Project Information
Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes
Background and Objectives
The EU is facing long-term structural challenges compounded by the recent economic crisis. More and better jobs are needed to lower unemployment, raise the employment participation rates of female, older, migrant, low-skilled and young workers and thus tackle social exclusion and inequality. The EU’s growth strategy, Europe 2020, aims for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, with innovation and job quality as flagship initiatives. Innovation and job quality are however currently treated separately but ought to be better integrated in policy and workplace practice. Research that can lever this to mutually boost innovation and job quality is needed. QuInnE contributes to the EU growth strategy of boosting innovation, job quality and employment by investigating how job quality and innovation mutually impact each other, and the effects this has on job creation and the quality of these jobs. Research based on OECD statistical data from the 1990s usefully established correlations between job quality and countries’ propensity for innovation and national rates of (un)employment. The data for this research is now dated and, importantly, pre-dates the 2008-09 crisis that affected all parts of the EU.
Approach
The project comprises three strands of research. The first strand involves policy analysis, at both the EU and country levels. The second aspect involves quantitative analysis which will be undertaken at both the aggregate level (EU level by country and industry) and firm level (using German, French and Spanish data). The third (and largest) component will involve comparative case study research (i.e. qualitative, exploratory research). This research design allows a degree of triangulation between the findings from the quantitative and qualitative strands of research. While statistical techniques will be used to examine correlations and causation in the innovation-job quality nexus, the case study method will be used to probe firm-level behaviour in order to explain and understand the causal mechanisms at play in the same nexus. The case studies will be undertaken in seven countries (Sweden, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Hungary, Netherlands and Spain), eight industries (with at least two countries completing case studies on firms in the same industries, including the public sector) and in firms of varying size (SMEs and larger firms). In Germany, three industries will be studied: car manufacturing, video-games and retail logistics.
The project is thus scientifically innovative in three ways: first, its use of a mixed methodology to examine the relationships between job quality, innovation and employment; second, whilst job quality, innovation and employment have been studied extensively in themselves, this project will aim to analytically integrate all three and explore the relationships between them; third, it moves beyond correlations, adding causation and the mechanisms of why and how job quality can boost innovation and employment.
Publications
Gautié, Jérôme / Jaehrling, Karen / Perez, Coralie, 2020: Neo-Taylorism in the Digital Age: Workplace Transformations in French and German Retail Warehouses. In: Relations industrielles / Industrial Relations 75 (4), pp. 774–795
Duhautois, Richard / Erhel, Christine / Guergoat-Larivière, Mathilde / Mofakhami, Malo / Obersneider, Monika / Postels, Dominik / Anton, José Ignacio / Muñoz de Bustillo, Rafael / Pinto, Fernando, 2018: The employment and job quality effects of innovation in France, Germany and Spain: Evidence from firm-level data. European Commission Horizon 2020 project “Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes” (QuInnE). QuInnE Working Paper WP5-3 | Lesen
Jaehrling, Karen, 2018: Introduction: Prospects for Virtuous Circles? The institutional and economic embeddedness of companies’ contemporary innovation strategies in Europe. In: Karen Jaehrling: Virtuous circles between innovations, job quality and employment in Europe? Case study evidence from the manufacturing sector, private and public service sector. QuInnE Working Paper WP6-3. European Commission Horizon 2020 project “Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes” (QuInnE), pp. 1–34 | Lesen
Jaehrling, Karen (ed.), 2018: Virtuous circles between innovations, job quality and employment in Europe? Case study evidence from the manufacturing sector, private and public service sector. European Commission Horizon 2020 project “Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes” (QuInnE) | DOI-Link | Lesen
