This programming document describes Eurofound’s planned work over the programming period 2021–2024. It sets out the policy and institutional context for the programme, describes the multiannual programme for the four-year period and sets out the work programme for 2021. Eurofound’s priorities for 2021–2024 are shaped by the key challenges for social cohesion and just transitions in a changing environment in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis. The Agency focuses on issues where it can draw on its core expertise in the areas of working conditions, industrial relations, employment and living conditions, to support its stakeholders, by providing evidence that can assist their policy action.
Whatever the benefits of telework – and there are many, including more flexible working time, increased productivity and less commuting – there are drawbacks, as many of the one-third of Europeans who were exclusively working from home during the pandemic will attest. Primary among these is the ‘always on’ culture that telework engenders, encouraging workers to respond to emails, phone calls and texts from work long after the working day or week has ended. This situation may be aggravated if the organisational culture at work incentivises employees to accept heavy workloads and put in overtime, often unpaid. All of which upsets work–life balance, leading to conflicts between work and home life, insufficient rest and health problems like work-related stress and sleep disorders.
An ageing Europe and rising public expenditure on long-term care have signalled for some time that the fundamentals of care provision need to be addressed. However, the shocking death toll in care homes during the COVID-19 pandemic and the fact that many long-term care services were ill-equipped to protect their vulnerable users have lately focused the public mind on the issue. Most people in the EU will need such care for themselves or someone close to them at some stage in their lives. Demand is already escalating, as the rise in the long-term care workforce – by a third in just a decade – testifies. Calls for a European care strategy rightly insist that care users be listened to, but here we highlight others in the system whose needs deserve attention too.
According to the dictionary, an organisation is an organised group of people with a particular purpose. To achieve this purpose, tasks are divided between the members of the group, and the task of some of those people is to manage the others. Interestingly, whereas most tasks are allocated based on competence and qualifications, the allocation of the task of managing people is often based on a different rationale. Many managers are appointed to their role because they exceled at the tasks that are carried out by the people they are supposed to manage. Many business owners take on the management of their staff, regardless of whether this is where their strengths lie. But people management is not easy and requires skills that, contrary to what is often assumed, are not just learned by doing.
As Europe braces for a winter wave of the Coronavirus, behind the public health indicators that rightly dominate the headlines, a revolution in working life is under way. In early spring, millions of people throughout Europe took their work home and tried to rapidly adjust to the new world in which they found themselves. The unfolding changes in working life from this sharp shock look set to be a 'révolution tranquille', where longstanding principles and practices could be fundamentally changed for decades to come. The decisions that are made now will ultimately determine the nature of how this revolution will unfold, and what it will mean for workers and employers alike.
This study provides information allowing for an assessment of the representativeness of the actors involved in the European sectoral social dialogue committee for the human health sector. Their relative representativeness legitimises their right to be consulted, their role and effective participation in the European sectoral social dialogue, and their capacity to negotiate agreements. The aim of Eurofound’s studies on representativeness is to identify the relevant national and European social partner organisations in the field of industrial relations in the EU Member States.
To poročilo ima dva dela. Prvi del vsebuje pregled dejavnosti prestrukturiranja v EU od januarja 2019 do vključno prvih učinkov krize zaradi pandemije bolezni covid-19. Drugi del zajema analizo primerov nadnacionalnih prestrukturiranj, tj. prestrukturiranj, ki vplivajo na delavce v več kot eni državi.
Following a sluggish response by many Member States to introduce or modify gender pay transparency measures, as it recommended in 2014, the European Commission intends to table a proposal for EU-level legislation on pay transparency later in 2020. In this context, a new Eurofound study investigated whether key people at company level see these measures as useful or beneficial. The results show that the richer pay audits are favoured over the simpler pay reports in terms of their perceived usefulness. Both managers and employee representatives agree on this.
Megatrends, such as digitalisation, globalisation, demographic change and climate change, are transforming the world of work, with knock-on effects for working conditions and job quality. Against this background, this report examines working conditions and job quality from a sectoral perspective, using data from the 2015 European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS). The report first outlines the sectoral characteristics underpinning employment – economic structure, demographics, occupational level and employment status.
The gender pay gap in gross hourly earnings in the EU was 14.8% in 2018. To help combat discriminatory pay practices by employers, the European Commission recommended in 2014 the introduction of pay transparency measures in all Member States. But more than half still have not implemented any such measures. Ursula von der Leyen announced in 2019 the Commission’s intention to table measures introducing binding pay transparency measures as part of new anti-discrimination legislation. Where do Member States currently stand on the agenda?
The European Quality of Life Survey (EQLS) is carried out every four to five years since its inception in 2003, with the latest edition in 2016. It examines both the objective circumstances of people's lives and how they feel about those circumstances and their lives in general. It covers issues around employment, income, education, housing, family, health and work–life balance. It also looks at subjective topics, such as people's levels of happiness and life satisfaction, and perceptions of the quality of society.
This series brings together publications and other outputs of the European Jobs Monitor (EJM), which tracks structural change in European labour markets. The EJM analyses shifts in the employment structure in the EU in terms of occupation and sector and gives a qualitative assessment of these shifts using various proxies of job quality – wages, skill-levels, etc.
