flexible employment policies and working … the improvement of living and working conditions...

P. Huuhtanen, I. Kandolin, Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Helsinki, Finland.

EUROPEAN FOUNDATION for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions

Flexible Employment Policies and Working Conditions

Finland

Summary and discussion

National context

Results of the research

Summary and conclusions

References

Annexes

The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions is an autonomous body of the European Union, created to assist the formulation of future policy on social and work-related matters. Further information can be found at the Foundation’s website at http://www.eurofound.ie/ This report is available in electronic format only and has not been submitted to the standard Foundation editorial procedures.

© European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, 2000

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1. Summary and discussion 1.1 Executive summary National context The labour market in Finland has been traditionally regulated by legislation and tripartite co-operation between the government and labour market parties (employers’ and employees’ organisations). In contrast to the situation in most other member states of the European Union (EU), the level of trade union membership of both blue- and white-collar workers in Finland is very high, about 80 %. The existing industrial relations system offers a general framework for the development of flexible employment strategies. Finnish legislation on occupational safety and health is comprehensive in content. It actually covers all people taking part in working life. The occupational health service system covers over 90% of employees. Working life issues have a high priority in the programme of the new government. Even if opinions regarding the universal application of collective agreements and the role of local agreements differ between the main government parties and employers’ organisations and trade unions, the general climate for continued tripartite co-operation is good in Finland. Typical in Finland is the high proportion of women participating in working life. However, in contrast to the situation in other countries, part-time employment is only 11% for women and 5% for men in 1997. The portion of fixed-term workers in 1998 was 18% (women 22%, men 13%). The topics of Finnish studies mostly cover “external quantitative flexibility”, “internal quantitative flexibility” and such atypical employment forms as fixed-term work and different working-time patterns. Other topics have been the uncertainty regarding work and the situation of the unemployed (“external qualitative flexibility”). An analysis of Finnish studies suggests that two trends and causal links seem probable: higher demands for productivity lead to greater stress and time pressure at work, and increased flexibility in response to fierce competition often leads to unemployment and fixed-term employment. Sectors with increased competition, especially labour-intense service sectors, have primarily begun to use different working time arrangements as a means to cut costs. In service sectors with less or no significant change in competition different working time arrangements have been applied mainly to increase the employees' options. Research data show that uncertainty (threat of “external qualitative flexibility”) has negative effects on an employee’s well-being although the interaction is complex. Changes in economic activity and in the labour market have increased the polarisation of the labour force. Research on flexible enterprises show, however, that enterprises with the greatest success in the 1990s have used quantitative and qualitative functional flexibility simultaneously. In answering the main study questions, the following conclusions are presented: • Both organisational and individual history are important determinants of reactions toward

change. The temporal factors are almost always omitted in studies on flexibility.


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• Difficulties in balancing the capacity of computers, staff available in teams, and the behaviour of customers limit the benefits of flexibility policy in call centres.

• Conflicting demands from different flexibility strategies are apparent in Bank case. • Case analyses of shortened working days did not reveal any deterioration of working

conditions. • There is a risk of more intensified work, without enough recovering elements and breaks in

call centre work. • Qualitative flexibility in terms of training and increased participation improve well-being

of personnel in the hospital case. • Short-term temporary employment does not offer workers a possibility to become fully

motivated and to use their skills and qualifications. In an intervention project carried out in a hospital short-term employment did not lead to innovative practices.

• There are distinct gender tendencies behind the new models for working life (negative impacts of "all types of flexible strategies"). Fixed-term contracts have become most common among women over 30 years of age with higher education, while, among men, fixed-term contracts are more common for younger employees entering their first jobs. There is a risk of further segregation of the labour market by gender, especially concerning work content and wages.

• Elderly workers' participation in working life has been used to balance the supply and demand of labour, for example, through adjustments in pension rules and statutes and retirement ages. This policy has increased the risk of marginalisation among elderly workers with low education.

• Developing skills is difficult in contingent work, because skills are only in fragmentary use.

• In all, repeated national surveys have concluded that employee competencies have not been used as much as possible during the 1990s within all principal employee categories.

1.2 Discussion The social dimension of the Nordic welfare state model stresses the importance of guaranteeing a socially and economically productive life for all groups, independently of their status in working life. Strong and stable economic growth is a precondition of employment and thought it revenue is increased and opportunities to maintain the safety net as regards, for example, sickness and unemployment are strengthened. Collective agreements provide further opportunities for local solutions to working hours, pay and other working conditions. However, too few data on flexible arrangements and their impact on working conditions at the local level are available. Regarding the older generations at work, the main means with which to combat marginalisation is to maintain work ability as long as possible. For the youngest generation, attachment to working life is the key issue. A period of fragmentary work is not a risk for those with high level of education who voluntarily choose this alternative during the first years in working life. In contrast, the risk of marginalisation is severe among those who are less educated and who have been unemployed since leaving school and who also have unemployed family members.


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The following broad recommendations are suggested (to be further elaborated): • Responsibilities regarding health and safety issues must be clarified regarding atypical

work situations. • Preventive measures should be taken to eliminate the safety risks of temporary workers. • Occupational health services should be organised for the self-employed.


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2. National context 2.1 Description of external factors, national debates 2.1.1 National policies regarding flexibility in working life The labour market in Finland has been traditionally regulated by legislation and tripartite co-operation between the government and labour market parties (employers’ and employees’ organisations). The development is based on legislation, social security systems and agreements between the parties regarding flexibility, in the form of both employment and contracts and working time arrangements (the Working Time Act in 1996, based on a EU directive). In contrast to the situation in most other member states of the European Union (EU), the level of trade union membership of both blue- and white-collar workers in Finland is very high, about 80%. Unions also have an active role within the workplace. Employers and self-employed farmers are well organised also in their confederations. A recent public action of labour unions against the Insurance Group’s notices and outsourcing witnessed the broad power of labour unions. The Finnish legislation on occupational safety and health is comprehensive in content. It actually covers all people taking part in working life. In principle, the practices of the labour inspectorate have been adjusted to meet European requirements. The Ministry of Social Affairs and Health, the labour inspection districts and the Ministry of Labour are the main authorities governing occupational safety and health. The occupational health service system covers over 90% of employees. Expansion of the coverage is still needed for the construction industry, retail trade and transportation services (i.e., industries with many fixed-term contracts) and the self-employed. About 20-40% of the 70 000 persons active in occupational health and safety are appropriately trained. The level of training of experts in occupational health is approximately 70-80% (Rantanen 1995). Both positive and negative economic incentives are used to promote occupational health (e.g., compensation for occupational health services for 50% of employers and different kinds of penalty fines by labour inspection). Working life issues have a high priority in the programme of the new government, including research initiatives and policy measures regarding unemployment, productivity, work ability, occupational health and safety, burn-out, marginalisation, and the ageing workforce. The parties agree on the need to extend the period during which people belong to the workforce. The need to bring labour protection legislation up to date is also apparent. Legislative amendments The applicability issue, among other things, is also being discussed by the committee preparing an amendment of the Law on Contracts of Employment. Preparation has also been started on an amendment for the Occupational Health Care Act regarding the responsibilities of organising occupational health services in atypical work situations. In relation to the Labour Protection Act, discussion is also in progress concerning occupational safety responsibilities. In the construction industry, a new agreement between parties will be signed regarding occupational health services for fixed-term workers.


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Legislative amendments that became active on 1 February 1997, regarding certain chapters of the Contracts of Employment Act, the Labour Protection Act, and the Study Leave Act, aimed at enhancing the employment and social security of persons in atypical work. Making it easier to enter fixed-term employment contracts aims at increasing flexibility in working life and at making flexibility possible in the service sector, as it was earlier in industry. As one part of the income policy agreement in 1998, a working group was nominated to prepare guidelines for a working time bank. An analysis has been made of the content of current agreements in different economic sectors. Regarding working time agreements and practices, the situation differs markedly between the public sector, industry, and the private service sectors. In addition, agreements differ also between different personnel groups (blue-collar workers, white-collar workers) inside each sector. The greatest flexibility and local agreements on a working time bank have been negotiated between parties regarding white-collar employees in industry and employees in the public sector. As a result of temporal fluctuation in the economic situation and the shortage or surplus of labour, elderly workers’ participation in working life has been used to balance the supply and demand of labour, for example, through adjustments in pension rules and statutes and retirement ages (legislation covering early and part-time retirement). This policy has increased the risk of marginalisation among elderly workers with low education. The National Age Program for the ageing workforce is now underway (1998-2002). It aims at enhancing the situation of elderly workers, for example, by moulding attitudes, disseminating information on the work ability of ageing people, offering training, and developing more flexible work arrangements. 2.1.2 Statements of involved parties According to the Central Organisation of Finnish Trade Unions (SAK), laws on working time, employment contracts and so forth provide a general frame of reference. Changes in recent years have meant that the collective agreements provide still further opportunities for local solutions on working hours, pay and other working conditions. This problem should, however, be solved within the framework of collective agreements for the various economic sectors. In general, unions are emphasising the importance of collective income policy agreements at the national, economic and local level. In these collective agreements, exceptions to and specifications of respective laws are negotiated and documented. Continuous negotiations and the development of co-operation are seen as the best ways to build confidence within work organisations and to create even better prerequisites for the reform of working life. The Labour Market Climate Survey by SAK in January 1999 revealed that attitudes toward the scope of local agreements have become more critical. Altogether 71% of the respondents representing the Finnish population over 15 years of age shared the opinion that workers have a weak position if salaries and other conditions of employment are negotiated totally at the local level. In 1996, the respective proportion was 62%. According to representatives of the Employers’ Confederation of Service Industries, flexible working hours are especially important in the service sector. Working time should be organised in relation to customers’ needs and behaviours. The demand for services and staff fluctuates daily, weekly and seasonally. Local agreements and experimentation are emphasised, combining the advantages of flexible working hours for both employers and