Jaehrling, Karen / Gautié, Jérome / Keune, Maarten / Koene, Bas / Perez, Coralie , 2018: The digitisation of warehousing work. Innovations, employment and job quality in French, German and Dutch retail logistics companies. In: Karen Jaehrling: Virtuous circles between innovations, job quality and employment in Europe? Case study evidence from the manufacturing sector, private and public service sector. QuInnE Working Paper WP6-3. European Commission Horizon 2020 project “Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes” (QuInnE), pp. 280–332
Jaehrling, Karen / Obersneider, Monika / Postels, Dominik, 2018: Digitalisierung und Wandel von Arbeit im Kontext aktueller Marktdynamiken. Empirische Befunde zum Zusammenspiel von Innovationen, Beschäftigung und Arbeitsqualität. Duisburg: Inst. Arbeit und Qualifikation. IAQ-Report 2018-03 | DOI-Link| Info | Lesen
Makó, Csaba / Illéssy, Miklós / Latniak, Erich (with the support of Bórbely, András / Kümmerling, Angelika / Losónci, David / Tóth, Anna F. / Szentesi, Ibolya), 2018: The relationship between employment, job quality and innovation in the automotive Industry: a nexus of changing dynamics along the value chain. Evidence from Hungary and Germany. In: Karen Jaehrling: Virtuous circles between innovations, job quality and employment in Europe? Case study evidence from the manufacturing sector, private and public service sector. QuInnE Working Paper WP6-3. European Commission Horizon 2020 project “Quality of Jobs and Innovation Generated Employment Outcomes” (QuInnE), S. 88–130
Lectures
Dr. Erich Latniak, Csaba Makó, Miklós Illessy, Bálazs Heidrich, Niela Kleinsmith, Chris Mathieu: Smart use of manual work: Opportunities and limts of automation (lessons from the german and hungarian automotive industry). ILERA European Congress 2019: Perspectives of Employment Relations in Europe. In Kooperation mit: International Industrial Relations Association – Sektion der Bundesrepublik Deutschland e.V., Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, 05.09.2019
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: Implementing high performance work practices in non-liberal market economies: Some lessons from three industries in France, Germany and Sweden. Fathomless Futures: Algorithmic and Imagined. SASE's 31st Annual meeting, New York/USA, The New School, 27.06.2019 Weitere Informationen
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: Amazon is not a pioneer of ‚Digital Taylorism‘. Digging into the deep structures of the current workplace transformation and the scope for collective bargaining in Germany. International Labour Process Conference, Wien, Österreich, Universität Wien, 26.04.2019 Weitere Informationen
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: ‘Digital Taylorism’: What scope for collective bargaining at company level ? . Work and Equality Institute Seminar. UK, Manchester, University of Manchester, 26.09.2018
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: Digitalisation in ‘old’ industries. The search for security under disruptive technologies and deconstructed labour markets. 40th International Working Party on Labour Market Segmentation (IWPLMS). In Kooperation mit: Forschungsinstitut für gesellschaftliche Weiterbildung (FGW) und Netzwerk Arbeitsforschung NRW, Düsseldorf, 07.09.2018 Weitere Informationen
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: The link between job quality and innovation: virtuous or vicious circles? ETUC/ETUI conference: The World(s) of Work in Transition. ETUC/ETUI, Brüssel, 28.06.2018 Weitere Informationen
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: The institutional and economic embeddedness of companies’ workplace-related innovation strategies in Europe. Situating Human Resource Management Practices in Their Political and Economic Contex. Leeds, CERIC (Center for Employment Relations, Innovations and Change), University of Leeds, 09.03.2018 Weitere Informationen
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: La digitalisation du travail dans les entrepôts : innovations et qualité de l’emploi dans des entreprises de la logistique du commerce en Allemagne, en France et aux Pays-Bas. Innovation et qualité de l’emploi : résultats du projet QuInnE. CEPREMAP, Paris, 19.01.2018
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: How does labour market segmentation affect innovation dynamics – and vice versa? . 38th Annual Conference of the International Working Party on Labour Market Segmentation (IWPLMS 2017) . Manchester, European Work and Employment Research Centre, Manchester Business School of The University of Manchester, 14.09.2017
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: Moving to an e-World: New virtuous circles in retail logistics? Results from qualitative case studies. SASE 29th Annual Meeting. Lyon, Frankreich, Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics, 30.06.2017
Dr. Karen Jaehrling: Innovations and job quality: Farewell to the virtuous circle? Introduction to the session. SASE 29th Annual Meeting. Lyon, Frankreich, Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics, 30.06.2017