Eurofound's European Quality of Life Survey (EQLS) examines both the objective circumstances of European citizens' lives and how they feel about those circumstances and their lives in general. This series consists of outputs from the EQLS 2016, the fourth edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 2003.
Eurofound’s European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) paints a wide-ranging picture of Europe at work across countries, occupations, sectors and age groups. This series consists of findings from the EWCS 2015, the sixth edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 1990.
Eurofound’s European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) paints a wide-ranging picture of Europe at work across countries, occupations, sectors and age groups. This series consists of findings from the EWCS 1996, the second edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 1990.
Eurofound’s European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) paints a wide-ranging picture of Europe at work across countries, occupations, sectors and age groups. This series consists of findings from the EWCS 2001, which was an extension of the EWCS 2000 to cover the then 12 acceding and candidate countries. The survey was first carried out in 1990.
Eurofound’s European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) paints a wide-ranging picture of Europe at work across countries, occupations, sectors and age groups. This series consists of findings from the EWCS 2000, the third edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 1990.
Eurofound’s European Company Survey (ECS) maps and analyses company policies and practices which can have an impact on smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, as well as the development of social dialogue in companies. This series consists of outputs from the first edition of the survey carried out in 2004–2005 under the name European Establishment Survey on Working Time and Work-Life Balance.
Eurofound’s European Company Survey (ECS) maps and analyses company policies and practices which can have an impact on smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, as well as the development of social dialogue in companies. This series consists of outputs from the ECS 2009, the second edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 2004–2005 as the European Establishment Survey on Working Time and Work-Life Balance.
Eurofound’s European Company Survey (ECS) maps and analyses company policies and practices which can have an impact on smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, as well as the development of social dialogue in companies. This series consists of outputs from the ECS 2013, the third edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 2004–2005 as the European Establishment Survey on Working Time and Work-Life Balance.
Social dialogue lies at the heart of the EU treaties and governance. Social partners are core stakeholders who can assess policy needs and contribute to policy formation and to designing and implementing national reforms in the social and employment fields. This report focuses on the timely and meaningful involvement of national social partners in the preparation of the new resilience and recovery plans and the national reform programmes (NRPs) that were temporarily integrated under the European Semester in 2021.
As the EU embarks on the transition to a climate-neutral economy, it is crucial to understand the impact of such a transition on production models, employment, work organisation, working conditions, social dialogue and citizens’ lives and living conditions.
This report investigates the practical implementation of the European Works Council (EWC) Directive at company level. It explores the challenges faced by existing EWCs and provides examples of identified solutions and remaining issues from the point of view of both workers and management. The report looks at the way that EWCs meet the requirements of the EWC Directive in terms of establishing processes of information and consultation.
Hospital and civil aviation workers have been severely impacted by COVID-19. While hospitals are on the frontline when it comes to fighting this global pandemic, civil aviation is experiencing the most challenging crisis ever encountered in the sector. This study explores how social dialogue and collective bargaining are playing a role in the way both sectors are adapting to the pandemic. What kind of changes have been introduced, either through social dialogue or collective bargaining? Are the changes temporary or permanent?
The report provides an overview of the scale of teleworking before and during the COVID-19 crisis and gives an indication of ‘teleworkability’ across sectors and occupations. Building on previous Eurofound research on remote work, the report investigates the way businesses introduced and supported teleworking during the pandemic, as well as the experience of workers who were working from home during the crisis. The report also looks at developments in regulations related to telework in Member States and provides a review of stakeholders’ positions.
The COVID-19 pandemic triggered an extraordinary level of provision of social services across the EU. Healthcare and care providers carried much of the burden and, together with essential services, played a crucial role in getting citizens through the crisis. This report explores how public services adapted to the new reality and what role was played by the digital transformation of services. The aim is to contribute to the documentation and analysis of changes in funding, delivery and use of healthcare and social services during the pandemic.
This study provides information allowing for an assessment of the representativeness of the actors involved in the European sectoral social dialogue committee for the civil aviation sector. Their relative representativeness legitimises their right to be consulted, their role and effective participation in the European sectoral social dialogue and their capacity to negotiate agreements.
This study provides information allowing for an assessment of the representativeness of the actors involved in the European sectoral social dialogue committee for the textiles and clothing sector. Their relative representativeness legitimises their right to be consulted, their role and effective participation in the European sectoral social dialogue and their capacity to negotiate agreements. The aim of this Eurofound study on representativeness is to identify the relevant national and European social partner organisations in the textiles and clothing sector in the EU Member States.
There have always been workers who have worked at different locations, on site with customers or while on the move. Companies have also developed open-plan workspaces to cut costs and foster cooperation. Cloud computing allows workers to access internal data from anywhere, while digitalisation increases the use of automated decision-making and control based on (big) data. This report addresses the extent to which place of work determines job quality.
This report focuses on trends and developments in collective bargaining that were evident from the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. It examines potential new strategic approaches and priorities incorporated in negotiation agendas, as well as collective bargaining practices and coordination at sector and company levels in the private sector.
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