How to Succeed with Self-Managed Work Teams: An Example of Chevron
Employee participation is a highly motivating factor for employees to complete their jobs successfully. However, when it comes to the reality of implementing employee participation, employers sometimes look over the concerns of their employees. Presently, companies are touting the benefits of various forms of employee participation in management decisions. In the article titled "Succeeding with self-managed work teams" there were several points and examples on how self-managed work teams are formed and operate. The principle behind this article spanned several questions about the operation and success of the idea of self-managed teams. This example from Chevron's Kern River project demonstrates the benefits of maximizing human resources mixed with technology and other resources.
Chevron initially formed this type of a team in order to foster teamwork, increase the involvement of their employees, and cultivate the empowerment of their workers. In order to accomplish this task, team members must possess several skills. The perfect mix of technical skills, flexibility and cooperation makes a team. The success of these types of work teams such as in the case of Chevron depends on the performance of what they accomplish throughout their task. Self-managed work teams helped cultivate the success of some of the largest companies in corporate America today by improving the level of turnover and absenteeism. By streamlining job classifications and improving the relationships with unions these self-managed work teams were more than an improvement, they were a revolution.
Initially Chevron experimented on the idea of these self-managed work teams to improve the cooperation between teams but also to utilize their resources in the most efficient manner. "The small asset team structure ownership at the micro level instead of at the macro level, resulting in duplication of work processes and poor utilization of resources." According to the article, at the level where there are
Chevron initially formed this type of a team in order to foster teamwork, increase the involvement of their employees, and cultivate the empowerment of their workers. In order to accomplish this task, team members must possess several skills. The perfect mix of technical skills, flexibility and cooperation makes a team. The success of these types of work teams such as in the case of Chevron depends on the performance of what they accomplish throughout their task. Self-managed work teams helped cultivate the success of some of the largest companies in corporate America today by improving the level of turnover and absenteeism. By streamlining job classifications and improving the relationships with unions these self-managed work teams were more than an improvement, they were a revolution.
Initially Chevron experimented on the idea of these self-managed work teams to improve the cooperation between teams but also to utilize their resources in the most efficient manner. "The small asset team structure ownership at the micro level instead of at the macro level, resulting in duplication of work processes and poor utilization of resources." According to the article, at the level where there are