College and Research Libraries CHRISTIAN M. BOISSONNAS Employee Suggestions: Alternative Course of Action for Libraries Libraries willing to deal formally with employee suggestions are faced with several options. This paper examines these options and discusses in detail the pros and cons of formal suggestion systems. While they seem like the most realistic way of dealing with the prob- lem, they have great potential disadvantages, among which are high cos.t, high mortality rate, and low participation rate. SoME LIBRARIANs, ESPECIALLY TIIOSE OF JUNIOR RANKS in large institutions, ex- press feelings of frustration because they believe that their suggestions are not given a fair hearing by their super- visors. This paper examines the alterna- tive courses of action which are avail- able to a library willing to deal with this problem. How to deal with employee sugges- tions is a popular topic in the personnel management literature. The traditional approach has been to develop a sugges- tion system. Over sixty of these systems, as well as a number of general articles, were examined for this study, and not one has indicated that a suggestion sys- tem has been-or should be-instituted solely to alleviate a morale problem. Al- though the objectives mentioned most frequently were improvement in pro- duction methods and employee rela- tions, elevation of employee morale was consistently presented as a secondary goal. 1 An unfortunate problem with these studies is that, despite their quantity, most distinctly lack quality. In fact, only four could be considered scholarly. Christian M. Boissonnas is associate li- brarian, Cornell University Libraries. Two of the four were conducted in Sweden by Ekvall.2 He attempted to de- termine the psychological components of suggestors in a manufacturing indus- try which has few characteristics in common with a library. In addition, be- cause of cultural differences, it is ques- tionable whether Ekvall's findings could be applied in an American setting. The third study, carried out in Great Britain by Gor£n, is subject to the same reservation.3 He concluded that a sug- gestion system could be both an econom- ic transaction or a contribution to mo- rale depending on who was looking at it, and that for a system to be success- ful, management had to determine be- forehand the type of participation it was seeking and then set up a reward system which would meet the employees' expectations. The fourth study, by Har- din, identified the characteristics of par- ticipants in the suggestion plan of a medium-sized casualty insurance compa- ny in the United States.4 All four studies dealt with suggestors within the framework of formal sys- tems. No research dealing with employ- ee suggestions in general could be found. Strauss and Sayles mention con- sultative committees to improve com- munications between management and the lower levels of the organization as I 109 110 I College & Research Libraries • March 1974 an alternative to a suggestion system. 5 Employees and supervisors participate by electing representatives who meet with management to discuss problems, suggestions, or complaints raised by their constituents. A collective bargain- ing relationship is an example of a vari- ant of the consultative committee mod- el. Because of the possibility that collec- tive bargaining may someday become a reality at many universities, the creation of such a committee cannot be support- ed or encouraged without risking an un- fair labor practice charge. If proved, it would require at the very least a per- manent prohibition against dealing with such committees. While strictly speaking they are not true suggestion systems, con- sultative committees do provide a formal means of handling suggestions. In addi- tion to the potential legal problem, Strauss and Sayles find that their effec- tiveness may be decreased in the follow- ing ways: by lack of communication be- tween the committee members and the rank and file; by impairing the morale of middle-level managers who are by- passed; by operating in a hostile labor- management relations environment; and finally by failing to provide incentives for individuals to submit suggestions. The problem of employee suggestions is essentially one of communication. One way to deal with it is to make a spe- cial effort to train managers and super- visors to encourage their staff to make suggestions and to instruct them on how to deal with those suggestions properly once they are submitted. This approach, which places the responsibility for elic- iting suggestions clearly on the super- visor, is preferable to any other since it minimizes the need for interference from the top administrative officers in departmental affairs. Unfortunately, un- less the supervisors possess uniformly high managerial qualities and recognize the need to deal with employee sugges- tions very seriously and carefully, situa- tions will arise in which employees feel that they are not being given a fair hearing. In any large organization, it is unrealistic to assume that this would not happen, no matter how well trained the supervisors were. The only realistic alternative to train- ing supervisors to deal with suggestions seems to be a formal suggestion system. The volume of literature devoted to this subject is understandable in light of the statistics published annually by the National Association of Suggestion Systems. The 1969 Annual Statistical Report includes the following data: In 229 member companies, roughly three million suggestions were submitted through formal systems, and 43 million dollars were paid in awards. These com- panies include over 7.5 million eligible workers out of a total labor force of over 8.5 million. 