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Research

Research Projects Prof. Dr. Sebastian Brandl

Research Projects Focusing on the Governance of Labour Market Services

Project lead
HdBA – Campus Schwerin, Prof. Dr. Sebastian Brandl

Cooperation
VIA University College – Society and Social Work, Aarhus, DK
Associated professor Thorsten Braun & Edda Merete Luth

Context
In both Germany and Denmark, the conditions for enabling the long-term unemployed (LZAL) back into the labour market are favourable. At the same time, labour-market policy in Denmark, as in Germany, has been providing programmes and initiatives for the direct integration of LZAL into the primary labour market for years. The resulting focus on more individual integration support geared towards the primary labour market is not only associated with more intensive, expanded services for unemployed clients, it comprises close cooperation with employers. In both countries, a project team is therefore investigating how job centres are implementing this reorientation and how integration specialists as street-level bureaucrats put the approach to integration in the primary labour market into practice.

Research questions

  • Strategies and organisational changes at the job centre with direct integration as its goal.
  • Implementation of the direct integration of the long-term unemployed into the primary labour market by integration specialists (business development representatives, coaches). The effects of organisatonal changes and qualification offers on how street-level bureaucrats act.
  • Limitations/tense relationships as well as the necessary skills of street-level bureaucrats.
  • Differences and similarities between the cases under investigation in Germany.

Methods
In both countries, each project team is investigating the project issues through case studies at two job centres . Managers and integration specialists will be asked using an approach with many perspectives. Case studies will then be compared and differences and similarities between countries determined.

Publications
Brandl, Sebastian; Braun Thorsten (2022): Arbeitgeberorientierte Integration von Lang-zeitarbeitslosen – Zur Relevanz von street-level organizations am Beispiel von Jobcentern in Dänemark und Deutschland.(Labour Market Integration of the Long-term Unemployed – On the Relevance of Street-level Organisations Using the Example of Job Centres in Denmark and Germany) Working Paper 2 of the HdBA Sociology and Labour-market subject group. Mannheim/Schwerin.

Project lead
Prof. Dr. Gerd Bender, Prof. Dr. Sebastian Brandl

Cooperation
University of Duisburg-Essen, Institut für Arbeitsmarkt und Qualifikation (IAQ) (Institute for Labour Market and Qualification), PD Dr. Martin Brussig, Prof. Dr. Markus Hertwig (TU Chemnitz - University of Technology)

Context
Personal services are not generally just put together for the client but together with them; it is about interactive work. In the relevant research, therefore, there is reference to the service triangle whose corners represent the specialist, the company where he/she is employed and the client. Working together with various specialists is often indispensable when drawing up effective and economic complex personal services. For this reason, building up the corresponding networks is a significant component of social infrastructures. This adds corners to the service triangle, and the interactive element of the specialist's work increases as coordination now has to be agreed with them. In addition, such networks are often not structured in a hierarchical way. No network partner has the authority to issue instructions to another network partner; there is, to a greater or lesser extent, interactive negotiation rather than instructions. All this places certain demands on those who work in service networks but also on organisations that wish to network with others or on their management respectively.

Research questions
The core project question is as follows: What requirements in terms of qualifications and organisation need to be fulfilled for interactive networking to work efficiently? This is examined using two services as an example, provided by the BA, for people facing particular difficulties in the labour market (holistic integration, Inga and case management).

Methods
Research methods comprise the case study, primary data collection tools are the expert sessions and interviews with participants on various levels of hierarchy within the National Employment Agency and selected network partners. Since the start of the project in the late summer of 2013, fourteen qualitative case studies in job centres and employment agencies all over Germany have been carried out. Management and heads of divisions, team leaders, integration specialists and case managers, those responsible for interfaces and also some cooperation partners were asked, amongst other things, about their cooperation practice as well as about factors that help or hinder a cooperation.