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employees. In general, legislation that is too rigid regarding the organisation of work should be avoided. According to the Commission for Local Authority Employers, which negotiates collective agreements for the public municipal sector, work to develop job-sharing models, increase flexibility at work, and improve employees' professional skills is in progress. New jobs are being created through increases in part-time employment and experiments with diversifying working hours. In 1998 only 28 municipalities of the total of 452 had started negotiations concerning exceptional working-time arrangements. Other new solutions have been implemented at individual workplaces. According to TEHY, the Union of Health and Social Care Services, the employer has almost always been the party to make initiatives on flexible working time arrangements. Two main forms of flexibility are becoming common. There is, for example, longer, usually 12-hour shifts (i.e., "condensed" working time with longer continuous free periods). Secondly, there is a longer term solution, usually a 1-year period over which the total maximum number of hours are worked instead of the habitual 3-week system. Employees, with their representative unions, have thus far shown only little initiative in participating in the planning of new forms of flexibility that would introduce this concept on the basis of individual needs. Part-time work is not very widespread in the municipal sector, and only 14% of employees worked part-time in 1998. Employees' representatives have not favoured part-time work because, in a sector with a low wage level, earnings from part-time work would not be enough for basic living expenses. The employer has also been watchful because of the possible lowering of the quality of services. It is assumed that part-time employment will become more common, however, mostly because of state substituted practices like the part-time bonus and part-time pension systems that have become more popular. The use of state-offered family, maternity, child and nursing leaves has become more common in female-dominated sectors. Accordingly substitutes, both part- and full-time, will be needed. Because these new forms of individual flexibility, shortening of daily or yearly working time, are more commonly chosen by women, the wage gap between the genders has increased. The majority of the workers in the service sector are women. This female dominance leads to different kinds of working time arrangements, based, for example, on legislation and agreements on free time for nursing and child care, substitutes for maternity leaves, and arrangements for child care in cases of sudden illness. The Employees’ Federation of Service Industries has proposed that a more even distribution of these extra costs be organised among all employers. The increase in legislation-based absence from work may lead to an unwillingness to hire permanent workers, especially in small service companies. Both the representatives of the trade unions and the employers share the opinion that too little data on flexible arrangements and their impact on working conditions at the local level are available. The negotiating parties are trying to formulate new policies and strategies in response to the legislative amendments described in section 2.1.1. 2.1.3 Statistics and trends Typical in Finland is the high proportion of women participating in working life. However, in contrast to the situation in other countries, part-time employment is only 11% for women and


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5% for men (in 1997, Lehto & Sutela 1999). The portion of fixed-term workers in 1997 was 18% (women 21%, men 15%). A traditional working life career pattern in Finland can be characterised as long full-time employment, ending sharply in an early full-time pension (mean age of retirement 58 years). The data gathered in the seventh Finnish working life barometer in October 1998 (telephone interview of 1232 wage and salary earners) revealed that, in spite of the slowing growth in the number of employees, the amount of overtime work continues to increase. In addition to paid overtime work, much overtime is done without separate remuneration in the public sector (Ylöstalo 1999). In 1998, the majority of the respondents said that tight schedules at work had increased. The number of new permanent employment relationships was somewhat greater in 1998 than earlier. However, the share of new permanent employment is still low, slightly over 30% of all new employment. Altogether 13% of the workplaces had recruited part-time workers in 1998. In addition 3% of the workplaces had begun to hire part-time workers (Ylöstalo 1999). In the private service sector, the share of fixed-term employees was 16% (in banks 4%) and that of part-time employees was 18% (in banks 8%) in 1998 (Statistics of Employer’s Confederation of Service Industries). As regards new recruitments in 1998, the share of fixed-term employees was 48% and that of part-time employees 49%. Part-time contracts are the most frequent in the retail and hotel and restaurant branch, while fixed-term contracts are common in social and health services. In the public sector in 1998 flexible working hours and employment contracts were not common. Altogether 14% of the employees in the municipal sector worked part-time and 22% had fixed-term contracts. The proportion of temporary workers has not increased during the 1990s; in 1991 their share was 22% (Kuntatyönantaja 3/1999). According to the European Survey on Working Conditions in 1996, Finland is one of the leaders in many positive aspects; Finnish employees can participate more than workers in other EU countries in the planning of their work, in quality assessment, and in in-house training. Furthermore, new forms of work organisation, like teamwork and job rotation, are already widely used in Finland. Possibly, as a cost of this activity, workers in Finland state more often than other workers that they do not have time to get their jobs done (32%). The characteristics of the technological infrastructure in Finland is one prerequisite for flexible work arrangements. According to the Quality of Work Life Survey in 1997 (Lehto & Sutela 1999), 64% of the workforce uses computers and other information technology, 36% use e-mail at work, and 38% use mobile phones at work (men 57%, women 20%). 2.1.4 Summary of a review of Finnish literature The topics of Finnish studies mostly cover “external quantitative flexibility”, “internal quantitative flexibility” and such atypical employment forms as fixed-term work and different working-time patterns. Other topics have been the uncertainty experienced regarding work and the situation of the unemployed (“external qualitative flexibility”). Some data on teams are also available (“internal qualitative flexibility”). The analysis of Finnish studies suggests that two trends and causal links seem probable: higher demands for productivity lead to greater stress and time pressure at work, and


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increased flexibility in response to fierce competition often leads to unemployment and fixed-term employment. Research data show that uncertainty (threat of “external qualitative flexibility”) has negative effects on the employee’s well-being although the interaction is complex. The changes in economic activity and in the labour market have increased the polarisation of the labour force. Repeated national surveys have concluded that employee competencies have not been used as much as possible during the 1990s within all principal employee categories (problems in increasing “internal qualitative flexibility”) (Kevätsalo 1999). Kevätsalo argues that, at the same time, the polarisation of labour has increased as a result of the strong position of traditional management methods. A new kind of entrepreneurial work organisation is suggested as an alternative choice for the local managers and employees. An important precondition is the development of trust between parties. Employees should still defend their rights but a shift is needed away from a calculative attitude toward commitment to common goals (Kevätsalo 1999). A study in the textile and clothing industry revealed that this industry is on the threshold of discovering new work organisations and new uses of the labour force. In women's work culture, the disposition of equality is understood as a binding norm (Heiskanen et al 1998). The Tayloristic mode of production no longer matches the empirical reality in women's teams. Along with the start-up of teams, a need is arising to create new practices that increase communication and lead to common meetings and negotiations. When analysing the impact of temporary employment on performance in a grocery store, Kalliomäki-Levanto et al. (1998) concluded that there were two core concepts that influenced the results: the flow of goods and customers, and the insecurity of the temporary employees. When the two were examined together, the results revealed that the organisation most only tolerates a mobile workforce, unanticipated situations and interruptions, while the agency-hired worker most also tolerates the added factor of insecurity in everyday life. A study in 1995-96 has revealed a 10-15% higher rate of accidents for temporary workers (duration of work less than six months) in industry than for workers in permanent jobs. No difference in accident rate could be found in service work (Report of Federation of Accident Insurance Institutions, 1999). According to the Quality of Work Life Survey, the most frequent comments on fixed-term employment concern the stressfulness of constant insecurity, the inability to plan for the future, conflicts and competition arising from insecurity, and difficulties with everyday affairs, for example, difficulties in getting loans from banks (Lehto & Sutela 1999). The positive aspects of fixed-term employment are the feeling of independence, the possibility for change, and the avoidance of internal conflicts within the workplace. However, two out of three respondents rated the nature of their employment relationship as negative, the women more often (75%) than the men (56%). (Lehto & Sutela 1999.) The survey also revealed that the situation is worse for persons over 40 years of age and those with very short employment contracts. Lehto and Sutela (1999) concluded that “when labour market flexibility is implemented through a fixed-term employment relationship, the highest price is paid by women. Fixed-term employment is common among salaried female employees over 30 years of age with an upper secondary or tertiary qualification”.


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Accordingly, there are distinct gender tendencies behind the new models for working life (negative impacts of “all types of flexible strategies”) (Lehto & Sutela 1999, Heiskanen et al 1998). Perceived job insecurity has been best explained by the temporary nature of the employment relationship and earlier unemployment experiences. In particular part-time and temporary workers, who experience job insecurity and would prefer full-time or permanent work, have joined trade unions. A regression analysis confirmed the negative effects of perceived insecurity found in earlier studies in respect to work and health behaviour (Nätti et al 1998). Temporary and part-time work has increased in the hotel and restaurant sector in Finland during the past ten years, especially with respect to new work contracts. Changes in the work can affect the psychological contract and commitment of the employees. These issues can also relate to the psychological climate of work groups. The definition of "untypical" or contingent work in the study of Moilanen & Vainikka (1999) refers to work which is not full-time and permanent. These are, for example, temporary agency work, seasonal, part-time work; and on-call work. The aim of the study was to compare the basic life resources of employees in permanent and contingent work. In a cross-sectional survey, a sample was taken in randomized blocks (unemployed, part-time employed and regular work) to obtain enough people in atypical work situations. Altogether 755 employees in the hotel and restaurant sector answered the questionnaire. There were 86% women and 14% men. At the time of the data collection 70% had a work contract, and 30% were unemployed. Sixty-three per cent were in permanent work and 37% in temporary work. The income of the contingent workers was significantly lower than that of permanent, full-time employees. The possibilities of planning one's future, raising a family, having children and supporting them was considered to be hindered by the type of work in contingent work. Health care and housing arrangements were also hindered by temporary work more often than permanent work was the possibilities to take part in free-time or social activities was perceived to be hindered by an atypical work situation. However, employees in permanent jobs were more exhausted than temporary or part-time workers were. Moilanen & Vainikka (1999) also found that the following basic life tasks and resources were statistically very significantly connected with type of work contract: • income, and the possibilities of • future planning, • having and supporting children, • taking part in societies and associations, • arranging housing and health care, • having free-time and hobbies - so that people in temporary and contingent work claimed

that work hinders the management of life tasks. The income of temporary workers was also statistically significantly lower than that of permanent workers.

