Managers and Enterprise Bargaining: Some Preliminary Findings

Encouraged by a series of tribunal decisions in an economic climate demand-ing greater productivity, enterprise bargaining in Australia has gained momentum since the mid-1980s. Bargaining is now permitted at the decen-tralized level of organizations which has assisted in workplace reform and flexibility. This study explores its impact on the practice of managing human resources and industrial relations. The experiences of employers and key prac-titioners engaged in enterprise bargaining processes are reported, focusing on the quality of management and changes in management performance stem-ming from entetprise bargaining. Enterprise bargaining is a process conducted between employers and employees for the purpose of negotiating working conditions. It has achieved prominence in the 1990s through a series of evolutionary changes to Australian industrial relations, given impetus by a concern for productivity and efficiency. From a centralized system of bargaining, we now see the emergence of decentralized negotiation con-ducted at the enterprise level