The Third European Survey on Working Conditions

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The Third European Survey on Working Conditions

• Carried out in the 15 member nations in 2000
• Around 1500 workers were interviewed in each
  country giving a total of 21,703
• The survey covers the active population, i.e.
  persons at the time of the interview were either
  salaried employees or self-employed

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Sample design

• The sample design is a multi-stage random
  sampling, called random walk.
• The identification of sampling points is based on
  the Eurostat territorial breakdown for each
  country (NUTS II) and population density.
• The selected sample is weighted so that the
  sample is identical to the target population
  according to six variables region, city size,
  gender, age, sector of activity and occupational
  category

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Response rate
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Structure of the questionnaire

• The questionnaire is divided into 8 basic
  sections
• Section 1 Background information on the
  interviewee and his place of work (nationality,
  age, size of firm, sector of activity, etc.)
• Section 2 Physical environment (basically
  designed to capture factors affecting health,
  safety and stress at work)
• Section 3 Time (measures factors related to
  working time)

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Structure of the questionnaire

• Section 4 Organisational environment captures
  work organisation (e.g. learning,
  problem-solving, complexity, repetition, team
  organisation, quality standards, etc.
• Section 5 Social environment mainly focuses on
  forms of communication and assistance received at
  work

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Structure of the questionnaire

• Section 6 Outcomes in terms of health, safety
  and job satisfaction
• Section 7 Demographics marital status, gender,
  structure of household
• Section 8 Mainly information on payment system
  and level of earnings

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Comparison of organisational modes for the EU-15

• Lorenz and Valeyre (2005, 2006)
• Lorenz, Lundvall and Valeyre (2006)
• Arundel, Lorenz, Lundvall and Valeyre (2006)

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Field of study

• Salaried employees working
• in establishments with at least 10 persons
• in both manufacturing and services
• Total population studied 8 081 persons
• Draws primarily on Section 4 Organisational
  environment

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Table 1 Organisational Variables
Source Third Working Condition survey. European
Foundation for the Improvement of Living and
Working Conditions
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A visual display of the first two factors of MCA
analysis
Team team work Rot job rotation Mono task
monotony Rep task repetiveness Caut automatic
constraints on work pace Cnorm quantitative norm
constraints on work pace Chier hierarchical
constraints on work pace Chor horizontal
constraints on work pace
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Summary of results for the 4-cluster
solution (percent of employees in each cluster)
Source  Third Working Condition survey.
European Foundation for the Improvement of
Living and Working Conditions
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Differences in forms of work organisation by
sectors, establishment sizes and occupations

• Discretionary learning forms of work
  organisation
• financial and business services electricity, gas
  and water
• managers other executives technicians
• Lean forms of work organisation
• manufacturing vehicles electrical end
  electronics wood and paper
• blue collars
• increasing with the size
• Taylorist forms of work organisation
• manufacturing textile, garments and leather
  food processing wood and paper vehicles
• machine operators and assemblers unskilled
  workers
• increasing with the size
• Simple structure or traditional forms of work
  organisation
• services land transport personal services
  trade
• sales and service staff unskilled workers
• decreasing with the size

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Table 3 Forms of Work Organisation by Sector of
Activity (percent of employees by organisational
class)
Source Third Working Condition survey. European
Foundation for the Improvement of Living and
Working Conditions
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Table 4 Forms of Work Organisation according to
Occupational Category (percent of employees by
organisational class)
Source Third Working Condition survey. European
Foundation for the Improvement of Living and
Working Conditions
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Table 5 National Differences in Organisational
Learning Modes (percent of employees by
organisational class)
Source  Third Working Condition survey. European
Foundation for the Improvement of Living and
Working Conditions
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Forms of work organisation across European
nations

• Learning forms of work organisation
• Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden
• - Southern countries and Ireland
• Lean forms of work organisation
• UK, Ireland, Spain and France
• - Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Germany and
  Austria
• Taylorist forms of work organisation
• Southern countries and Ireland
• - Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden
• Simple forms of work organisation
• Southern countries
• - Netherlands, Denmark, Finland and UK

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Table 8 Logit Estimates of National Effects on
the Use of Work Organisation Forms
significant at 5 significant at
1 Reference country Germany Source 
Third European Survey of Working Conditions.
European Foundation for the Improvement of Living
and Working Conditions.
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Exploring the links between organisational modes
and innovative performance
Figure 3
Figure 2
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Figure 6
Figure 6
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The relation between organisational modes and
institutional context
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