People who were employed were happier and more secure about the future and more satisfied with their life than those who had no work contract at the time of the data collection. The workers who had permanent work experienced their life as more secure than temporary workers did. Those in part-time work experienced their life as less happy and their future as


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more uncertain, than full-time workers did. Normal everyday functioning in society is based on the assumption of full-time and permanent work. If the change in working life is toward increased "flexible" work, the problems with life resources should to be solved. The amount of work is distributed unevenly. Those who have permanent full-time work tend to have too much strain, and those who have contingent work feel uncertainty and are underemployed. (Moilanen & Vainikka 1999) A follow-up study of municipal workers revealed a significant association between downsizing and medically certified sick leave (Vahtera et al 1997). The rate of absenteeism was 2.3 times greater after major downsizing, classified by occupation, than after minor downsizing. The corresponding rate ratios for musculoskeletal disorders and trauma were 5.7 and 2.7. Vahtera and his co-workers concluded that downsizing is a risk to the health of employees. However, this risk varies according to individual factors such as age, socio-economic status and health, as well as according to factors related to the place of work and the size and age structure of the staff (Vahtera et al 1997). A study of two large Finnish commercial banks which merged in February 1995, explored how people experienced the bank merger and the phases they saw in the merger (Heikkilä 1998). A study goal was to describe the individual's coping strategies and coping-oriented activity during the process. Another goal was to determine concrete or mental changes the bank employees experienced and what types of solutions they arrived at after the change processes. Effort was made to combine qualitative and quantitative data. In contrast to most studies on merging, it was found that, although the merger had been a very stressful phase for people, a large proportion of them experienced it as positive in the end. Especially those who left the bank voluntarily felt that the merger had been a great opportunity to realize aspects of oneself. Of those who remained working at the bank, 57% felt that the merger had been an opportunity further to obtain more challenging tasks, new colleagues and the chance to learn about new types of bank services and products (Heikkilä 1998). According to a recent study (Flexible Enterprise Project, by Antila & Ylöstalo 1999 a, b) on medium size and large Finnish private enterprises (with more than nine employees), a total of 23% of all workplaces were classified as functionally flexible. Flexibility was defined by using a flexibility variable (designed by the Swedish team Towards Flexible Organisations 1996) including two dimensions: 1) a responsibility index (task autonomy of an employee, decentralization of decision making) and 2) training included in the job. This approach focuses on internal factors in the organisation, (i.e., internal functional flexibility). Bigger workplaces were more flexible (64% of those with 200 or more employees) than smaller ones (21% of those with less than 20 employees), and workplaces in the service sector, especially the finance and insurance sector (68%), were more flexible than the ones in manufacturing (18%) and construction (9%). Similar trends of flexibility are evident in all the Nordic countries. Functionally flexible workplaces were more likely than traditional ones to use various working time arrangements (e.g., flexitime, sabbaticals, adjusted periods, time banking). There was a particularly clear difference between flexible and traditional workplaces as to how common individually tailored working times were. Altogether 60% of the flexible workplaces provided individually tailored arrangements for working hours, while only 43% of the traditional ones did so.


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Sectors with increased competition, especially in labour intense service sectors, have begun to use different forms of working time arrangements primarily as a means with which to cut costs. In the service sectors with less or no significant change in competition different working times have been applied mainly to increase the employees' options (Antila & Ylöstalo 1999b). Participative planning, i.e., joint discussions between the management and the personnel, has proved means for successful implementation of new working time models (Kandolin 1997). Almost half of the functionally flexible workplaces had fixed-term employees, but fixed-term employees accounted for only 7% of all employees at flexible workplaces. Traditional workplaces used fixed-term employees slightly less often. It seems that flexible workplaces use fixed-term employment as an element in personnel policy to quite a large extent, even if the significance of this type of employment is not very great. When studied at an interval of several years, functionally flexible enterprises were found to be clearly more successful, in terms of the number of employees, productivity and wages, than traditional ones. Productive workplaces that increased their staff during the first half of the 1990s have several typical characteristics: extensive co-operation with others, the use of information technology and readiness to develop work organisations. According to the Flexible Enterprise Project on essential factor has proved to be that enterprises with the greatest success have used quantitative and operational flexibility simultaneously. 2.2 Description of the cases 2.2.1 Case I: Bank Since the beginning of the 1980s, the financial service sector has gone through continuous change in information technology. Simultaneously, the labour force has been reduced dramatically in deposit banks in Finland, from about 53 000 in 1987 to less than 25 000 in 1998. (Financial Sector Union SUORA). The number of branches was 3523 in 1989 and 1570 in 1998. Mergers, organisational restructuring, highly advanced computer technology with electronic transactions and increased self-service for customers (e.g., via the Internet), and the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) have changed the work organisation, division of tasks, and skill requirements of managers, experts and clerks. The case study focused on internal quantitative and qualitative flexibility strategies in call centres of a nationwide banking group in Finland. The first part of the case describes an experiment with 6.5 of hours working time per day, including Saturdays and Sundays, starting in January 1999 (”internal quantitative flexibility”). The second part deals with motives and experiences regarding the implementation of a team-based work organisation (”internal qualitative flexibility”). Position of the concern in the market The banking and finance group provides a full range of services, covering the whole of Finland. The bank and Finnish Export Credit were merged in December 1997 under the ownership of a holding company. The headquarters are located in Helsinki, and the group employs about 4700 workers, reduced by over 500 during 1998. Measured by assests, the bank and its subsidiaries form Finland’s second-largest commercial banking group. It has its own nationwide network of 63 branches and advanced telephone and on-line banking services. Altogether 477 post offices also provide its banking services. (Annual Report 1998)


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Retail customer transactions grew by 4% in 1998, the increase being greatest in the use of home banking services, self-service telephones and bank cards. Correspondingly, there was a rapid decrease in payments and withdrawals made in branch offices. Electronic account transfers accounted for 95% of the payments of companies and institutions. The number of bank and combination cards increased by more than 10% to over 430 000 cards. The Bank intends to reinforce its position in retail and corporate banking services, particularly in the main population centres. It has nearly one million retail customers (of slightly more than 5 million inhabitants in Finland), who use it as their primary bank, and about 200 000 corporate customers. In 1998, in the operating profit was a satisfactory FIM 775 million, a 16% improvement over the previous year (Annual Report 1998). The telephone bank of the bank concern has a staff of more than 200 in three units located in three towns. The first centre was started in 1992, the third in 1998. At the start of 1999, the telephone bank became the first Nordic bank to offer personal banking services on Sundays. In the first quarter of 1999, about 40 new customer-service employees were recruited. Call Centre Technology Technologically, the telephone banking system in use (CTI) is among the most highly developed in the Nordic countries. It identifies the customer, recognises whether loan, investment or payment services are required, and then automatically routes the call directly to a suitable bank expert. The newest channel for the customers is the Internet on-line bank. The Bank will also be the first to launch banking services based on digital signature for the wireless application protocol (WAP) that has been developed for mobile phones. The service will be offered to a pilot group of customers by the end of this year and will be extended to all customers who use WAP mobile phones in the course of 2000. Personnel policy of the concern The Bank concern has a special feature regarding its negotiation of conditions for employment and for collective agreements. It has its own, nationwide collective agreement and is not obliged to follow the nationwide bank collective agreement (although major disagreements are in general not possible). This situation forms the basis of the employer policy of the company. According to bank policy, for example, working time arrangements can be, and are, solved inside the concern, within the rules of the Working Time Act. They are solved in a permanent working time group, in which both parties are included. The telephone bank, as such, has no authority or power to make its own decisions in these matters. Occupational health and safety policy Regarding the working conditions, the Bank has its own collective agreement system, based on the agreement between parties. An annual “Labour Protection Programme” provides guidelines and common policies for organising occupational health and safety services. The bank has been very active in this field. The safety programme of the concern is accepted in an in-house committee on occupational safety matters and in an in-house committee on internal collaboration. It is updated yearly and is based on a broad, systematic approach with health promotion and improvements in ergonomics and working conditions in an organisational context.


