HR metrics to safeguard employees’ interests: use of analytics by unions/associations

Abstract

A safe working environment is the fundamental right of each and every employee, whether it be a worker, a supervisor or even the CEO. However, the importance of safety for workers increases multiple-fold in case of organizations involving manufacturing and other hazardous jobs. The role of a worker Union in India has been changing with time. Unions are slowly looing their bargaining power over the employees, and question marks have been raised regarding their functioning. In case of an accident, the Union is unable to come up with relevant data or metrics in order to fight for or defend the worker. Hence, we, students of Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad Post Graduate Program, through this project have tried to identify the HR metrics that can be used by the Unions and the employees to safeguard their interests. We have restricted the findings to the automotive industry only, which helped us do pointed research. For this, we interviewed multiple Union Representatives, NGO’s working in the field of employee safety to come up with the metrics. As an outcome of the project, we have proposed a comprehensive metric covering 33 leading and lagging indicators of organizational safety. The indicators are also segregated according to the relevance to the stakeholders, which will help trade unions in collective bargaining and protecting the welfare of the workers.