OLD and NEW – U.S. Labor and Commerce Department*

OLDNEW
    Employee-Manager Roles
  • Communication is mostly top-down, and work is tightly controlled through management-established procedures.
  • Work Organization
  • Work is organized by functional department, craft or trade with job boundaries well-defined. Jobs are designed with narrow scope and limited responsibility for the end product.
  • Employee Skills
  • Labor-intensive work requires the technical skills to get the job done. No knowledge of product or process outside the immediate task is necessary.
  • View of Employees
  • Impersonal corporate cultures focus on the cost side of employee issues.
  • Workers are empowered with the knowledge and skills for all facets of work processes and business goals and actively participate in organizational decisions.
  • Work is organized into self-managing units whose job boundaries cut across traditional organizational lines. Supervisors act as mentors.
  • Work requires creative thinking, self-motivation and academic basics.
  • Workers are viewed as assets. Corporate culture is flexible and supportive when it comes to the needs of workers.

*Source U.S. Labor and Commerce Department



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