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The safety policy has been traditionally centralised. The concern has its own occupational health care unit, which has active co-operation with human resource management experts and with safety personnel. Occupational health personnel hired by the bank have a good opportunity to react rapidly to health claims, for example, by providing ergonomic guidance and workplace consultations. Health inspections are organised at five-year intervals by organisational units, and feedback is given to the work community. The results and recommended measures are jointly discussed. Outside the Helsinki region, daily services are purchased from private local occupational health care companies. Training in health and safety issues is organised for all employee groups and health and safety representatives, both in internal courses and in outside training. 2.2.2 Case II: City Hospital Health care services in Finland are almost totally provided by the public sector. The Ministry of Social Affairs and Health is responsible for national health policy, new legislation and the state share of financing. The local authorities (i.e., municipalities and cities with elected councils) provide, organise and purchase the major part of the health services for their residents, however. The tax financing covers 75% of the total financing of health care expenditures (EURO 7.5 billion in 1996), private financing consists mostly of out-of-pocket payments of individual households (22%), private health insurance (2%) and employers (1%). Recent developments in the health care sector The public sector in Finland employs 28% of the total workforce, the state sector has 7% of the employees, and the municipal sector, which is primarily responsible for health care, education, and social service, employs 21%. Due to the economic recession in the first half of the 1990s, there have been marked cuts in the budgets of the public sector, the biggest savings focussing on personnel expenditure. Accordingly, 10% of the jobs were lost in the first half of the 1990s in the municipal sector, but in the second half the figures began slowly to increase again, as the number of part-time employees began to increase. The cuts in personnel have meant changes in work policies, increased insecurity, a heavier workload for those remaining and, accordingly, an increased number of cases of fatigue and burnout. The negative consequences of the recession were more evident in the municipal sector than in the private or state sectors. Because new employees have seldom been hired, the ageing of the workforce has become a problem in the public sector. The average age of employees is about 42 years in the public sector and 38 years in the private sector. Correspondingly, the proportion of younger employees (less than 35 years of age) is much smaller in the municipal sector (24%) than in the private sector (37%). Most employees in the municipal sector are women (76%), compared with 40% in the private sector. Problems of unemployment, ageing, and burn-out among personnel in the municipal sector have appeared, and, therefore, in 1996, the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs, together with the Ministry of Labour, started to develop projects to improve the situation by decreasing the problematic time pressure and strain of health care work and improving work quality. One of these projects was a 2-year intervention concerning working time arrangements in 20 municipalities (from the total of 452). Employment subsidies were granted when a municipality, through an agreement with the employees, reduced the working hours of its employees and, at the same time, employed an unemployed job seeker.


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The case city (a middle-sized city, less than 100 000 inhabitants) was not included in the national experiment, but, in the spring of 1997, decided nevertheless to give a grant to the city hospital to undergo a similar experiment. Two forms of flexibility were combined, namely, the shortening of working hours (part-time work) and employment of new personnel (fixed-term contracts for 2 years). 2.3 Description of the research methods Research methods in the bank case: • analysis of company documents and statistics • semistructured interviews of the senior vice president, vice president (Human Resources

and Development), local managers, employees representatives, employees, health and safety representatives, occupational health and safety specialists (a total of 10 interviews)

• interviews of four representatives of employers’ and trade unions The experience gained from earlier reorganisation with respect to teams, training and skill development and the impacts of this form of “internal qualitative flexibility” are described on the basis of interview and survey data. A survey was conducted in two units of the telephone bank in 1998. The units with a different history of work organisation offered the possibility to compare different flexibility policies and the impact of flexibility within the same company. Research methods in the city hospital case: The implementation and effects of the 2-year working time experiment have been studied using both quantitative and qualitative methods. In addition to the ward with shortened working time, another ward for elderly patients with no major changes in personnel composition was chosen to serve as a control group. The number of personnel (minus the head nurses) in the study and control wards were: study ward n=24 working time 90 h/3 weeks control ward n=19 working time 115 h/3 weeks. The experience started in May 1997, and the first survey and theme interviews of the personnel were conducted in July 1997. The first half a year follow-up was conducted in December 1997, the 1-year follow-up took place in May 1998, and finally, the last follow-up was carried out in May 1999. The questionnaire study concerned the total personnel of the two wards. It comprised measures of background and family history, also including data on the economic situation of the family. Included were questions on the psychosocial aspects of the work (e.g., mental and physical load, time pressure, use of time in different tasks, possibilities to participate in the planning of schedules, workplace atmosphere and social support). Well-being was measured by mental and somatic symptoms, by feelings of, and possible causes of, stress, and by job satisfaction. In addition to these repeated measures in each follow-up sequence, the questionnaire also included questions measuring evaluations of possible changes concerning these issues.


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The personnel of the wards also participated in theme interviews in groups of 5-8 persons. The interviews focused on the implementation process of the experiment and also on the rhythms of the usual workday and the quality of the health services provided. In addition to the personnel of the wards the management of the hospital, the health manager and the director of the nursing service were interviewed.


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3. Results of the research 3.1 Strategies for flexibility and company policy 3.1.1 Case I: Bank 6.5 Hours of working time Flexibility as the strategy for a concern aims, at a general level, to guarantee services at times when customers are active both in the domestic and global market (money exchange, stock exchange). At the business level, the aims are more concrete. The pilot phase showed that work in the telephone bank, being at its start the most sophisticated and expensive system in Nordic countries, proved to be strenuous. A survey in 1995 had also shown that, of the employees in the different business units, those working in the telephone bank experienced the most stress. According to experience gained in call centres in the United States and Europe, 7 hours, 30 minutes is too long a time for efficient or effective telephone selling. In addition, experience in Finland shows that most customer calls come at noon, which is the normal lunch break. One major aim of the experimentation was to improve the accessibility of customer-service personnel. Given the limited scope of choice, two basic schemes were considered to reduce workload. Firstly, working time could be limited in strenuous tasks. Secondly, it could be possible to balance workload by having employees work at other, less demanding tasks for part of the workday. The telephone bank units are located in three separate localities (Helsinki, Kuopio, Oulu). Therefore in practice, other tasks during a working day cannot be organised. A shortened workday was left as the strategic choice. Simultaneously, more effective use of computer systems and workstations became possible. In the 7 hours, 15 minute schedules between 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. (14 hours of service time), most of the employees work during normal hours. Everyone needs her or his own workstation. Therefore, during the morning and evening hours, many workstations were not being used. The new schedule offered the possibility to gain more efficiency and effectiveness without extra investment in equipment by having employees work in pairs using the same workstation a total of 13 hours per weekday. The opening and closing of the workstations take a long period of time, which could be used for effective customer service. In a shorter working time, more activeness and energy in selling products is expected. In addition, more interesting work that is better adapted to the employees’ life situation is expected to increase commitment to the company. From the employers’ point of view, a shortened workday necessitates a reduction in compensation. This difficult problem was solved by a new management-by-result bonus wage system. It is supposed to guarantee the earlier income level of the employees when weekend work compensation is used. Furthermore, good performance can even increase income. Relation of the experiment with company policy on occupational safety and health.


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One aim of flexibility is to increase the mental scope of choice as regards individual performance at work. A personal daily work rhythm and the mental and physical capacity of employees (e.g., according to age or life-situation outside work) should be taken into account to a greater extent than before. A shortened working time gives, at least in principle, a better possibility to balance work and leisure-time activities, ideally even during a single workday. Furthermore, fewer hours at work facilitates vocational training, an option especially used by middle-aged female employees. Part-time work is rare in the bank. But it could offer, for example, students or mothers with small children a possibility to take part in working life. This situation is possible mainly in payment transaction tasks that do not need to be connected with customers’ behaviour and time schedules. Employees’ viewpoint According to a 34-year-old female employee, the pilot programme means 15 hours less working time a month, and even more if the compensation for work on Sundays is included. She responded with: ”I don’t like rush hours, taking children from day care is easier, I like free time during weekdays, it helps control of my life and gives me more time with my small children.” ”I am a morning person and like to start at 6:45, I am more effective in the morning.” Others mentioned also that by working a shorter day, more time is left for life spheres other than work. A shorter working time is even more attractive in the summer. Because of a new bonus wage system, based on a 4-month period, higher income could be expected. Those who stayed in normal working hours valued their leisure time on Sundays very highly and did not like having the idea of shorter times if they felt that such hours were being forced on them by the employer. Summary of the aims of the working time experimentation: • Availability of basic banking services to all customers, at all times and places (e.g., loan to

cover the purchase of a residence on a Sunday) • Longer operation times for workstations (CTI system) • Reduction of stress (according to a company-wide survey in 1995, conducted by the

Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, the stress level was at its highest in the telephone bank)

• Better quality of services • Increased profit by more active selling • Better balance between work and leisure time • Stronger commitment to organisation The following three basic types of flexible working time arrangements are in use: • 7 hours, 15 minutes in two shifts between 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. on weekdays and between 10

a.m. and 6 p.m. on Saturdays • 7 hours, 15 minutes only on a day shift; a service team works the traditional day shift

between 9 a.m. – 4.45 p.m. and offers services to branches inside the company. • 6 hours, 30 minutes in two shifts, including Sundays


