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Empirical determinants of employee resistance against innovations

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  • Zwick, Thomas
Abstract
Employee resistance against innovations is a virulent phenomenon and there is a broad theoretical literature on its determinants. The empirical evidence is scarce, however, and mainly provides descriptive evidence on the incidence of the phenomenon and concentrates on the effectiveness of change management as a measure against it. A second branch of the empirical literature investigates the impact of unions on adoption costs and the successful implementation of innovations. There is no representative evidence on the impact of the economic environment on employee opposition against the implementation of an innovation in the firm independent of managerial activities, however. This paper uses a unique firm-level data set of a representative sample of German service firms which includes detailed information on the economic environment of the firm. It shows that employee opposition against innovations can be predicted by very basic information on the firm that is relevant for the economic situation of the employees. Employee opposition is smaller in firms whose generic business strategy is differentiation, while it is larger in firms aiming at gaining competitive advantage by low costs and prices. If the goals of the innovation is an increase in employee performance, the firm experiences higher resistance, while resistance is lower in firms aiming at increasing the product range by the innovation. Profit and turn over expectations of the firm and the outside option of the employees are negatively correlated with employee resistance. Finally, smaller firms and firms operating in the computer and software or the technical consulting sector experience lower employee resistance. Therefore, the focus on change management measures or union activities in order to predict employee resistance against innovations seems too narrow.

Suggested Citation

  • Zwick, Thomas, 2000. "Empirical determinants of employee resistance against innovations," ZEW Discussion Papers 00-47, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:zewdip:5331
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    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/24395/1/dp0047.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Milgrom, Paul R, 1988. "Employment Contracts, Influence Activities, and Efficient Organization Design," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(1), pages 42-60, February.
    2. Dowrick, Steve & Spencer, Barbara J, 1994. "Union Attitudes to Labor-Saving Innovation: When Are Unions Luddites?," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 12(2), pages 316-344, April.
    3. Scott Schaefer, 1998. "Influence Costs, Structural Inertia, and Organizational Change," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 7(2), pages 237-263, June.
    4. Machin, Stephen & Wadhwani, Sushil, 1991. "The Effects of Unions of Investment and Innovation: Evidence from WIRS," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 101(405), pages 324-330, March.
    5. repec:bla:scandj:v:90:y:1988:i:4:p:475-91 is not listed on IDEAS
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    Cited by:

    1. Bourjila Mountacer & Ayoub El Bahi, 2024. "Technological innovation as a catalyst for change in organizational culture: Case of Moroccan SMEs [L'innovation technologique comme catalyseur de changement de la culture organisationnelle: cas de," Post-Print hal-04401627, HAL.
    2. Kris Aerts & Kornelius Kraft & Julia Lang, 2015. "Profit sharing and innovation," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 24(6), pages 1377-1392.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Innovation; Labour-Management Relations; Estimation;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M12 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - Personnel Management; Executives; Executive Compensation
    • O32 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D
    • J53 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor-Management Relations, Trade Unions, and Collective Bargaining - - - Labor-Management Relations; Industrial Jurisprudence
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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