Publications

Research Focus on Work in the Demographic Change

Project lead
Prof. Dr. Lutz Bellmann, Dr. Ute Leber (IAB); Prof. Dr. Peter Guggemos, Prof. Dr. Sebastian Brandl (HdBA)

Project staff
Dr. Ingo Matuschek (HdBA), Sandra Dummert (IAB)

Third-party funding provider
Hans-Böckler-Stiftung (Trust), Project number: 2014-800-3

Aims & Context
The purpose aimed to use empirical analysis to close the gap between debates on demographic change (DW) and ensuring a skilled workforce - which is marked by a high level of awareness of the issues - and the limited number of workplace initiatives for older employees, something that was repeatedly confirmed in studies in the past. The issues that companies feel they are confronted with when they offer measures for older people (educational programmes, health, adapted workplaces for employees with age-related restrictions and much more) or when they wish to employ an older person (50plus) need to be laid bare.
It was important to investigate to what extent the restrictions with such measures referred to in literature were still applicable in times of a significant increase in older workers in companies, whether any further restrictions had become an issue or whether companies had implemented other strategies that had not been recorded as ways of dealing with an ageing workforce. It was assumed, however, that the gap between public support of the paradigm shift towards longer working lives and actual company practices still existed. That would have meant that despite a workforce ageing at an average rate, a tendency towards early retirement and traditional recruiting strategies still prevailed, and that programmes for older people would not have been deemed necessary. It was also reasonable to assume that following initial measures such as age structure analyses, no independent dynamics would develop in company age management. Restrictions of this nature needed to be identified.

Sector selection
The issue would probably be the most virulent in sectors where steps had already been taken to combat demographic change. The application of demographic collective agreements, the activities of social partners and pilot projects pointed to a corresponding awareness among labour policy players and suggested a sector-specific approach. The chemical sector was particularly suitable for providing a case study for clarifying the aforementioned issues: The ambivalence suggested in the way demographic change was organised at company level was reflected in the chemical sector in the implementation of the collective agreements on "Working time arrangements adapted to life stages" (North-East) and "Working life and demographics" (nationwide) These also contain provisions for the financing of an early transition to retirement.

Methods
Investigations were based on a two-tier approach. In the first qualitative step, expert interviews with works councils as well with HR managers in East and West Germany were conducted. Their particular role in the introducing and implementing of measures for older people evolved from the question of whether and how the shift away from the early retirement paradigm was being implemented in companies. It was not only companies which were clearly committed to an age-sensitive employment strategy that were examined but also those who did not make it past the first stages. In a second step, the results of the qualitative data collection were used as a basis for a standardised company survey. The aim was to achieve a representative overview of the selected sector.

Publications

  • Brandl, Sebastian; Guggemos, Peter; Matuschek, Ingo (2020): Altern in Betrieben als Herausforderung von Personalmanagement, Betriebsräten, Tarifparteien und Fachberatungsstellen (Ageing in the workplace: a challenge for HR management, works councils, social partners and specialist counselling services). in: Freiling, Th.; Conrads, R.; Müller-Osten, A.; Porath, J. (pub.): Zukünftige Arbeitswelten. Facetten guter Arbeit, beruflicher Qualifizierung und sozialer Sicherung. i.E. (The future of work. Aspects of good work, vocational training and social security)
  • Bellmann, Lutz/Brandl, Sebastian/Dummert, Sandra/Guggemos, Peter/Leber, Ute/Matuschek, Ingo (2018): Altern in Betrieb. Alterung und Alter(n)smanagement in kleineren und mittleren Unternehmen – vom Einzelfall zur professionalisierten Systematik. (Ageing in the workplace. Ageing and age management in small and medium-sized enterprises – from individual cases to a professionalised system) Study 393 of the Hans-Böckler-Stiftung (Trust). Düsseldorf.
  • Brandl, Sebastian/Guggemos, Peter/Matuschek, Ingo (2018): Vom Einzelfall zum systematischen Alter(n)smanagement in KMU (From individual cases to systematic age management in SMEs). WSI-Mitteilungen 71(1): 51-58
  • Bellmann, Lutz/Brandl, Sebastian/Matuschek, Ingo (2018): Altern im Betrieb. Editorial der Schwerpunktheftkoordinatoren. (Ageing in the workplace. Editorial by the special issue coordinators) WSI-Mitteilungen 71(1): 2