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The teams, 9-16 employees in each, have been given the freedom to make individual daily and weekly arrangements. The first employees come in before 7 a.m. on weekdays to open the workstations (all active between 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. on the morning shift) and the last ones leave after 9 p.m. Implementation and experiences with team organisation Instead of competing with products, competition in banks is based on diversified service processes. The work organisation of call centres is based on teams, each offering service to specific customer groups. Each call centre can organise its own daily routines as long as it meets the customer service standards of the concern. According to the local manager of one call centre, the teams should have the main responsibility of guaranteeing qualified customer service. In principle, teams should have enough autonomy to organise daily staffing, guided by certain principles. The employees have different skill categories (loans, investments, and payment). In the mid-1990s, a lean organisation model based on customer segments was the goal. The local directors of the call centres were supposedly responsible for one customer segment. Each of them had to take responsibility for a couple of teams located in three different call centres. However, the diversification of services according to the customers’ individual needs proved to be difficult with the computer applications available. In addition, the directors had more administrative tasks than had been anticipated. Internal coherence between different flexibility strategies At the moment, the call centres are struggling between two main principles for organising their work. The combination of customer-segmented teams with the basic skills needed to handle different products (payment transactions, loans, investments) has proved to be more difficult than expected. The employees in each team have two possible working time schedules. Furthermore, current technology does not allow as flexible and precise a routing of customer calls as expected. The capacity of the computers is also limited. Therefore customers too often have to wait, and the best experts are not always available on the phone. A balance between customer segments on one hand and the available skills of the operators on the other is difficult, especially during rush hours and weekends. The strategic challenge in the future will be to find a solution that will give customer-service employees a better possibility to concentrate on the most essential issues of customer relations. Service time should be allocated to products that need more discussion and negotiation time with the customers but still provide enough profit in relation to the time used. Administrative and back office tasks take too much time at the moment. Degrees of freedom of management: control over environment Until the late 1980s, management practices were highly centralised in the bank. As a result of organisational changes, different business areas were given more autonomy in the beginning of the 1990s. However, sufficient competence in personnel policy and practices regarding, for example, employment policy and salaries, was difficult to organise. This situation led to a recentralisation of the human resource management (HRM) policy. As is often the case, differing opinions were also expressed about the centralisation of decision making and degrees of freedom at the concern and local level. The representatives of


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the telephone bank felt that they had to sell the idea to the central administration. This planning phase took several years. According to the senior vice president, the Bank Employers’ Association was informed about the Sunday work. Sunday work is seen by the competitors as a radical change in the employment policy of the banking sector. In addition the balance between shorter working hours and compensation is difficult to negotiate between parties. The interviewees of the call centre were of the opinion that the working time and salary issues are centrally controlled. They also felt that the call centres must bear a great deal of the responsibility for customer pressure directed toward the whole concern; employees in the call centres are in the front line and play a buffer role. Public opinion against the banking sector and reduced personal banking services have been very critical in this respect since the beginning of the 1990s. In contrast to the long preparatory phase, the implementation of the new working-time experiment started too fast, without all the necessary information and discussion needed between the employers’ and employees’ representatives. Due to the unsuccessful information dissemination (e.g., regarding compensation) the pilot project attained a bad reputation in the beginning. The employees’ representatives were afraid that the pilot was the first step towards all banking work being organised in forms of 6 hour, 30 minute schedules, including weekends. 3.1.2 Case II: City Hospital Aims and implementation of the flexibility project The working time experiment in the city hospital combined two forms of quantitative flexibility, namely, the shortening of working hours (part-time work) and the employment of new personnel (fixed-term contracts for two years). In the implementation process flexibility often also met the demands of individual employees because it was based on voluntary participation. The city hospital working time project was actually a counter project of the one-sided flexibility policy carried out in the middle of the 1990s when, because of an economic recession, the number of personnel was reduced and substitutes were not hired. This kind of employment policy had resulted in increased workload, and it had had effects on the well-being of the personnel. The 2-year experiment with part-time work was initiated by the hospital management without negotiations with the union. Negotiations were not needed because the working time arrangements did not differ from the regulations determined by law. According to the health manager, the project in the city hospital, with 365 employees working in hospital wards, was based on the voluntary participation of the employees. In March 1997 the hospital inquired about the willingness of employees to shorten their working time to part-time for two years, without (any real) monetary compensation. Of the 285 permanent health care workers, only 10 were willing to shorten their hours from the usual 115 hours in a 3-week period to 90 hours. In addition, 25 temporary workers (mostly with a couple of years of experience on short contracts with the hospital) were willing to participate in the experiment.


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In May 1997 one of the six wards for chronic elderly patients started to function with personnel with shortened working hours, 9 permanent workers and 16 with a 2-year temporary contract. The other nurses willing to work part-time were placed in other wards for elderly patients, one in each of five wards. In the experiment, thus, part-time work was introduced together with an increased number of personnel. The aim of the experiment, according to the city council, was to improve employment and, according to the city hospital, to reduce workload and, consequently, to improve the quality of health services. An attempt was also made to co-ordinate the number of personnel and services needed by placing more personnel in time periods of basic treatment, where most of the work takes place (i.e., in the morning when the meals are served, and fed, and in the evening during dinner time and bathing activities). Employees' viewpoint Central themes in the implementation of the experiment have been identified on the basis of initial interviews with the employees. One of these is the problem of receiving information about the experiment. The experiment was carried out in a remarkably short period. The employees felt that they received too little information about the project and that the information was partly contradictory. The lack of appropriate information caused the employees to be further confused by unofficial information, rumours and guesses. Another important problem was caused by voluntary participation. The temporary workers considered their situation to be difficult. According to the persons interviewed, they felt that they had compelling reasons to participate. If they had not taken part in the experiment, it might have been difficult to find another job in the city hospital or elsewhere in the city, where the unemployment rates are remarkably high. Temporary workers had usually obtained jobs only for a couple of months at a time. Working on a more long-term basis (e.g., for a period of 2 years) brought about many advantages for them, for instance, possibilities for long-term planning of the future. The relationships between the workers worsened in the beginning of the experiment at least temporarily. The employees who decided to participate felt that they were criticised by others. Some employees in the hospital thought that the participation in the experiment could be a kind of risk to all employees. They were afraid that the experiment would be extended later to the other wards. 3.2 Flexibility and working conditions 3.2.1 Case I: Bank 6.5 Hours of working time The impact of the new working time schedule was evaluated for the first time after the first four months. Regarding the employer’s expectation of higher sales during the shorter working day, the first experiences have been positive. As regards the organisational costs and benefits of the 6.5-hour experimentation, the customer service employees received about 230% higher sales rates, on average, than those working normal working hours during the first three-month pilot period. Higher sales activeness was witnessed by both the employer’s and employees’ representatives. The marked difference can be partly explained by the higher initial


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competence level of those who volunteered for the experiment and by the different routing of incoming customer calls. The frequency of Sunday work depends on the total number of employees doing the shorter day. During the first months, on average, it was once monthly. A shortened workday means that employees have no lunch breaks. Two shorter 15 minutes breaks are allowed. The employer offers a meal either before or after the workday, on the employees’ own time. Snacks are provided by the bank during the work period. “Sometimes the break just slips by” (employee). In one call centre, the experimentation started with more flexibility than in two others with respect to the employers’ interest in getting full use of workstations. In order to get full advantage of the longer operation time, employees must work in pairs, one after the other, covering a total time of 13 hours a day. Therefore no breaks in the service are allowed between the work shifts. The employees’ representatives argued that this kind of arrangement does not give enough flexibility during a workday. The feedback from the employees on shorter working time has been very positive. Now more flexibility can be offered (e.g., to mothers with small children). One advantage of work on Sundays has been the better possibility to concentrate on tasks since fewer people are present at the workplace. According to the occupational health nurse, this statement illustrates the more hectic working pace of a normal workday. No comments on the reduced lunch break have been expressed. Employees have made their own selection between different types of working time schedules. According to an interviewee, one key condition for successful experimentation with flexible working hours is that participation must be strictly voluntary. Extension of the pilot period The pilot period was extended to the end of October 1999. A total of 84 employees are participating in this phase. More flexibility for daily work was allowed when the lengthening of the pilot period was negotiated. Impacts of the shorter working time on pension salary and other unclear questions were discussed more clearly than in the first phase. Teamwork The matrix organisation, consisting of interlinked teams in each of the three call centres, was replaced with three independent call centres in 1998. However, process expertise has been linked between the three centres. According to the sales manager interviewed, continuous changes in team structure can cause insecurity as regards the future. The anticipation of new tasks is difficult, and plans that are created together with team members have to be changed too often. The result is continuous stress and frustration. Customer behaviour is difficult to change and foresee. Positive incentives and negative sanctions regarding the quality and cost of services provided by banks are applied partly to different customer groups.


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Team-building takes time. As one interviewee said: “In a team of six employees, flexibility in arranging daily work is needed. There are great differences between teams as regards working climate, hierarchy, and the way things are organised. We do not interfere with each other’s calls. What are needed are common rules for the teams, but because of the arrival of new members, we have had not yet had time to create these rules.” Higher demands for productivity create unconscious pressure. “The supervisors do not always leave me alone long enough for me to do my job. ”As regards information. ”I feel annoyed because information is not distributed evenly to everybody”. It is grouped by the skills of the employees, for example, with the notation ”This note is to those with loan skills”. Comparison change in two units As one part of a longitudinal study on technological changes in financial firms, the impact of changes on work content and stress was analysed. A multilevel process model of change was adopted. It combines technological, organisational and psychological change processes and works with the hypothesis that the evaluations of change vary according to the phase of change (Huuhtanen 1997). The first centre (unit A, n=45) was started in 1992, the other (unit B, n=53) in 1998. The mean age of the subjects was 43 years at the beginning of the study. The employees in unit B had been working earlier in payment service tasks, characterised by more routine transaction operations. The basic principles of the work organisation, customer-service model, job contents and computer applications were the same in both units. In unit B, being a new unit, the work environment and furniture were planned according to the latest ergonomic standards. Survey data were collected on the impact of new data systems in the following areas: the complexity of job demands, autonomy, interaction, and job appreciation. Furthermore, questions were asked about experienced stress, strain syndromes and ergonomic issues of the physical work environment and computer workstation. Of the subjects, 90% worked with computers more than four hours daily. In general, those working in unit B evaluated the changes as having been greater than their colleagues in unit A did. This response could be seen, for example, in the evaluations of the increase in things to be remembered, the level of interesting work, opportunities to use one’s abilities, the difficulty of tasks, and job appreciation. In addition, the feeling of having mastered the work was lower among the employees in unit B. They more often felt that they did not have enough time for practising the new applications. Both groups felt that the implementation of new systems had increased the work pace and also the monitoring of their work by supervisors. Those in unit B experienced slightly more stress and attributed it to their work more than the subjects in unit A did. The results agree with those of many previous studies as regards, mainly, the positive impact of new technology on the content of work. The evaluation of the change during the previous six months revealed significant differences between the two units, each with a different history of work organisation, content of tasks, and computer systems. A tentative conclusion is that the more developed mental models of the work in call centres helped to prevent a high mental load during the training period in unit A.


