Determinants of employee involvement practices in manufacturing enterprises

Faced with today's dynamic and competitive environment, manufacturing enter prise successes rely significantly on using the workforce's entire capacity to generate new ways of working and to make relevant and timely decisions. This paper identifies the determinants of employee involvement (EI), and d iscusses the employment of EI practices and its influences on the organizat ional performance of manufacturing enterprises with particular reference to both electronics and plastics industry sectors in Hong Kong. Incorporating the empirical findings of a recent study, an analytical digest of manageri al views on critical factors, sub-factors and benefits of EI adoption is pr esented. A generic decision framework for EI adoption is elaborated using t he analytical hierarchy process technique. The study found that management commitment, rewards and motivation were the most critical factors; clear co rporate mission, continuous improvement and both extrinsic rewards and intr insic rewards were the dominating sub-factors of EI adoption. Effective inv olvement practices could bring along attainable employee satisfaction, qual ity improvement and productivity enhancement in manufacturing enterprises.