Project team
Prof. Dr. Sebastian Brandl & Diplompolitologe (graduate in political science) Bernhard Stelzl

Third-party funding provider
Hans-Böckler-Stiftung (Trust), Project number: 2014-711-4. The project used examples to examine how the results of company surveys are dealt with within an organisation. Against a backdrop of restructuring, redundancies and an ageing workforce, the aim was to determine the role that the employees' views of the quality of work would play moving forward. Any ambiguous survey results were also to be clarified.

Context
Inter-company, representative employee surveys repeatedly show a relatively high level of work-related demands in some cases, and a clear discrepancy between anticipated and actual work quality, as well as a low level of job satisfaction in Germany. At the same time, there appears to be only a limited amount of detailed analysis at operational level concerning how to deal with stress factors. Employee surveys are also used in companies and administrations, initiated by the employees themselves, the company or staff councils. It is still unclear, however, how those involved from a company side deal with the results of the surveys, what role the employees play in terms of deriving measures from these results and whether the intention of involving employees over and above the surveys actually takes place.

Research question
The project was about how work-political players in companies dealt with the results of the surveys and the role of the employees in this process. Research questions were as follows:

  • What conclusions did management/HR management and the staff council come to concerning the survey findings?
  • What measures were introduced and to what extent were the employees involved?
  • What did the employees think of the adequacy of the measures?

The project centred around the (comparative) analysis of the subsequent processes in the company surveys on work quality, not the tools themselves used by the employers or employee repesentatives within the organisations. These follow-up processes are not clearly defined in literature nor in practice. Ultimately, this encompasses any activity that has something to do with the employee survey within the company.

Methods
The project focused on the research questions by way of three organisations in the public sector as examples. In these organisations, it was possible to build on previous employee surveys and "Good Work" surveys initated by the staff council. These organisations were, as with the public sector in general, characterised by redundancies, an ageing workforce and restructuring.
The follow-up processes for the surveys were gathered using multi-step qualitative operational case studies. Expert interviews as well as problem-focused interviews with employees were carried out after the preliminary analysis of company documents on the details of the case. Evaluation was then followed by focus group workshops. There were then expert interviews and workshops with the trade union industry group which had accompanied the staff council survey process.

Findings:
With the help of their surveys, staff councils were able to find ways to improve the quality of work (health management) and connect organisational modernisation with a focus on shaping the future of work (new management formats, junior staff). In the negotiations, the survey results gained significance of their own in the arguments which none of those involved could ignore. External support (resources, know-how) proved to be essential to the survey process.
It became clear from the interviews that some of the topics in the surveys had been slightly misunderstood. However, a systematic examination of ambiguous survey results - such as through the focus groups conducted as part of the project - did prove to be necessary so as to identify problems and develop the appropriate measures to resolve them. External support is needed to expand such opportunities for participation. One potential problem here, however, is that the increase in work load may have led to a decline in willingness to be committed to work. On the other hand, a noticeable consequence was a desire for self-optimisation that set individuals apart from others.