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This comparative case analysis shows the importance of the local context, history, and labour force structure when different flexibility strategies are implemented and the impacts on health and safety are evaluated. Isolation In the telephone bank, the number of fixed-term employees is only four, and six others work part-time. More employees were recruited for the call centres during the first months of the experimentation. Practically all of them have been employed full-time. Therefore, at the current stage, no risk of marginalisation is in sight. A risk of marginalisation could be possible in part-time work if colleagues feel that temporary employees are not needed. In addition participation in training is more problematic for part-time employees. A sales-oriented shorter workday increases the risk of continuous training being neglected if common practices are not created. For security reasons, work in isolation is prohibited in customer-service tasks if money is also handled. During all operating hours, a centralised help-desk service is available that assists employees with all kinds of problems. Career development and employability The tasks of a call centre are typically a starting point for a career in banking. This is the common trend in the Bank also. Employees rarely move to other call centres without a promotion, either to expert or supervisory positions. The qualifications needed are the capability to work in teams, stress tolerance while on the telephone, rapid and flexible reaction in fast-changing telephone conversations, and an interest in continuous learning. As regards studies on the impact of different flexibility strategies, the time factor in assessing the exposure and responses to changes and stress factors is of crucial importance. In unit B, before the employees moved into the call centre, their workday was filled with routine tasks, and there was no individual evaluation of their output. The stricter sales goals have created pressure among the conscientious, self-confident and ambitious employees. They have had to abandon their earlier work procedures and adopt a new way of thinking. The creation of such a new work culture, with new attitudes, takes 3-5 years. In contrast, the use of new computer applications can be quickly learned. In this case of computerisation and team building, problems of usability, training, unsatisfactory working postures and the environment can be seen rather soon. However, the impact of computerisation, new customer-service practices, and working time on skills, marginalisation and organisational culture can be analysed only after a long period of time. Participation, maintenance of skills, access to training The interviews revealed that, during shorter workdays with higher productivity demands, employees are more selective regarding training and participation in meetings at the workplace. Colleagues with traditional working times complained that those in the pilot project were showing more symptoms of stress than earlier. One problem area is the division of tasks in a team between employees with different working times. Employees with shorter working times were not considered eager to do extra unanticipated tasks. Discussion has been raised also about the uncompleted tasks of those doing a shorter day.


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Selection of the employees In regard to teamwork and raising productivity demands (internal qualitative flexibility), the selection of banking employees plays a role. Those who have worked for 20-30 years in routine tasks have difficulties in responding to the qualitative flexibility demands and in developing new sales skills. The implementation of changes so that many new things should be learned and adopted in too short a time has caused difficulties among these groups. As the occupational health nurse has stated: “My experience in a call centre has shown me that the selection of the employees is crucial. The work is mainly based on auditive functions that necessitate keen concentration, rapid decision-making and good verbal ability.“ In the opinion of the interviewee, earlier employees who contacted occupational health personnel had more musculoskeletal symptoms and problems with fatigue than current workers do. Today employees experience greater job satisfaction. A new kind of flexible attitude is needed from both the employers and the employees. ”Healthy” competition between employees regarding productivity and customer services is useful. According to the interviewee responsible for safety issues in the concern, “Sometimes, under a continuous threat of being laid off, examples of exaggerated self-assertion become manifest”. 3.2.2 Case II: City Hospital The forms of flexible employment (i.e., shortened working hours and long lasting fixed-term contracts) had mostly positive effects on the quality of the work and well-being of the employees. In-house training Along with quantitative flexibility, qualitative flexibility was also introduced. The importance of in-house training was emphasised, and training became a regular feature in the study ward. The entire personnel took part in the training events simultaneously (work in the ward being handled by substitutes). In the beginning of the experiment there was a 3-day training period, mostly to introduce teamwork practices to people who had not worked together before. Work in pairs was introduced, and pairs of nurses started to plan their tasks together. In addition, twice a year there has been a 1-day training event for the entire personnel concerning patient treatment and quality questions. Increased participation According to the one-year follow-up survey, participation increased significantly. The employees’ possibilities to participate in the planning of their own schedule increased both in the control ward (p=0.029) and, more markedly, in the study ward (p=0.0017). In May 1998 two-thirds of those in the study ward reported having good possibilities to participate compared with a good half of those in the control ward. Increased participation correlated significantly with mental well-being (r=.34, p=0.0021). In addition after control of other relevant aspects of the work (e.g., time pressure, workplace atmosphere, social support) and of the employees (e.g., age, family situation) the employees with good possibilities to participate in the planning of their own working hours felt less mental stress than the others did.


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Decreased fatigue Fatigue in shift work has been found to vary during morning, evening and night shifts, night shifts usually being the most strenuous. This trend also appeared in our study. In the one-year follow-up, reported fatigue decreased in the study ward on the morning (p=0.0002) and evening (p=0.004) shift, but there were no changes in the control ward. Accordingly, two-thirds of those in the study ward reported being seldom or never fatigued during these shifts compared with one-third of those in the control ward. Fatigue was commonest on the night shift, and no changes were found during the follow-up period. Despite the decreased fatigue, no statistical changes were found in the psychosomatic symptoms studied. Mental ill-health (symptoms of, e.g., irritability, depression, nervousness, lack of ability to concentrate), as well as somatic ill-health (e.g., hypertension, headache, stomach pain) was rare; at the most 5% of the employees reported having experienced such symptoms often. There were no changes in either the study or the control ward regarding health status. Status of fixed-term employees In the study ward the employees were asked about possible changes in the quality of work, as well as about changes in workplace atmosphere and social support. There were no significant differences in the estimates of the permanent and fixed-term employees concerning safety at work or the physical and mental demands of the work. These aspects were estimated to be at the same level as before. The employees reported that support from their superiors and colleagues had increased and conflicts among the personnel had decreased, equally again among the permanent and fixed-term employees. There were significant differences between the permanent and fixed-term employees, however, concerning changes in productivity, use of skills, dissemination of information and possibilities to influence. The permanent personnel experienced no changes concerning these aspects of work, but the fixed-term employees were of the opinion that they were better able to use their qualifications and skills (p=0.042 between the fixed-term and permanent employees) and that they were more productive (p=0.021). In addition the fixed-term employees were receiving more information about workplace issues (p=0.013) and their opportunities to influence their own work had improved (p=0.045). The work had become more meaningful as motivation increased (p=0.036). Tendencies toward change, though not statistically significant, were starting to emerge among the fixed-term employees already in the first (i.e., half-a-year) follow-up, but significant changes became evident only in the second, one-year follow-up. The obvious conclusion, thus, is that short fixed-term employment does not offer workers a possibility to become fully motivated nor are they able to use their qualifications and skills at full capacity. Short-fixed-term employment does not arouse innovative practices. Both the permanent and fixed-term employees were mostly satisfied with their choice to participate in the experiment. Only 10% were willing to change to longer working hours (i.e., 115 hours per three weeks), and most were willing to continue to work shorter hours permanently.


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3.3 General impact The cases described in this report did not reveal any major risks of marginalisation. Discussion is in progress on about the possibility to close the widely used path to early retirement through a period of unemployment, covered by unemployment compensation. If this path is no longer open, a high risk of marginalization of elderly workers is evident. The cases reported involve public and private services, two highly female dominated sectors of the labour market. In both cases the working time was shortened, and, in the hospital, also fixed-term contracts were involved. Recent development has shown that there are distinct gender tendencies behind the new models of working life. Fixed-term employment and part-time work has become a more common practice among educated and highly qualified middle-aged women, while among men it is more often associated with younger generations in new jobs. Women also, more often (75%) than men (56%) find fixed-term employment not as a choice, but a negative thing. There is a risk of further segregation of the labour market by gender; which segregation often has resulted in a lower level of both work content and wages for women. 3.4 Labour relations system In Finland, the existing industrial relations system offers a general framework for the development of flexible employment strategies. Nation wide research, training and intervention programs are launched in order to improve the work capacity of the work force. Universities and other research institutions have good relationships with companies and unions, which has made many-sided research activities possible. The content and coverage of Finnish legislation on occupational safety and health provides a good basis for the planning of occupational safety and health measures at the workplace level. However, specifications regarding the responsibilities of organising occupational health services in atypical work situations are needed. Basic working time solutions are agreed upon in collective agreements. In the banking sector, unions make agreements on working hours during weekends, and daily opening hours are decided at the company level. The union of the financial sector has raised discussion about more flexible opening hours as a response to “responsible personnel policy”, including training and abstainment from labour reduction (Helsingin Sanomat 12.5.1999). Employer organisations emphasise solutions based on laws and want more decision-making in companies. According to the preliminary findings of a study conducted in the University of Turku, local agreements under union agreements increased markedly between 1992 and 1998, and 86% of the companies in the private sector made local agreements on some working time issues. The study witnessed the general trend that employers’ attitudes toward local agreements are clearly more positive than those of employees (Helsingin Sanomat 21.5.1999). Even if opinions regarding the universal application of collective agreements and the role of local agreements differ between the main government parties and employers’ organisations and trade unions, the general climate for continued tripartite co-operation is good in Finland.