6 While not everyone agrees that suggestion systems are inher- ently good, the magnitude of these fig- ures makes it impossible to reject them outright. If that many employees are covered and that much money is paid in awards annually, these systems must be worth investigating. There are probably as many different suggestion plans as there are organiza- tions using them. They vary with respect to details such as who should be covered, how large the awards should be, who should review suggestions, and so on. There is, however, a basic model after which most plans are patterned: Eligi- ble employees who wish to submit sug- gestions obtain forms at various loca- tions in their company, fill them out, and deposit them in the nearest sugges- tion box or send them to the secretary of the suggestion committee. Supervi- sors usually are not eligible for awards under a suggestion plan since coming up with new ideas is part of their job. Managers and executives are almost al- ways ineligible. Suggestions are reviewed which may result in an economic saving in some operation, higher morale, better working conditions, better service, re- duction in cost, or improvement in safe- ---------- --------------------------------------------------------------~ ty. They are reviewed by a suggestion committee whose composition and name vary from company to company. Most often it includes only managers and ex- ecutives and, on occasion, supervisors. The committee evaluates the suggestions and determines the award which should be given. Large companies frequently employ an investigator to perform these functions. A wards are primarily financial. In fact, no example of a company which did not offer financial awards could be found. They differ mostly in the way in which a wards are presented: by the win- ner's supervisor or the plant superin- tendent; privately or in formal ceremo- nies. In most plants, awards for sugges- tions resulting in measurable savings are computed as a percentage of the first year's saving, minus the cost of imple- menting the suggestion. This percentage is commonly 10 percent, but goes as high as 25 percent. Many sug.gestions do not result in measurable financial savings and are usually rewarded according to a fixed schedule, with the amount of the award varying with the importance of the suggestion. A suggestion system such as the one described above seems well suited to help solve internal communication problems. Employees make suggestions and receive awards for those which are accepted. The potential availability of a reward acts as an incentive for sub- mitting more suggestions. Yet according to Northrup, the mortality rate of such plans is very high. He estimated twenty years ago that a majority of .the plans started in the previous twenty years had been abandoned. 7 No recent figures are available which show that this phenome- non is still true, but the wealth of arti- cles on ''how to design a suggestion sys- tem" seems to indicate that the secret of the perfect plan has not yet been dis- covered. Suggestion plans fail for a variety of reasons. Those most commonly cited are that top management tends not to give Employee Suggestions I 111 enough support to the plan, rewards are generally too low when compared to the benefits reaped by the organization, the processing time is too long, and the plan itself is insufficiently and inconsistently promoted.8 Northrup suggests additional reasons which are of critical importance if the improvement of employee morale is one of the main reasons for starting the plan. 9 First, a suggestion system which is started in an atmosphere of poor per- sonnel relations or in a company where there is no carefully thought-out per- sonnel plan stands little chance of being successful. Second, it creates problems at the managerial level of the organiza- tion. Running it takes time, savings may be minimal, and support from supervi- sors hard to get. Third, by creating channels of communications which can effectively bypass supervisors, the plan may cause dissatisfaction at that level and may even encourage poor supervi- sion. Companies have tried ways to prevent the last point from becoming a prob- lem. General Motors tries to keep super- visors interested in the plan by having them investigate suggestions; United Specialties gives foremen a flat 10 per- cent of the awards paid to suggestors from their departments; Ford has a sep- arate plan for supervisors.10 Finally, one problem of suggestion plans which does not necessarily cause their failure, but which must be consid- ered, is the low level of participation. The National Association of Suggestion Systems Annual Statistical Report,. re- ferred to earlier, gives a participation rate of 27 percent. Northrup in 1952 considered 25 percent participation an excellent rate. 11 While there is no evi- dence to suggest that there is a high cor- relation between morale and participa- tion, this factor should be kept in mind before establishing a suggestion plan. There is then no evidence to support the notion that suggestion systems are a good way to improve employee morale 112 I College & Research Libraries • March 1974 and communication. Nor is there evi- dence that shows that they do not help. There are a great many reports which show substantial cost savings, but no one has yet found a way to quantify chan- ges in employee morale. From a purely economic standpoint, it seems that a successful suggestion sys- tem can be a great asset. