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Davies Ndumiso Sibanda on Labour Matters

MANY employers spend a lot of time fighting members of the Workers Committee instead of working together for the good of the organisation because they do not understand the role of the Workers Committee.

I have always asked new members of the workers committee how many of them have been congratulated for being elected into the Workers Committee and have had meetings with the bosses on how they will work together.

In most cases very few will have been congratulated, instead most will have been warned that Workers Committee business is not what they were hired to do and as such they should be careful as they do Workers Committee business which does not add any value.

Such conduct by particularly managerial employees is a clear sign of individuals who have not been trained in their human capital management role and labour laws of the country. The labour laws that provide for the establishment and roles of the Workers Committee are intended to provide for protection of workers’ rights at work, ensure good labour relations prevails and also that workers contribute to productivity improvements.

Going through minutes of Works Council meetings in different organisations, one can easily tell management thrust in managing and utilising the Workers Committee.

I have seen cases where organisations focus on rights and limits, others’ focus is on good labour relations while a few create a balance of all focusing on productivity improvement. At times within the same organisation there are managerial employees who unlock value from the Workers Committee and there are others who are at war with Workers Committee members.

In worse cases, the chief executive cannot unlock value from the Workers Committee but leads his team in a war against the Workers Committee members to an extent that workers are scared to be appointed into the Workers Committee. This is a clear sign of failure in leadership.

I recall a case of a chief executive who was boasting that he has instilled fear amongst workers to an extent that no worker wants to form or be a member of the Workers Committee and as such for the last three years he has had no problems.

However, on doing labour relations audit, it was established that there was extreme fear of victimisation by workers and they had responded by joining the union and talked to the employer through the union, which was made of non-employees.

The company had over 25 disputes with workers pending before the NEC. All the disputes could have been easily dealt with at Works Council had there been a Workers Committee.

The case given above exposed the business to low morale, conflict culture, mistrust, fear and ultimately low productivity. Further, having internal matters externalised through the union to the NEC before being first dealt with by the Workers Committee and the employer has many damaging effects that cannot be dealt to exhaustion in this article.

In conclusion, to get maximum value from the Workers Committee, the starting point is not training the Workers Committee but training all managerial employees in labour relations covering areas such as basic labour law, role of the Workers Committee, conduct of productive council meetings and productivity improvement and thereafter train the Workers Committee.

Davies Ndumiso Sibanda can be contacted on: Email: [email protected]