Influence of the EU on industrial Democracy in the UK: Industrial democracy is an arrangement which involves workers making decisions, sharing

responsibility and authority in the workplace. In some European countries the structures of Industrial Democracy have been in place for decades but the ideas behind Industrial Democracy do not fit in well with the more aggressive relationship that has existed between managers and unions in British companies. European legislation encourages a much more prominent role for workers in a firms decision making process. The new 'partner based relationships' where unions and management works toward the same goals, exist in British industry because of the present EU influence. Now Unions are perceived as an institution existing to educate management and employees the benefit of involving workers in decision making process. As a result, employee involvement in decision making has become functional, by this means impacting positively on workers performance and enhancing their contribution to the success of the organization. Now works council is made up of representatives of all departments within a firm. The role of works councils is to discuss long term objectives of the business and to suggest strategies for improving the future prospects of the business. There is also an option for Worker Shareholders and Worker Partners, who have a stake in the ownership of the business. Share holdings are often encouraged by the use of share option and saving schemes. These schemes have seen some success in the UK, with some company putting a great deal of emphasis on the importance of as many workers as possible having a stake in the business. Although it is feared that the European Monetary Union will increase wage dumping it is the practice of paying workers less than the standard rate set by the industry. Some German company is already facing trials for such incident.

Methods used to Gain Employee Participation and Involvement in the Decision Making Process in Organisations: There are many different mechanisms for employee involvement in the decision making process in organisations.

Attitude survey is one of the ways of involving employees by seeking their views on matters that concerns them. It can be used to obtain views about processes such as job evaluation, pay determination and performance management in order to assess their effectiveness and the degree to which employees feel they are fair. It can also be used to elicit views about personnel policies and how they operate in such areas as equal opportunity, employee development, and health and safety. Attitude surveys are conducted through structured questionnaires, interview and focus group discussions. Quality circle or Improvement group is another method that can be used to overcome problems which result from the top-down type of management where management ignores the knowledge that exists at the other levels in the organization. Quality circles are small groups of volunteers who are engaged in related work. It provides opportunity to tap the knowledge of employees, who may know more about work problems which might be hidden from managers. Thirdly, Suggestion scheme is a method that provides a valuable means for employees to participate in improving the efficiency of the company. In this process employees have the opportunity to tell management how they perceive the organization is running. Lastly, through Direct Participation individual employees can be involved in decision making processes that affect their everyday work routines.

Impact of Human Resource Management on Employee Relations: Employee involvement in decision making plays an important role in organizations because it affects workers overall performance. On the other hand, the spirit of good attitude towards work by employees can be reduced if employee involvement in decision making is not taken into consideration by management. The discussion on human resource management policies and practices focused on hard and soft versions of human resource management. The hard version of human resource management emphasized on resource and adopted the rational approach to managing employees as any other economic factor.

While the soft version of human resource management involves treating employees as valued assets, a source of competitive advantage through their commitment, adaptability and high quality of skills, performance and so on. In order to identify the specific impact of human resources management on employee relation, we must realize that the human resource of an organization consists of management and employees both. When management allows employees to be involved in decision making on matters which concerns them and the organization, it increases the commitment of employees. In other words such an approach by management wins the commitment of employees towards organizational goals. Thus, if the commitment of employees is won by management through employee involvement in decision making, it increases job satisfaction, motivates employees to work hard and reproaches employees to have good attitude towards work. Job satisfaction, good attitude towards work and employees working hard will ultimately lead to improved employee performance. In turn, improvement in employee performance leads to achievement of major organizational goals at the end of the day.