Publications:

Project lead / team
Prof. Dr. Sebastian Brandl & Diplompolitologe (graduate in political science) Bernhard Stelzl

Third-party funding provider
Hans-Böckler-Stiftung (Trust), Project number: 2012-564-4

Findings
For results, see Hans-Böckler-Stiftung (Trust)

Summary
The literary review investigates the causes of the high level of stress in terms of working practices and performance management in the public sector (ÖD), as well as measures to reduce stress factors in terms of employees' health. A starting point for this lies in the inter-sector observation that work has become increasingly subjectivised as a result of performance-oriented policies. This issue was examined in a literary review. Changing work and performance conditions in the public sector in terms of the assumed stress factors were analysed, as far as this information is available in literature. The analysis was limited to fields of the (former) immediate public sector with a high degree of interaction (national, state and local administrations, the police, schools, nursery schools as well as hospitals). The literary overview displays a high level of subjective stress among public sector employees. The ageing workforce is not insignificant alongside performance-related factors as a contributing cause. The main causes of stress include: staffing levels, restructuring, an increase in tasks as well as in the intensity of work, insufficient employee involvement, and a lack of opportunities to reduce stress at work. The way departments and work processes is a major source of stress. Existing measures for managing stress tend to focus on individual behaviour rather than on circumstances; (health) reports focus on absenteeism statistics (days off etc.). The establishing of a systematic procedure for observing and reporting on stress and its causes (trend reports) is therefore a strong recommendation. Knowledge lacks in terms of the connection between part-time work and stress. Evidence suggests that there is a significant individual strategy for reducing stress, especially among women. Further research is required to analyse the strategies adopted by labour-policy players to address performance issues and the reactions of employees. It is also necessary to examine the partly low job satisfaction in more depth.

Project on the Changes in the Working Society / Social Sustainability / Sustainable Work

Regarding the SDGs (Goal 8 "Decent work and economic growth"), the UNDP report "Arbeit und menschliche Entwicklung (Work and Human Development)" calls for a "route to sustainable work" to be pursued, which addresses not only the ecological consequences of work but also global development issues, and suggests a comprehensive social transformation of working society.
It is therefore the aim of the working group to intensify the debate on work and sustainability, to focus on certain topics and to broaden networks. Ecological workplaces is not the only issue to be discussed. In accordance with the more detailed definition of sustainable work as set out in the UNDP report, and the heterogenity of the Sustainable Development Goals the emphasis will be on the complex relationship between ecological and social sustainability and economic development goals.
The following issues are some of those to be addressed and more closely operationalised:

  • What opportunities and risks for employees (considering gender-specific, regional and sector-specific differences) are linked to the social-ecological transformation in Germany?
  • What interdependencies evolve between the social-ecological transformation and the current transformation process under discussion known as Industry 4.0?
  • What will be the relationship between paid work and other forms of work (e.g. care work (Care), domestic work, voluntary work, etc.) in a sustainable working society?
  • What connections are there between the sustainability or unsustainability of the (paid) working society and everyday lifestyle practices?

Working Group Publications:

  • Jochum, Georg; Barth, Thomas; Brandl, Sebastian; Cardenas Tomazic, Ana; Hofmeister, Sabine; Littig, Beate; Matuschek, Ingo; Stephan, Ulrich; Warsewa, Günter (2020): Nachhaltige Arbeit. Eine Forschungsagenda zur sozial-ökologischen Transformation der Arbeitsgesellschaft. In: Arbeit 29(3): 219-233
  • Jochum, Georg; Barth, Thomas; Brandl, Sebastian; Cardenas Tomazic, Ana; Hofmeister, Sabine; Littig, Beate; Matuschek, Ingo; Stephan, Ulrich; Warsewa, Günter (2019): Sustainable work. The social-ecological transformation of the working society. Position paper of the Working Group "Sustainable work" of the German Committee Future Earth. German Committee Future Earth. Working Paper 19/2.
  • Jochum, Georg; Barth, Thomas; Brandl, Sebastian; Cardenas Tomazic, Ana; Hofmeister, Sabine; Littig, Beate; Matuschek, Ingo; Stephan, Ulrich; Warsewa, Günter (2019): Nachhaltige Arbeit. Die sozialökologische Transformation der Arbeitsgesellschaft. Positionspapier der Arbeitsgruppe Nachhaltige Arbeit im DKN. Working Paper 19/1.