Quality of Work

1. The opportunity to engage in tasks that are fulfilling and meaningful to workers personally.
2. A decent standard of living—not just a reasonable wage, but a sense of economic security
3. Health ,well-being, and support for family life, or life outside work generally
4. Worker participation in decision-making and other (undefined) rights. (Lowe, 174)

        The list of goals Lowe derives from these four pillars seem appropriate in creating a definition for quality-of-work; a workplace that upholds these goals is essentially providing quality work.

1. A basic right to work that provides a decent living standard and economic security.
2. Mutual trust among employers and workers
3. Opportunities for all workers to constructively participate in decision making, on how, when, and under what conditions they do their work.
4. A culture of openness regarding information about the business and provision of the resources workers need to use this information effectively.
5. Healthy and safe work environments, developed through collaboration between workers and employers.
6. Work environments supportive of a balanced life, so that family and personal goals an be achieved alongside work goals.
7. Encouragement of innovation based on worker's initiative and creativity.
8. Opportunities to use and further develop skills, knowledge, and abilities in the course of doing one's job. (Lowe, 174)

        Although Lowe's goals are appropriate in providing a general definition of quality work they can be further refined to provide greater insight into the needs of Canadian workers. Lowe's goals are arranged in a seemingly random order, however, it seems that a hierarchy must exist in the minds of workers; some goals must be inherently more important to the populace then other goals. Lowe's first goal, a basic right to work that provides a decent living standard and economic security, and fifth goal, healthy and safe work environments, both seem vital in defining quality work. However, the same cannot be said for Lowe's seventh concept, encouragement of innovation, and his eighth concept, career-long learning. These goals are not necessarily important to every Canadian worker, as proven by the polling provided by Lowe himself. In his graphical display of the Angus Reid Group “Workplace 2000: Working Toward the Millennium. A Portrait of Working Canadians” Lowe provides the figure that over twenty percent of Canadians view their job simply, as a way to make money.  (Lowe, 58). It is also important to note that a workplace void of these seventh and eight concepts would likely be considered a very quality workplace if it fulfilled the first six of Lowe's requirements. It therefore seems apparent that an effective discussion of quality of work should focus on these topics that carry immediate weight with all workers. These include, most importantly; compensation that can provide an adequate standard of living; healthy and safe workplaces; and job security and the ability to find work.

        The role that unions and workers can play in promoting a quality-of-work agenda is an important one that will likely carry weight on their own futures. According to Lowe, “the presence of a union is a good indicator of above-average job quality in economic terms (pay, benefits, security)”. (Lowe, 157). It follows that increased union membership would bring increased job quality in those same economic terms. Thus, unions can ensure that the economic characteristics of quality work are held intact throughout the future through increasing and maintaining membership ranks. However, as Lowe argues, the union is not necessarily a good indicator of above-average job quality among human-resource issues. (Lowe, 157). This is despite the fact that unions have undergone a transformation in membership, from a mainly blue-collar base to mainly skilled, educated and diverse workers in white collar, service occupations. (Lowe, 158) Unions should utilize this transformation in membership to bargain for the quality agenda put forward by their new members; this new white-collar union base of workers likely has different concerns then the previous blue-collar majority. Unions should match these concerns, for example, by fighting for workplace health and safety in the office as well as the assembly line. The safety concerns of the industrial-revolution era union in the manufacturing sector concerned immediate physical safety—(To prevent amputations through safe machinery and processes, etc...). Today's unions should refocus their safety concerns around the those of their members and provide for more modern problems, for example, bargaining for ergonomic workspaces, healthy hours, overtime compensation etc. This approach, the focus on new human-resource quality-of-work issues, however, is also limited by the size and breadth of union membership. In order for unions to protect the safety rights etc. of workers they must represent a significant portion of the workforce in that field. In reality, however, many fields are virtually unrepresented by unions, while others have very limited union membership. Unions must, therefore, provide focused marketing towards these under-accessed populations. Lowe provides several possible sources for new union membership, however, his discussion of part-time workers seems most important. The growing ranks of part-time workers, as well as their relatively young age (according to Lowe, “more then a quarter of all part-timers are teenagers”) indicates that marketing unions towards part-time workers could be an effective way of both securing the part-timers rights and of securing the desired growth in membership among unions. (Lowe, 160) Lowe's “selling point”, that “unionized temps tend to earn more than their non-unionized counterparts (the difference in 1991 was $4.75 an hour”, (Lowe, 161) seems to also provide excellent incentive for those part-time workers to join union ranks. Focused marketing designed to promote the specific benefits of unionization to each untapped population will allow unions to access these membership pools. Unions should translate this gain in membership into increased bargaining power in both sectors that are currently unionized, and sectors that have little or no current unionization.

        Overall, unions must ensure that they do not become a diminished source of power for the workers of Canada. They must do this to continue to provide the economic and human-resource derived quality-of-work characteristics described earlier. Through growing their member base through accessing untapped populations, such as part-time workers, unions can ensure that they maintain the size and breadth necessary to bargain effectively and protect the quality-of work that Canadian workers deserve and demand.

Works Cited

Lowe, Graham S. the Quality of Work: A PEOPLE CENTRED AGENDA. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2000

Jobquality.ca. 2000. Canadian Policy Research Networks. Friday November 21st 2008. []

Taylor, Jeffery. Introduction to Labour Studies: Study Guide. Canada: Athabasca University, 2001