Were we to vote on the top 10 books to seal away to help explain 50 years from now how difficult it was at the end of the 20th century to move from bureaucratic to post-bureaucratic work cultures this compact volume would be one of my nominees. Thoughtful and well-researched, its dense pages deconstruct our dilemmas and challenges in a calm and balanced way that buttresses a convincing case made for pragmatic work culture reforms.
David I. Levine believes strongly in our national need to develop high-involvement workplaces, and by the time you and your students have assessed his multi-faceted, though low-keyed argument, you are likely to concur (as do I). His use of an original 1993 field study of the UAW-NUMMI auto plant, with its impressive productivity gains from overdue plant-level reforms, adds much credibility to his advocacy.
Similarly, his unique checklist for telling whether or not you have a high-involvement workplace, while admittedly not a definitive assessment tool, adds much utility to the volume.
Enriched by droll and apt epigrams, the wide-ranging text illuminates such diverse topics as employee involvement options, capital market faults, Japanese labor relations, and teaching frontiers. Sound attention is paid to overdue reforms in federal labor law, in skills certification, in the structuring of the labor market, and in the involvement of the federal government in modern labor-management relations.
Above all, Levine's preoccupation with the classic question - Why is work so rarely organized in a participative fashion? - helps make all the more urgent and persuasive the specific policies he proposes to "improve macroeconomic performance and raise worker productivity and satisfaction."
As interest grows in the likely re-appearance in Congress of the T.E.A.M. Act (vetoed in August'96 by Pres. Clinton), the Levine book, clear in its support of the role of unions in high-involvement workplaces, will become evermore useful. It helps make clear the standards with which we may judge certain Productivity Committees legitimate, and others, malevolent "company unions."
Were a new edition to appear some few years from now, it would be interesting to read Levine's assessment of the possible impact here of the arrival of a virtual workplace, one that turns on its head many of the tenets of the current work culture (it emphasizes ceaseless change, rather than stability, and it dissolves job strictures in favor of flexibility).
Similarly, Levine's views on the now-trendy concept of the "learning corporation" would be appreciated, as would his thoughts about worker sabbaticals, the impact of the Sweeney "New Voice" Leadership on organized labor, and labor's growing employ of long-range forecasting projects.
Nowhere as exciting, flashy, or provocative as competitive volumes, this one makes a solid and lasting contribution. Up to the usual high standards of Brookings publications, it warrants a place on the "must read" list of us all.
Reinventing the Workplace: How Business and Employees Can Both Win. By David I. Levine. Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution, 1995. 220pp. Cloth $36.95. Paper $15.95.
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