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4. Summary and conclusions 4.1. Summary The flexibility strategy regarding shorter working day in the telephone bank was targeted towards reducing fatigue and equipment costs, creating a more productive means of servicing customers and increasing individual choice for the employees. As regards the organisational costs and benefits of the 6.5-hour experimentation, the customer service employees received about 230% higher sales rates, on average, than those working normal working hours during the first four-month pilot period. The feedback from the employees on shorter working time has been very positive. Now more flexibility can be offered (e.g., to mothers with small children). The frequency of Sunday work depends on the total number of employees doing the shorter day. During the first months, on average, it was once monthly. There is a risk of more intensified work, with not enough recovering elements and breaks at work. The interviews revealed also that, during shorter workdays with higher productivity demands, employees are more selective regarding training and participation in meetings at the workplace. A sales-oriented shorter workday increases the risk of continuous training being neglected if common practices are not created. It should be stressed that the content of work in this case is very diversified, with high demands for competence, in contrast to typical “taylorised” work organisations in call centres in general. Long-term planning of one's career is, however, difficult. Because of a substantial reduction in staff during recent years, and under a threat of further notices, the company has problems in recruiting new employees. A special employee group has been formed in the Helsinki region to assist the branch offices that have periodic shortages of labour. The city hospital worktime project actually was a counter project of the one-sided flexibility policy carried out in the middle of the 1990s when, because of an economic recession, the number of personnel was reduced and substitutes were not hired. This kind of employment policy had resulted in increased workload and had negative effects on the well-being of the personnel. The 2-year experiment of part-time work was initialized by the hospital management without negotiations with the union, but it was based on voluntary participation, those with permanent employment had, for individual reasons, chosen the possibility to shorten their working time. For fixed-term employees the 2-year experiment guaranteed longer employment instead of previous short contracts. Internal quantitative flexibility was combined with inner qualitative flexibility; in-house training was made a regular practice; pairwork was introduced; and participation in the planning of schedules was greatly increased.


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The impacts of the experiment were positive regarding the well-being of the employees. But not until the 1-year follow up, it was evident that longer-term temporary employment offers workers a possibility to become fully motivated and to be able to use their qualifications and skills at full capacity. Short-term temporary contracts do not lead to innovative practices. The combination of quantitative and qualitative flexibility has proved to be essential in enterprises that have had the greatest success in the 1990s. Functionally flexible enterprises, when studied at an interval of several years, were clearly more successful than traditional ones, in terms of the number of employees, productivity and wages. Productive workplaces that increased their staff during the first half of the 1990s have several typical characteristics: extensive co-operation with others, the use of information technology and readiness to develop work organisations, (i.e., the introduction of quantitative and operational flexibility simultaneously). 4.2 Conclusions Conclusions The development strategy in the Finnish work life is based on high level of competence, productivity and quality. This means active policies in preventing the deterioration of working conditions and social security. Risk of polarisation exists mainly between unemployed and those in the work life. The situation is worst among elderly long-term unemployed workers, with low educational background. Difference in basic education is exceptionally great between the younger and older generations in Finland. A contradiction prevails between the low labour market value of employees with experience on one hand and, a high appreciation of work experience and knowledge based on experience on the other. This same contradiction appears in modern theories on the relation between adult education and working life (Tikkanen 1998). A high rate of unemployment means a waste of human resources. Threat of unemployment and the fragmentation of one's work career cause uncertainty and makes long-term visions impossible. A sense of coherence, including comprehensibility, meaningfulness and controllability of life, is difficult to sustain. Limited opportunities to take part in working life often result in a vicious circle because of poor self-esteem and poor motivation for education. Regarding the older generations at work, the main asset in combating marginalisation is the maintenance of work ability for as long as possible. For the youngest generation, the attachment to working life is the key issue. A fragmentary work career is not a risk for those with high education who voluntarily choose this alternative during the first years in working life. In contrast, the risk of marginalisation is severe among those less educated, who have been unemployed since leaving school and who have unemployment also among their family members. Learning takes place by combining the individual’s own reserve of experience, the testing of new tools and modes of work, assessment, and the creation of new mental models for work (Huuhtanen 1998). Learning and development mainly occur only daily working challenges have been solved at workplaces. Teams offer a good arena for this purpose, as was experienced by the bank employees. No major differences between the age groups were noted.


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When working hours are organised, it should be borne in mind that updating of one’s talents and skills takes time. Special attention should be paid to this facet when shortened working hours with higher productivity demands are adopted, as was the case in telephone bank. The social dimension of the Nordic welfare state model stresses the importance of guaranteeing a socially and economically productive life for all groups, independently of their status in working life. Strong and stable economic growth is a precondition of employment and through it revenue in increased and opportunities to maintain the safety net as regards, for example, sickness and unemployment are strengthened. The risk of marginalisation and increasing inequality is evident. If fixed-term employment, and the part-time work often associated with it, continue to become a more typical practice for women, there is a risk of further segregation of the labour market by gender, especially with respect to the lower level of both the content of work and wages for women. Change management and work reorganisation that takes into account age-related questions can be promoted by means of working life programmes. Regarding new forms of flexible work, like telework, new means of risk assessment, surveillance and inspection should be developed, that are based on the concept of internal control, and continuous training should be developed (Huuhtanen 1996). In the finance sector companies are merging in different fields (banks and insurance companies). This development increases the pressure towards a reorganisation of tasks and the division of labour. Additional staff reduction in the financial sector is expected. On the other hand, the demand for people with advanced technical skills and skills in dealing with clients, as opposed to routine back-office work, continues to increase. Indirectly the European Monetary Union is expected to encourage the merger trend in the finance sector, which will increase the demand for experts that only the very biggest firms can employ. (REMU 1998) Rapid and continuous changes in bank work necessitate a capacity to recuperate quickly after stressful work periods, and to re-orient oneself with no loss of motivation, learning activity and creativity in a situation where change is the rule (REMU 1998). Initiative, sales skills, team work skills, internet skills, better familiarity with the clients and closer knowledge of the products are needed from clerks. As the case analysis revealed, the combination of quantitative and qualitative flexibility in teams of the call centres proved to be difficult, especially across the hierarchy of supervisors and employees. A balance between the service for different customer categories, skills available in teams, and different working hours is difficult to maintain. Customers are more demanding and their behaviour, as regards for example the use of the internet, is difficult to foresee. Employees, with their representative unions, have thus far shown only little initiative in participating in the planning of new forms of flexibility that would introduce flexibility based on individual needs. Repeated national surveys have concluded that employee competencies have not been used to the extent possible during the 1990s within all principal employee categories (problems in increasing “internal qualitative flexibility”) (Kevätsalo 1999). Furthermore, it has been


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strongly argued by some researchers that there are distinct gender tendencies behind the new models for working life (negative impacts of “all types of flexible strategies”) (Lehto & Sutela 1999, Lavikka et al 1998). Workplaces in the service sector, especially the finance and insurance sector (68%), were functionally more flexible than those in manufacturing (18%) and construction (9%). Similar trends towards flexibility are evident in all the Nordic countries. Sectors with increased competition, especially labour intense service sectors, have primarily begun to use different working time arrangements as a means to cut costs. In service sectors with less or no significant change in competition different working time arrangements have been applied mainly to increase the employees' options. According to the Flexible Enterprise Project, an essential factor has proved to be that enterprises with the greatest success have used quantitative and operational flexibility simultaneously (Antila & Ylöstaöo 1999b). The obvious conclusion, thus, is that short fixed-term contracts do not offer workers a possibility to become fully motivated nor are they able to use their qualifications and skills at full capacity. Regarding the risk of marginalisation for elderly employees, the following questions are important: If competence demands are raised, what are the future prospects of those with one to two more routine skills? How much is the employer willing to invest in re-training elderly employees? Recommendations The following broad recommendations are suggested (to be further elaborated): • Occupational health services should be organised for the self-employed. • Responsibilities regarding health and safety issues must be clarified for atypical work

situations. • Preventive measures should be taken to eliminate the safety risks of temporary workers.