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company did a care- ful study between 1960 and 1965 of the savings effected each year as a result of its suggestion plan and arrived at the figure of $881,608 over that five-year period.12 Westinghouse in 1957 estimat- ed that its plan was responsible for sav- ings of almost $1.5 million, Socony Mo- bil calculated that its plan brought in an 800 percent return on its investment, and in a sample of sixty-five companies the Dartnell Corporation found a sav- ings-to-program-cost ratio varying be- tween 2.7 and 5.1 to 1, or an average saving of $3.88 for each dollar spent.13 In these various reports the cost of an individual suggestion was shown as vary- ing between $25 and $50. Given this admittedly confusing pic- ture, what should be done? The consul- tative committee approach has potential- ly disagreeable legal repercussions and it may aggravate the communication problem rather than solve it. Upgrading the knowledge of supervisors so that they will deal more effectively with em- ployees who submit suggestions is al- ways desirable. The problem with that approach is that it is never completely effective, and the work put into it must be continued on a permanent basis if the improvements are to be sustained. It is unlikely that a suggestion plan de- veloped simply to resolve a communica- tion or morale problem would be eco- nomically justifiable. Suggestion plans for libraries must reflect the fact that libraries are funda- mentally different from businesses. While businesses are profit-oriented, li- braries are user-oriented. In business, the value of a suggestion can be mea- sured by its impact on the company profits; in libraries, the benefit is much more difficult to ascertain. The cost and benefits of monetary incentives can therefore not be readily determined. It is possible, however, that library employ- ees could make suggestions leading to increased user satisfaction, which would justify the formation of a suggestion plan even though its economic value might be doubtful. The structure of such a plan need not be as elaborate as that of a large corporation. It could be as simple as creating a specific place in which sugges- tions could be deposited, with regularly- scheduled meetings of a review commit- tee. A wards might include recognition in the form of publication of the sug- gestion in the library's newsletter or an- nouncements at an annual luncheon. Anyone whose suggestion was accepted could have that fact entered in his per- sonnel record, which might lead him to receive preferential treatment when time came for promotion. Since it is un- likely that employees lacking initiative would be making suggestions in the first place, the possibility of promotion, in addition to recognition by co-workers and supervisors, might be a powerful enough incentive to motivate those in- terested in participating. Although such a plan would be rela- tively informal, if its implementation were carried out with seriousness and consistency its benefits might be worth- while for both the library and its em- ployees. REFERENCES 1. Herbert R. Northrup, Suggestion Systems (National Industrial Conference Board, Studies in Personnel Policy, no. 135 [New York: 1953] ), p.6; George Strauss and Leonard R. Sayles, Personnel: The Human Problems of Management (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1960), p.665. 2. GOran Ekvall, Industrial Suggestion Schemes: Studies Concerning Their Psy- chological Backg1'0und (Stockholm: Swe- dish Council for Personnel Adminish·ation, 1967), 68p.; and Creativity at the Place of Work; A Study of Suggestors and Sugges- tions Systems in the Swedish Mechanical Industry (Stockholm: Swedish Council for Personnel Administration, 1971), 219p. 3. C. C. Godin, "The Suggestion Scheme: A Contribution to Morale or an Economic Transaction?" British Journal of Industrial Relations 7:368-84 (Nov. 1969). 4. Einar Hardin, "Characteristics of Partici- pants in an Employee Suggestion Plan," Personnel Psychology 17:289-303 (Au- tumn 1964). 5. Strauss and Sayles, Personnel, p.667-70. Employee Suggestions I 113 6. National Association of Suggestion Systems, Annual Statistical Report for the Year 1969 (Chicago: 1970), p.5. 7. Northrup, Suggest·ion Systems, p.7. 8. William S. Wilcox, "Can Suggestion Sys- tems Pay for Themselves?" Management Record 14:85-87 ( March 1952). 9. Northrup, Suggestion Systems, p.48-52. 10. Ibid., p.26-35. 11. Ibid., p.41. 12. Joseph A. Montana, "Managing an Effec- tive Suggestion System," Administrative Management 17:3843 (Oct. 1966). 13. J. Roger O'Meara, "How to Keep the Sug- gestion Plan Successful," Management Rec- ord 2:42 (Feb. 1959); Cecil T. Young, "Suggestion Systems: Boon or Bane?" Per- sonnel Journal 42:131 (March 1963); Dartnell Corporation, Successful Sugges- tion Systems-The Two-Way Payoff (Chi- cago: 1969?), p.5. /