THE CONTROL OF STAFF-RELATED OVERHEAD By the same author THE MANAGEMENT OF DRAWING AND DESIGN THE CONTROL OF STAFF -RELATED OVERHEAD ARTHUR BREARLEY T.D., B.Sc., M.Sc., C.ENo., M.LMECH.E., M.I.PRon.E. M For my wife Margaret with my thanks ISBN 978-1-349-02666-1 ISBN 978-1-349-02664-7 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-02664-7 © Arthur Brearley 1976 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1976 978-0-333-18593-3 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without permission First published 1976 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD London and Basingstoke Associated companies in New Tork Dublin Melbourne Johannesburg and Madras SBN 333 18593 5 This book is sold subject to the standard conditions of the Net Book Agreement Contents List of Figures VI List of Tables Vll Acknowledgements Vlli Preface IX Introduction 2 Background to the Problem 7 3 Methods, Procedures and Systems 23 4 Measurement Techniques 30 5 Control Systems 52 6 Status, Motivation and Incentives 68 7 Industrial Relations, Trade Unions and Consultation 82 8 Maintenance, Audit, the On-going Problem 98 9 The Programmes Available 103 lO The Four Case Studies 109 11 The American Experience 140 12 The Necessary Features of a Programme 156 13 Conclusions 166 References 171 Index 177 v List of Figures l.l The changing U.K. balance of industrial and non industrial employment, 1962-73 3 1.2 Increase in non-industrial employment, excluding agri culture, as a proportion of industrial employment, 1962-73 4 2.1 Shares of total in employment 10 4.1 The four main rating scales 48 5.1 Attendance hours I - algorithm I 58 5.2 Attendance hours 2 - algorithm 2 59 5.3 Standard hours I - algorithm I 60 5.4 Standard hours 2 - algorithm 2 61 5.5 Performance I -algorithm I 62 5.6 Performance 2 - algorithm 2 63 11.1 Trends in employment by type 140 11.2 Productivity and wage trends - finance and insurance industries 141 11.3 Kearney survey-number of respondents by industry and number having programmes 142 11.4 Kearney survey - distribution by industry of thirty 'more successful' programmes 144 11.5 Kearney survey - use of techniques in the thirty 'more successful' programmes 149 11.6 Kearney survey-number of techniques employed in the thirty 'more successful' programmes 150 11.7 Kearney survey-significant variances in use of technique between thirty 'more successful' and sixty 'less successful' programmes 150 11.8 Kearney survey-distribution by size of thirty companies having 'more successful' programmes 151 11.9 Kearney survey-first year productivity gains realised through implementation of programme 153 11.10 Kearney survey-subsequent-year productivity gains following realisation of first-year initial benefits 153 Vl List of Tables 2.1 Trends and projections of employment in Great Britain, 1961-81 8 2.2 The occupied population of Great Britain by major occupational group, 1911-61 11 2.3 Percentage of white-collar workers m the employed population 12 2.4 Composition of the labour force by industry, showing the number of white-collar workers, and the growth trends 13 4.1 Evaluation of techniques 45 4.2 Ratings for walking - British Standard scale 49 7.1 Trade union membership and density, 1964-70 84 11.1 Kearney survey-definition and use of clerical control techniques 14 7 11.2 Kearney survey - use of techniques by companies having 'more successful' programmes in various industry groups 151 Vll Acknowledgements The author and publishers wish to thank the following who have kindly given permission for the use of copyright material. H.M.S.O., for statistics used in Fig. 1.1 and Table 2.1, and for Fig. 2.1. H.M.S.O. and G. S. Bain, for statistics used in Table 2.2. I.L.O., for statistics used in Fig. 1.2. R. Lumley and Methuen Ltd, for statistics used in Tables 2.4 and 7.1. Gower Press Ltd, for some of the measurement technique information in Chapter 4 already used in a different context in the author's The Management of Drawing and Design, 1975. A. T. Kearney, for source material used in Chapter 11. viii Preface This book is about the control of staff-related overhead. It outlines possible arrangements, not involving significant capital expenditure, for the systematic control of that part of any organisation's overheads which directly relate to white-collar workers. It does not set out to deal with every aspect of management and administration which could conceivably affect the numbers and the total cost of staff employees in any organisation. Clearly the range of such aspects is wide and would be outside the scope of any book of this kind. Neither is it a textbook of office methods and procedures nor of staff management. What the book does do is to start from the clear fact that the pro portion of white-collar workers in the overall population of the developed nations has grown and continues to grow. In the United Kingdom that growth is at a pace which means that by the eighties there will be more white-collar workers than manual workers in the United Kingdom. Staff-related costs as a proportion of the overall costs of most organisations in the U.K. have also grown and continue to grow. Again the same trends exist in all other developed economies, with the United Kingdom being an important example. The book emphasises that the problem is a world-wide one, common to all developed nations. Much of the information in the book is based on United Kingdom examples. The justification is that the problem and the issues surrounding it are particularly complex in the United Kingdom, which probably has the most difficult combination of the relevant circumstances. Possible approaches to the continuous improvement of staff pro ductivity by methods not involving significant plant and equipment capital expenditure are examined. Comments are made on those approaches and a suitable course of action for managers concerned with the issues is recommended. In doing so, the book also particularly examines recent experience in the United States where the proportion of white-collar workers is already much higher than in the United Kingdom. The text is intended for a general management audience inter nationally, and is mindful of the particular needs of senior managers lX