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References Antila J. & Ylöstalo P. Enterprises as Employers in Finland. In: Labour Policy Studies Nr 205. Ministry of Labour 1999a. Antila J. & Ylöstalo P. Functional Flexibility and Workplace Success in Finland. In: Labour Policy Studies Nr 206. Ministry of Labour 1999b. Anttila T. & Tyrväinen P. Kuntasektorin työaikakokeilut. Tavoitteet, toteutus ja tulokset. [Working time experiments in the municipal sector - targets, implementation and results] In: Työpoliittinen tutkimus Nro 202 (Labour Policy Studies). Ministry of Labour 1998. Financial sector staff skill demands in the EMU environment. REMU Project Final Report 30 July, 1998. Finance Sector Union, Finland, Bank Employers’ Association. Heikkilä T. Storm of change. A merger of two banks experienced by the employees. HUT Industrial Management and Work and Organisational Psychology. Rep No 7/98. Heiskanen T., Lavikka R., Piispa L. & Tuuli P. Joustamisen monet muodot - pukineteollisuus etsimässä tietä huomiseen. [In search of flexibility - building perspectives for the textile and clothing industry]. Tampereen yliopisto, Yhteiskuntatieteiden tutkimuslaitos, Työelämän tutkimuskeskus. Julkaisuja T17/1998. Huuhtanen P. Bridging the generation gap. [Editorial]. Scand J Work Environ Health 1998; 24(2):81-83. Huuhtanen P. The health and safety issues for teleworkers in the European Union. Consolidated report. European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions. Working Paper No: WP/97/29/EN, 1997. Huuhtanen P. Towards a multi-level model in longitudinal studies on computerization in offices. International Human-Computer Interaction 1997; 9(4), 383-405. Kalliomäki-Levanto T., Kivimäki M., Lindström K. & Länsisalmi H. Työyhteisö ja tilapäinen työsuhde - Vuokratyösuhde vähittäistavarakaupassa [An organisation and temporary employment - when an agency-hired worker and a grocery store meet]. In: Työ ja ihminen, Tutkimusraportti 12. Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Helsinki 1998. Kandolin I. New working time models. In: Newsletter of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health. Helsinki 1997. Kevätsalo K. Jäykät joustot ja tuhlatut resurssit, [Rigid flexibilities and wasted resources] Vastapaino, Tampere 1999. Kivimäki M., Vahtera J., Thomson L., Griffiths A., Cox T. & Pentti J. Psyhcosocial factors predicting employee sickness absence during economic decline. Journal of Applied Psychology, 1997, vol 82, no 6, 858-872.


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Kuntatyönantaja 3/1999. Newsletter of the Commission for Local Authority Employers, Helsinki 1999. Lehto A-M. & Sutela H. Efficient, more efficient, exhausted. Findings of Finnish Quality of Work Life Surveys 1977-1997. In: Labour Market 1999:8. Statistics of Finland 1999. Moilanen L. & Vainikka K. Life resources in contingent and permanent work in the hotel and restaurant sectors. Poster presentation at the International Research Conference on Health Hazards and Challenges in the New Working Life, 11-13 January 1999. Stockholm, Sweden. Nätti J., Kinnunen U., Happonen M. & Maunio S. Experiencing uncertainty regarding work in Finland. In: Finnish Labour review 2/1998. Ministry of Labour 1998. Parjanne M-L. Temporary employees - a flexible buffer. In: Finnish Labour review 2/1998. Ministry of Labour 1998. Rantanen, J. Identificational assessment of occupational health strategies in Europe. Finland. Working Paper No: WP/95/60/EN European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, Dublin 1995. Tikkanen, T. Learning and Education of Older Workers. Lifelong Learning at the Margin. Jyväskylä Studies in Education, Pyschology and Social Research 137, University of Jyväskylä 1998. Säästövapaan mahdollisuudet. Keskusjärjestöjen työryhmän raportti. [Options given by the working time bank]. Working Group Report, Central Labour Organisations, Helsinki 1999. Vahtera, J., Kivimäki, M., Pentti, J: Effect of organisational downsizing on health of employees. Lancet 350 (1997) 1124-1128. Working time report. The Joint Working Time Committee of the Finnish Employees' and Employers' Central Organisations. Helsinki 1998. Ylöstalo, P. Työolobarometri, lokakuu 1998 [Finnish working life barometer, October 1998]. Työpoliittinen tutkimus nro 204. Ministry of Labour, Helsinki 1999.


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Annex 1 Table 1. Working time arrangements of wage and salary employees in Finland according to gender in 1991,

1993, 1995 and 1997 Works (regularly) At nights Saturdays Sundays Year men women men women men women 1991 12 7 18 21 14 14 1993 14 9 22 24 15 16 1995 12 8 22 24 16 16 1997 11 8 34 33 24 23 Source: Statistics Finland. Labour force surveys, 1997

Table 2. Fixed-term employment in Finland according to gender, % Year Total Men Women 1982 11 9 13 1985 11 10 12 1991 13 11 16 1993 14 12 15 1995 17 14 20 1996 17 14 20 1997 17 15 19 1998 18 13 22 Table 3. Fixed-term employment according to occupation (ISCO 1993) and gender in 1996, % Occupational group Total Men Women Technical, scientific, pedagogic, humanistic work 23 16 32 Health care and social work 27 40 26 Managerial, administrative and clerical work 13 10 14 Commercial work 9 6 11 Agricultural, forestry and fishing work 31 26 43 Transport and communication work 8 8 6 Manufacturing, mining, quarrying and construction work 12 13 9 Service work 21 20 21 Source: Statistics Finland. EU-labour force survey spring 1996


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Annex 2 Case studies: comparative chart Concepts and dimensions Bank City Hospital 1. Enterprise Policy

• Flexibility concepts • Combination of internal quantitative and qualitative flexibility/numerical and functional

• Combination of internal quantitative and qualitative flexibility

• External quantitative flexibility

• Human resources policy • After closing several operational units carrying out routine payment tasks; emphasis placed on the increase of employee competency

• Traditionally centralised policy, oscillating between concern and local level decision making

• The concern invested in numerous projects aiming at improvements in working conditions, competence, and occupational health and safety issues

• Fatigue of the personnel, because of personnel savings common in most municipalities, a problem; focus on reduction of workload and improvement of the quality of services

1.2. Flexibility

• External flexibility

• Subcontracts • Outsourcing

• At the concern level: outsourcing regarding catering services, post, cleaning, transportation, security and occupational health services

• Quantitative external • Length and control status

• Fixed-term contracts for 2 years for 25 new workers (not hired by an agency)

• Quantitative internal • Overtime • Part-time

• Shift work

• Three types of working hour schedules

• Sunday between 10 am - 6 pm as the first bank in Nordic countries

• Only a small number of employees in part-time work

• Part-time work introduced on voluntary basis

• Overtime work no longer necessary

• Internal qualitative

• Functional flexibility • Polyvalence • Work teams

• Responsibility at work, innovation

• Polyvalence and work in teams

• 3-4 skill categories in teams • Each team responsible for one

customer segment • Difficulties in finding the

balance between customer segmentation and skill distribution in teams

• Team work: work in pairs

• Increased participation in the planning of shift schedules


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2. Working conditions

• Working conditions and work content

• Highly computerized telephone work

• Planned to fulfill high ergonomic standards

• Team working areas separated with half-open walls

• Qualified customer-service tasks, with 1-2 skill areas mastered by each employee

• Perceived changes at work and in job demands correlate with former skill demands

• Predictability of customer behavior in the long run difficult

• Nursing of chronic elderly patients

• Due to increased number of personnel more time available for different nursing tasks

• Due to pair work possibilities for more efficient timing of work

• Conditions and status of employment; training

• Nearly all with permanent jobs • In the long run, reduction of

staff still possible

• Good access to training • Local history important when

changes in work organisation and tasks are planned and implemented

• In the hospital permanent jobs prevailing; in the study ward 2/3 with temporary contracts

• Training at regular intervals for all (in the study ward)

• Volume of employment, age and gender

• About 240 employees, 80 % women

• Mean age about 44 years (in the concern)

• 360 employees, almost totally female

• Mean age over 40 years


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3. General impact

• Safety, health and welfare

• Health problems, stress, fatigue

• In general, high satisfaction with the new working time

• Firm basis for workplace support activities provided by annual health and safety programme

• Long tradition in developing occupational health services for the personnel

• Special skills and personality characteristics needed tasks for in call centre

• No increase in monotonous tasks

• Because of continuous changes in products and tasks make 'Lewinian refreezing' difficult

• Stress due to time pressure and continuous learning

• Risk of musculoskeletal symptoms

• Occupational health services of the standard level of municipal workplaces

• Mental well-being improved: fatigue decreased, significantly no change in psychosomatic symptoms

• Satisfaction with increased time available for basic treatment and reporting

• High satisfaction with part-time work

• Employment, employment creation, employment quality

• Social integration and exclusion • Integration of job • Risk of social exclusion, access

to job

• Segmentation

• Risk that too active sales activity that is may reduce interest in training and participation

• Possibility to bonus wages • No new segmentation by gender

• Recruitment and self-selection important factors

• Tasks of call centre a good basis for expert and supervisory positions in the concern

• Long-term planning of one's own career difficult

• Co-operation and support increased, fixed-term and permanent employees participated in work development training equally

• Improved motivation, better use of qualifications and skills, improved productivity at work due to long, 2-year contracts

4. Labour regulation and collective bargaining

• Bargaining level • Concern-level collective agreement, major disagreements with the nationwide bank collective agreement not possible in practice

• Working hours and wage system negotiated in joint working groups

• Participation in 6.5 hour pilot on a voluntary basis

• National collective agreements in the municipal sector

• Initiative from the employer, no formal negotiations needed between the unions

• Part-time work based on voluntary participation

• Union membership • More than 90% of the employees members of the concern's trade union

• Over 80% of all municipal employees belong to a union

• Industrial conflict • Negotiated inside the concern • Negotiated at national level

EF/00/50/EN

flexible employment policies and working … the improvement of living and working conditions...

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