The working environment in small firms: Responses from owner-managers

Limited research has been conducted on owner-managers’ responses to the working environment (occupational health and safety). This should be understood in the light of the way owner-managers develop identity from their business, and a better understanding is needed to develop preventive programmes that fit the owner-managers’ interpretation of the working environment. Qualitative interviews were carried out with the owner-managers or the managers responsible for the working environment in 23 small firms from the construction and metal industries. The interviews were analysed for attitudes on the working environment, understanding of risk, responsibility for the working environment, and attitudes towards regulation. The analysis revealed both a great heterogeneity of views on the working environment and groups of owners who share important characteristics. Most owner-managers take a positive approach to the working environment, but also try to ‘talk risk down’, criticize regulation as bureaucracy and push a part of the employer responsibility on to the employees. They try to follow what they experience as a generally acceptable standard for the working environment among the stakeholders in the sector, but some owner-managers also tend to neglect the working environment. The reason for the down grading of risk and the push to share responsibility can be found in the close social relationships and the identity work processes of the owner-managers with their business. They try to act as decent people and thus avoid personal guilt and blame if employees should get injured.

[1]  Simon Down,et al.  Narratives of Enterprise: Crafting Entrepreneurial Self-Identity in a Small Firm , 2006 .

[2]  L. C. Schaller,et al.  Impact of Hazardous Substances Regulations on Small Firms in Delaware and New Jersey , 1998 .

[3]  Graham Beaver.  Small firms: owners and entrepreneurs , 2003 .

[4]  Paul D. Reynolds,et al.  Sociology and Entrepreneurship: Concepts and Contributions , 1992 .

[5]  Sudhir Gupta,et al.  Case Studies , 2013, Journal of Clinical Immunology.

[6]  Petra N. Fonteyn,et al.  Small Business Owners' Knowledge of Their Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Legislative Responsibilities. , 1997, International journal of occupational safety and ergonomics : JOSE.

[7]  R. Fairman,et al.  Enforced Self-Regulation, Prescription, and Conceptions of Compliance within Small Businesses: The Impact of Enforcement* , 2005 .

[8]  Brian Elliott,et al.  The Real World of the Small Business Owner , 1981 .

[9]  J. Eakin,et al.  Leaving it up to the Workers: Sociological Perspective on the Management of Health and Safety in Small Workplaces , 1992, International journal of health services : planning, administration, evaluation.

[10]  Carol Atkinson.  An exploration of small firm psychological contracts , 2008 .

[11]  Peter Hasle,et al.  The Role of Agreements Between Labour Unions and Employers in the Regulation of the Work Environment , 2004 .

[12]  Scott Taylor,et al.  Beyond the Boundaries , 2004 .

[13]  Felicity Lamm,et al.  Small businesses and OH&S advisors , 1997 .

[14]  Graham Beaver,et al.  Management and the small firm , 2003 .

[15]  Philip James,et al.  Influences on Small-Firm Compliance-Related Behaviour: The Case of Workplace Health and Safety , 2006 .

[16]  S. Marlow,et al.  Minding the gap between employers and employees: The challenge for owner‐managers of smaller manufacturing firms , 2002 .

[17]  Peter Hasle,et al.  Small Enterprise Owners' Accident Causation Attribution and Prevention , 2009 .

[18]  J. Eakin,et al.  Health and the Social Relations of Work: A Study of the Health‐related Experiences of Employees in Small Workplaces , 1998 .

[19]  Robert Goffee,et al.  Understanding family businesses: issues for further research , 1996 .

[20]  O. Jones.  Understanding the small business sector , 2007 .

[21]  Danièle Champoux,et al.  Occupational health and safety management in small size enterprises: an overview of the situation and avenues for intervention and research , 2003 .

[22]  T. Watson,et al.  Entrepreneurial Action, Identity Work and the Use of Multiple Discursive Resources , 2009 .

[23]  P. Blau.  Exchange and Power in Social Life , 1964 .

[24]  G. Burgess,et al.  Compliance with the manual handling regulations amongst a random selection of small businesses in England. , 2002, The Annals of occupational hygiene.

[25]  S. Kvale.  Interviews : an introduction to qualitative research interviewing , 1996 .

[26]  John F. Dalphin,et al.  The Entrepreneurial Middle Class , 1982 .

[27]  Harry Matlay,et al.  Employee relations in small firms , 1999 .

[28]  M. Huuskonen,et al.  Health and Safety in Small Enterprises: European Strategies for Managing Improvement , 2002 .

[29]  D. Storey,et al.  Uncertainty, innovation and management , 1996 .

[30]  S. Marlow.  Regulating labour management in small firms , 2002 .

[31]  J. Solterer.  The Entrepreneur in Economic Theory , 1950 .

[32]  D. Storey.  Optimism and chance: The elephants in the entrepreneurship room , 2011 .

[33]  Paul Edwards,et al.  When and why is small beautiful? The experience of work in the small firm , 2007 .

[34]  Peter Hasle,et al.  Owner Attitudes and Self Reported Behavior Towards Modified Work After Occupational Injury Absence in Small Enterprises: A Qualitative Study , 2007, Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation.

[35]  K. Weick.  Making Sense of the Organization , 2000 .

[36]  Mats Alvesson,et al.  Managing Managerial Identities: Organizational Fragmentation, Discourse and Identity Struggle , 2003 .

[37]  Philip James,et al.  UNDERSTANDING SMALL FIRM RESPONSES TO REGULATION: , 2005 .

[38]  Per Langaa Jensen,et al.  Assessing Assessment: The Danish Experience of Worker Participation in Risk Assessment , 2002 .

[39]  P. Hasle,et al.  A review of the literature on preventive occupational health and safety activities in small enterprises. , 2006, Industrial health.