 1989. She has edited two books: The Changing Nature of Work (1995) and Diagnosis for Organizational Change: Methods and Models (1994). She is a past president of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology and the Society of Psychologists in Management. Ann received her Ph.D. degree from the University of Maryland and her M.S. degree from San Francisco State University, both in industrial-organizational psychology. She holds an honorary doctor of science degree from Goucher College, where she earned a B.A. degree in psychology.